Anti-smoking campaign targets parents

The Department of Health is targeting parents in its latest anti-smoking ads. The £8m campaign will highlight that children are likely to copy their parents and take up the habit.

The ad, which launched last weekend, uses the song “I wanna be like you” from the Disney film The Jungle Book and shows children copying their parents carrying out everyday tasks but it ends with a little girl using a crayon to mimic her mother smoking. It has the strapline “Smoking. Don’t keep it in the family.”

The campaign, which has been created by Miles Calcraft Briginshaw Duffy, will be supported by press ads and posters showing crayons resting in ashtrays and pictures drawn by children of their parents smoking. It will also include radio ads, advertorials and partnership marketing.

The strategy is to target parents when they are likely to be with their children, to emphasise the message.

The second part of the campaign, which has been created by Partners Andrew Aldridge, is a direct response ad for NHS stop smoking services, which will include TV, press, door drops and press inserts carrying information about the services. The agency has also produced an “IOU” voucher book for family members to help them get loved ones to quit.

An interactive TV platform, created by Weapon 7, shows a video of ex-smokers talking about their experiences of giving up and lets viewers find out information about their nearest Stop Smoking Service. Carlson Marketing will be holding events to recruit quitters for the campaign in July and August.

Both campaigns will be supported by online activity by Agency Republic. Communications planning was carried out for the DoH by Mediaedge:CIA.