Premium Cigarette Brands are a small percentage of the market that have higher retail prices but are able to attract and sustain a loyal customer base due to their marketing strategies, which include brand image building, advertising slogans and sponsorship of sporting events. The cache that cigarette brands have built up over decades of branded marketing is likely to persist in a post-plain packaging environment.Discover

Eighty-eight daily cigarette smokers were exposed to two identical cigarettes, smoked within a short timeframe from packs that appeared to contain either a premium/mainstream or value brand variant name. They ranked descriptors in four classes of brand features (prestige, connotation, taste and color) on perceived harm, attractiveness and appeal, with ratings being adjusted for demographic differences.

Indulge in Luxury: Discovering Premium Cigarette Brands

As hypothesized, ignoring the apparent brand name given to the cigarette, participants rated a cigarette more favorably when it was presented as a premium compared with the unknown. However, when more specific sensory qualities (flavor, satisfaction, enjoyment, quality, mouthfeel, and liking) were rated, there was no effect of brand variant name. Dryness and staleness were also unaffected by the presence or absence of a brand variant name, but harshness was negatively influenced.

Despite the fact that a significant portion of cigarette production is now done on an industrial scale, tobacco manufacturers are still finding ways to differentiate their products in order to keep sales up, even after smoking restriction laws have led to lower demand for traditional cigarettes. Brand name is one of the few remaining attributes that can be used by cigarette manufacturers to differentiate their product, but it has been found that it does not have the same impact on consumers as the advertising campaigns that once made it famous.

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