Tobacco Scam: Smokefree Restaurants: Target Restaurants

How does Big Tobacco manipulate the hospitality industry into protecting Big Tobacco's profits?

1. Falsely claims smokefree measures will ruin restaurants and bars.

2. Highjacks national and state hospitality groups as propaganda vehicles.

3. Lures owners into buying expensive "accommodation" ventilation systems.

4. Uses groups and owners as fronts to block cost-free smokefree measures.

Big Tobacco cynically targets hospitality...

Philip Morris was the first tobacco company to use an "accommodation program" to recruit restaurants, bars and recreation centers to protect its own massive profits.

The Accommodation Program serves as link between PM and the hospitality industry. Our ability to interact effectively with the hospitality industry is critical to our ultimate objective, which is to maintain the ability for our consumers to enjoy our products in public venues such as restaurants, hotels, bowling centers, and shopping malls. This relationship becomes even more important as legislative threats continue to mount at local, state, and federal levels.

— Philip Morris

But even Philip Morris realizes the hospitality industry has no reason to volunteer for Big Tobacco's private war, observing:

The Hospitality Industry is our greatest potential ally...But not necessarily a natural partner

PM products, for the most part, not sold in these venues

We do not have a strong business connection to the industry...

So, over time, Philip Morris developed a cynical recruitment strategy binding hospitality to Big Tobacco: Convince restaurant and bar owners that smokefree measures are poison. Then sell "accommodation" ventilation systems as the antidote.

This strategy is now in full swing through slick web sites, magazine ads, trade show displays, and hospitality "seminars" nationwide. Not only do some restaurant and bar owners march off to fight Big Tobacco's dirty war, they pay tens of thousands of dollars to buy their own gas masks — the ineffective ventilation systems pushed by Big Tobacco and the HVAC industry.

After test-driving lies in Beverly Hills...

In 1987, Beverly Hills was about to pass California's first 100% smokefree restaurant measure. This got Big Tobacco's attention. By the city council's final vote, the "Beverly Hills Restaurant Association" (BHRA), quickly and secretly set up by a tobacco industry PR firm, was loudly claiming restaurant business would be ruined.

While Beverly Hills' original 100% smokefree restaurant measure was in effect, restaurant revenues reported to sales tax authorities (blue line) held steady. Had sales dropped the claimed 30%, they would have followed the dashed line. (Learn More)

Not convinced, the council voted the measure into effect. Over the next several months, the BHRA relentlessly shrilled that business was off 30%. Worn down, the city council softened the measure to create non-smoking and smoking sections. But it turned out the 30% figure, like the BHRA itself, was a tobacco industry fabrication.

Philip Morris was so impressed by the scam's initial success that in 1988 it launched the "Boca Raton Action Plan" to promote "accommodation" strategies, parrot testimonials at hospitality industry gatherings, and cripple smokefree measures internationally.

Polishing its act in Pittsburgh...

The unobjectionable public theme of "accommodation" developed for Pittsburgh became a hallmark, according to Philip Morris VP for corporate affairs Guy L. Smith IV, because:

[T]his program seems to be working extremely well and it is widely acclaimed in the community as very reasoned and calm. It also had the satisfying result of having the anti's (smokefree advocates) all tied up in their underwear because it is so difficult to criticize.

After a Philip Morris survey found the Pittsburgh pilot "received overwhelming acceptance from both the Pittsburgh business community and the general public," the company's main PR firm, Burson Marsteller, rapidly expanded the program to other U.S. cities and into Philip Morris's European markets, where it was labeled "Courtesy of Choice" and "Preserve Our Traditions."

In June 1989, Philip Morris dropped the Boca Raton Action Plan on Pittsburgh, which had recently passed a measure restricting smoking in public places. At a total cost of $2-4 million, PM's "Accommodation Program" logo was eventually posted by 100 Pittsburgh restaurants.


Philip Morris's first "accommodation" logo		Version Big Tobacco uses in other countries