Big Tobacco spent more than $11.5 billion in the U.S. in 2005 on advertising, discounts, and promotional efforts at retail sales outlets like convenience stores.
Convenience stores are visited weekly by 75% of adolescents.
Research has shownretail marketing is more powerful than peer pressure.
Retail marketing has double the effect on children than it has on adults.
The advertisements most likely to be seen, to be liked, and to be viewed as making smoking more appealing are for the brands most commonly smoked by adolescents.
I support the elimination of tobacco company marketing and promotions in retail outlets as a way to decrease the attractiveness of smoking to our young people and protect them from the harmful and often fatal effects of tobacco use.
