Virginia Slims (cigarette)

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1978 Virginia Slims magazine ad. The image at the top is a photograph of a woman hanging laundry outside. The ad text reads: "Back then, every man gave his wife at least one day a week out of the house. You've come a long way, baby. Virginia Slims – Slimmer than the fat cigarettes men smoke."

Virginia Slims is a brand of cigarette manufactured by Philip Morris. The brand was introduced in 1968 and directly marketed to young, professional women, under the famous slogan, "You've come a long way, baby." Some media watchgroups considered this Virginia Slims marketing campaign to be responsible for a rapid increase in smoking among teenage girls.[link] Later campaigns have used the slogans, "It's a woman thing," in the 1990s, and "Find your voice." A report by the Surgeon General of the United States has interpreted these marketing strategies as attempting to link smoking "to women's freedom, emancipation, and empowerment."[link] This report also tied the increase of smoking among teenage girls to rises in sales of Virginia Slims and other "niche" brands marketed directly to women.

Virginia Slims are much narrower (23mm circumference) than ordinary cigarettes (hence, "Slims"), and are also longer than normal "king-sized" cigarettes, sold only in longer 100s and 120s, to give the cigarettes a more "elegant" appearance and ostensibly to reduce the amount of smoke they produce. They are also sold in "Superslims", "light," "ultra-light," and menthol varieties. The packaging is white with vertical colored stripes running along the left side.

Trivia

• Virginia Slims was the last cigarette brand to advertise on US television, airing an ad just before midnight on the night of New Year's Day 1971. The ad aired during an episode of The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson and featured a pre-Hill Street Blues Veronica Hamel.

• The slogan "You've come a long way, baby." is the name of the 1998 album of the British musician Fatboy Slim.

• The Truth anti - smoking campaign (based at TheTruth.com) directly targeted Virginia Slims with a campaign advertisement in which Truth representatives talk about the "Find Your Voice" slogan and then a woman steps forward and says through an artificial voicebox "Was this the voice you wanted us to find?"

See also

• Fashion brands
• Smoking culture

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