? Smokefree Campaign Timeline
Advertising has proved to be a highly powerful trigger in helping smokers decide to quit for good. The Department of Health has created innovative and hugely successful campaigns over the years – and you can explore them at a glance with this interactive timeline.
You can click on the years and scroll through to find a campaign. Moving your mouse over a campaign will give you a brief description, and you can click through to find out more information, including the campaign strategy, media used and campaign evaluation.
2013
'Mutation' health harms
28 Dec 2012 to 31 Mar 2013
On 28 December 2012, the Department of Health launched a campaign reminding smokers about the physical damage caused by smoking. The campaign dramatised the harms of smoking by making the invisible visible, showing a tumour growing from a cigarette.
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2012
Stoptober
08 Sep 2012 to 28 Oct 2012
The strategy Stoptober encouraged people all across the country to stop smoking together on the 1 October for 28 days (and beyond). Evidence shows that if a smoker can quit for 28 days they are five times more likely to stay smokefree. By joining Stoptober, quitters were able to get support and motivation throughout the 28 days. A key part of the campaign's strategy was to amplify the campaign messages through p...
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Smokefree homes and cars
31 Mar 2012 to 04 Jun 2012
On 31 March 2012, the Department of Health launched a campaign reminding smokers about the dangers of secondhand smoke to their children and families. The adverts dramatised the fact that over 80% of secondhand smoke is invisible and odourless, making it impossible to control. So, even if you smoke near an open window or door, the smoke can travel and harm others.
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Right Tools for the Job
01 Jan 2012 to 31 Mar 2012
In January 2012, the ’Right Tools for the Job’ campaign was re-launched to promote the new improved Quit Kit, by encouraging smokers to pick up a Quit Kit from their nearest participating pharmacy. ‘Right tools for the job’ was an award-winning campaign that first ran in 2010 and focused on the idea that whatever you're trying to achieve, it's much easier when you have the right tools.
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2011
Smokefree Generation
01 Nov 2011 to 04 Dec 2011
In November 2011, the ‘Smokefree Generation’ campaign was re-launched to motivate smokers to stop smoking and encourage them to order a Quit Kit. Smokers were asked to text their details or visit the Smokefree website to receive a Quit Kit. The campaign was first run in autumn 2009, and featured real children – not actors – making stop smoking appeals to their parents, showing smoking as the ‘enemy of the family’.
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2010
I'd Do Anything
2009 to 2010
Key research had shown that quitting for loved ones was the most motivating factor for a large majority of smokers, rating even above health. Inspired by these findings, the “I’d Do Anything” campaign created a message and vehicle that would resonate with smokers – particularly parents of young children.
Right Tools for the Job
2009 to 2010
The "Right Tools for the Job" was an award-winning campaign that focused on the idea that whatever you're trying to achieve, it's much easier when you have the right tools, and launched the Quit Kit as the right tool to help smokers quit. Targeting smokers who’d already decided to quit, but preferred to do it without NHS support, it pointed them in the direction of the new “Quit Kit” from the NHS.
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2009
Smokefree United
2009
The “Smokefree United” campaign was a virtual club of quitters, supported by football legends including John Barnes, Gianfranco Zola and Ian Wright, as well as the Premier League. It provided coaching and support to help football fans and players stop smoking. The campaign ran on radio as a partnership with talkSPORT, and through press advertising, PR, outdoor media, face-to-face activity and online. It was supported by partnerships with the Premier League and a range of football clubs in the North West.
Pregnancy
2009
Every cigarette harms an unborn child. This shocking fact was highlighted by this campaign designed to target pregnant women, their partners and midwives. Through a series of radio ads, posters and a midwives’ toolkit, the advertising revealed how smoking distressed the unborn baby by putting greater demands on its heart.
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Scared and Worried
2009
The Scared and Worried campaigns were part of the smoking as the ‘enemy of the family’ strategy and aimed to reinforce motivation for smokers to quit. The campaigns looked at smoking from the perspective of a concerned son or daughter. The ads showed children openly dismissing things that would normally be perceived as scary or worrying. What they actually viewed as scary or worrying was their parent’s smoking.
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Smokefree Generation
2009
“Smokefree Generation” was a multi-award-winning campaign that featured children making real stop smoking appeals to their parents, which took a similar approach to ‘Scared’, ‘Worried’ and ‘Wanna be like you’ in showing smoking as the ‘enemy of the family’. Real kids – not actors – were asked a simple question: 'If you could give your parents a message about stopping smoking, what would it be?'
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One Way Street to Success
2009
This TV ad was targeted at people who’d already decided to stop smoking, or were thinking about stopping, but weren’t quite sure how to go about it. The campaign was created to encourage people to take an 'easier route' to smokefree success with NHS support, rather than choosing the 'difficult' route of quitting alone.
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2008
Getting off cigarettes
2008
This campaign was designed to increase awareness of the help available to smokers from the NHS, and to encourage smokers to consider using NHS support when quitting. The TV ads feature cigarettes the size of multi-storey buildings with people stranded on top of them. At first they look stuck. But they then use their mobile phones to call the NHS smoking helpline. Cranes and fire ladders then arrive to help the smokers get off – a metaphor for local NHS Stop Smoking Services.
Wanna be like you
2008
This campaign, the first of several campaigns featuring smoking as the ‘enemy of the family’, effectively showed parents how their smoking could influence their child to smoke later in life. The ads featured a number of children copying exactly what their parents do, including mimicking them smoking. In the TV ad, the classic Jungle Book song “I wanna be like you” was used to emphasise the message. The overarching concept was successfully extended to other media too, from press to ambient (e.g. in playgroups), online and advertorials.
Reasons
2008
A lead generation campaign showing smoking as the ‘enemy of the family’, the “Reasons” campaign had a dual purpose: to motivate parents to quit smoking and give them the means to do it. Combining a mix of TV and online advertising, creative featured parents talking about their reasons for giving up. It showed that by being healthy and happy in the future, you’re able to enjoy family life more. This message was supported by details of the NHS Smoking Helpline and website, giving parents the opportunity to do something about their smoking straight away.
2007
Invisible killer
2007
The “Invisible killer” campaign was created to increase awareness of the hidden dangers of second-hand smoke – in particular the revelation that 85% of it is invisible and odourless. The press ads focused on this statistic with headlines: “There’s no smoke without more smoke”; and “The more you see the more you don’t”. While the TV ad showed a typical wedding with everyone – young and old – breathing in the toxic, invisible smoke.
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Hooked
2007
This campaign took a totally different approach to previous campaigns by focusing on the power of smoking addiction. Shocking images of people literally impaled on fish hooks, showed how an addiction is serious and irrational, making people do things that they don't necessarily want to do. The campaign was featured on TV, billboards and other outdoor media as well as in the press.
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Countdown
2007
On 1 July 2007, a new piece of legislation came into force, banning smoking in public places. An integrated campaign was devised to help ensure everybody understood what this legislation meant for them. The “Countdown” campaign was devised to clearly explain ‘what, how, when and where’ – ensuring everybody affected by the new law knew how it would affect them.
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2006
The Big Quit
2006
A departure from previous TV campaigns, “The Big Quit” was a nationwide stop smoking campaign anchored in radio. By targeting smokers up and down the country via their local radio stations – The Big Quit offered all the support, advice and local backup smokers needed to quit. Websites, podcasts, and motivational emails and texts extended the campaign beyond radio, while radio ‘street teams’ visited town centres to encourage people to swap their cigarettes for sugar-free lollipops and the chance to enter a ‘smoking amnesty’ prize draw.
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2005
Secondhand smoke is a killer
2005
With the hugely successful “If you smoke, I smoke” campaign in 2003, the dangers of smoking around children had become well established. However, with this campaign the Department of Health had a harder job to do – to tackle the subject of smoking around others in general.
2004
Give up before you clog up
2004
Working with the British Heart Foundation (BHF), this award-winning campaign targeted smokers who had proved particularly resistant to previous efforts to quit with uncompromising images based on what smoking can do to arteries. Utilising the similarity in shape between cigarettes and arteries, the ad graphically portrays the build up of fatty deposits caused by smoking – directly linking cigarettes with the damage they cause to arteries.
Emotional Consequences
2004
This campaign gave smokers a number of reasons to quit through a series of frank testimonials. Featuring real people talking about the real and terrible effects of smoking on their lives, these testimonials confronted smokers with their potential future in an empathetic, way. The multi-media campaign ran on TV, radio and outdoor sites, as well as in the press.
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2003
Death Repackaged
2003
Recognising the power of charity voices to engage with smokers, the Department of Health partnered with Cancer Research UK for the “Death Repackaged” campaign. It was created to highlight the hidden dangers of smoking, particularly the perception that ‘light and mild’ cigarettes are less dangerous. Featuring a range of dangerous animals with cuddly names, the hard-hitting ads exposed how smokers have been misled by terms such as ‘Low Tar’ and ‘Light’. This was also the Department Of Health’s first integrated anti-smoking campaign, including TV, radio, outdoor and press advertising.
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If you smoke, I smoke
07 Jul 2003 to 31 Aug 2003
“If you smoke, I smoke” was launched to highlight the health risks to children from second-hand smoke. By showing images of small children ‘naturally’ exhaling cigarette smoke, the campaign confronted smokers in a challenging and emotional way. The campaign message ‘If you smoke, I smoke’ was depicted in a child’s handwriting, increasing the impact.
1995
Quitline
1992 to 1995
A Health Education Authority for England (HEA) campaign. Actor, comedian and ex-smoker John Cleese brings his talents to this series of amusing TV ads designed to persuade smokers to quit. Scenes show John trying to quit smoking, do his best not to relapse, and imparting information about the effects of smoking on the smoker and those around them, particularly the effects on children.
1985
Smoker of the Future
1985
The “Smoker of the Future” campaign was designed to convince smokers to quit by highlighting smoking’s harmful effects through a nightmarish vision of the first ‘natural born smoker’.
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