Healthcare Marketing Impact Awards - 2024

Campaign: Big Tobacco’s "Fantasyland"
Agency/Firm: Duncan Channon
Client: California Tobacco Prevention Program

“Vaping won’t lead to smoking, if you ignore the research that says otherwise.”

So goes one of the snarky one-liners that underpins a spot from the California Tobacco Prevention Program and agency Duncan Channon, which took aim at Big Tobacco with a campaign that encapsulates the industry’s delusional marketing while turning it on its head. The effort, dubbed “Big Tobacco’s ‘Fantasyland’,” is the gold winner of Integrated Campaign of the Year in the advocacy category.

The CTPP wanted to highlight how the tobacco industry often doles out false promises to capture consumers, so it created ads exposing both sides of the lie. With out-of-home placements delivering quips such as, “Vaping is anti-aging, because you’re more likely to die younger from a stroke,” the message to audiences was clear: Don’t believe Big Tobacco’s hype.

“Fantasyland” ads dotted the airwaves, appeared in heavily trafficked physical locations around California and made a large presence on social media given vaping’s prevalence amongst younger consumers. The CTPP also ran longform ads in more than 30 Black-owned publications to educate audiences who are more at risk of health disparities in part because of the tobacco industry’s impact. In all, “Fantasyland” garnered nearly half a billion impressions and drove nearly 3 million visits to its landing page, according to the agency.