This photo from 1988 shows a billboard along Colfax Avenue for the tobacco brand Newport that reads, “Alive with pleasure!” This type of advertising seems like a silly part of the past, but it wasn’t that long ago that tobacco companies were making outlandish claims about their products to make them appealing to consumers.
If you want to dive deeper, John Daley at CPR has a great article on how the tobacco industry made it cool to smoke in Colorado’s communities of color. It includes a bonkers statistic about how companies targeted Black neighborhoods with advertisements for menthol cigarettes that eventually increased the percentage of Black smokers from less than 10% to more than 85%.
- 🚬 Related: Mayoral candidate Kelly Brough says she would support the flavored tobacco ban passed by City Council in 2021. Candidate Mike Johnston says he’s open to the idea. [Denverite]
