Need a light?

I just read about how Freedom cigarettes is paying celebrities to smoke their cancer sticks. These celebs get to go to any local bar, smoke their free butts, and then get paid!! How is this possible. Ok, ok, let me try not to get carried away with ethical jargon, this could be a good idea. I guess if the logo was printed on the side of the cigarette and the celebrity was viciously chain smoking trying to do their job. I don’t think that most cigs are very notable without serious scrutiny, I could be wrong, I am not an avid smoker. I know that Marlboros are all white and the Camels have the brown filters. If the celebrity made a show of pulling out the box of Freedoms when ever getting another and then waited for someone to offer them a light, this could be a viable form of Guerilla marketing.

Ethically, this is a little disgusting. I think that the celebrity should be fined and the company sued. But it does raise notice to a new trend in Guerilla Marketing, real life product placement.

This new trend pays people to go out and chat up certain products. They don’t have to just be a town wailer and scream about their products all the time. In normal conversations they are supposed to bring up their product and push it on the unsuspecting men and women. This is very interesting and though it might be worse than the free cigs in the long run, I feel that it does have potential and is still growing.