Michael Schumacher: Marlboro's Man
Michael Schumacher is a champion. He begins his attempt at a sixth Formula One championship in Melbourne during March, and the odds are that he will achieve this goal.
His life has centred on motor racing since he was four years old, when his father, Rolf, built him a go-kart and enrolled him in the local kart club. German regulations did not permit him to race before he was 14, so he obtained his first licence from Luxembourg (obtainable at age 12). In 1983, he had his German licence and won the German Junior Kart Championship the following year.
He continued with karts—he won the German and European titles—then signed to drive Formula Three cars in 1989 (placing third), then turned to sports car racing in 1990. In 1991 he gained his first drive in Formula One, becoming a regular driver with the Benetton team in 1992, and won two world championships before joining Ferrari in 1996.
Now in his early 30s (born January 3, 1969), Schumacher is a family man. He and his wife, Corinna, have two young children. And, in case you’ve ever wondered, Corinna, he says, is a very good driver. In fact, off the track, he prefers her driving. He lists soccer, tennis, swimming and skiing as his hobbies, although another hobby—a collection of leather coats—is beginning to fill his wardrobe.
creating an
image to sell
When he joined Ferrari, he also became Marlboro’s man, for Marlboro is the main sponsor of the Ferrari team. And the sponsorship figure to Ferrari is believed to be about $US86 million a year. Half (some suggest all) of Schumacher’s $US30 million-or-so a year contract with Ferrari comes from Marlboro.
This means he’s selling an image for tobacco, and the car he drives is a mobile billboard at both the racetracks and on millions of television sets worldwide, even in countries where cigarette advertising is banned. He’s the new Marlboro Man. The old Marlboro man, a cowboy (one of whom was used in anti-smoking ads before his death of lung cancer as a result of smoking), rode a horse across the Western plains. The new Marlboro man drives the car with the prancing horse logo.
In announcing in February 2001 that Marlboro was committed to sponsoring the Ferrari team until 2006, Hans Fluri, president of Philip Morris Europe, said, “We are delighted to continue the Marlboro–Ferrari partnership, which has endured since 1984. Our mutual cooperation in the Formula One world championship is a source of pride for our respective companies and the thousands of employees across the world.”
And it’s no wonder they’re delighted, responds Anne Jones, the chief executive of Action on Smoking and Health (ASH) Australia. “The sponsorship of Formula One is the jewel in tobacco’s crown. It’s the pinnacle of successful, glamour-laden, global events with a massive potential to reach the young through both the televised events and the spin-off merchandise.”
Schumacher is in fact being exploited, she adds—used by the tobacco industry to reach youth, to gain young people as smokers to replace those who quit or die from their habit.
“He’s a great sportsman, and yet he’s sullied by this association with tobacco. He’s been used to promote a lethal, addictive product to children.”
While there have been strong denials by tobacco companies that they have targeted children, more recent revelations from company documents show a different picture.
Back in 1957, a Philip Morris (makers of Marlboro) executive wrote: “Hitting the youth can be more efficient even though the cost of reaching them is higher, because they are willing to experiment, they have more influence over others in their age group than they will in later life, and they are far more loyal to their starting brand.”
In 1971, an internal R J Reynolds document claimed that “the lower age limit for the profile of young smokers is to remain at 14.” In 1981, a Philip Morris researcher wrote, “Today’s teenager is tomorrow’s potential regular customer. . . . It is during the teenage years that the initial brand choice is made.”
In 1997, US tobacco company R J Reynolds became the first company to admit marketing to youth under 18 years of age. The following year British American Tobacco (BAT) in Canada was forced to release documents on youth marketing and studies of young people’s motivation for smoking, including the starting behaviour of children as young as five years old.
The launch of the Marlboro cowboy in the late 1950s illustrates the promotion of an image designed, according to insiders, to “turn rookie smokers on to Marlboro” and to “capture the youth market’s fancy. . . . A perfect symbol of independence and individualistic rebellion.”
One executive who worked on Marlboro recalled, “When you see teenage boys—people the cigarette companies aren’t supposed to be targeting in the first place—going crazy for this guy, you know they’re hitting their target.”
And the image has been successfully transferred across to motor sport, according to a 1992 document—“The viability of the Marlboro man among the 18-24 segment”—prepared for Philip Morris. It concludes: “The racing advertising was perceived to be consistent with the cowboy image, but with a more modern and younger focus.”
Although the report is about motorcycle advertising, it sees sponsorship in motor sport presenting a “more modern Marlboro man.” “[The advertising] took the spirit of adventure and going to the edge further. . . . Sexual prowess is of much concern. The Marlboro man can have whomever he wants because he is at the top of the dominance hierarchy.”
Marlboro’s Aleardo Buzzi sums it up this way: “We are the number-one brand in the world. What we wanted was to promote a particular image of adventure, courage, of virility.” They have gained what they wanted, adds Jones—glamour plus global reach.
tobacco advertising ban
But tobacco companies are pulling out of Formula One sponsorship. Marlboro and two other tobacco companies involved in Formula One have announced a December 2006 date—time for an “orderly transition.” The European Union has not been happy with this date and produced a law banning it from the end of 2005.
The Belgian government decided to act sooner and voted to restrict advertising beginning this year. The Formula One governing body responded by dropping the Belgian racetrack, Spa, from their calendar. Spa was a favourite track for Schumacher. He made his debut there in a Jordan, and has won the race six times.
The tobacco sponsorship ban was signalled in Melbourne on the eve of the 1998 Australian Grand Prix. Max Mosley, president of the FIA, announced that Formula One would end the use of tobacco sponsorship by 2002, but only on the condition that it could be shown that tobacco advertising encouraged people to smoke.
Perhaps the sponsorship became more important than the evidence presented. The action of the European Union has probably been the final arbitrator, although new racetracks are being built outside Europe, with a China and a Bahrain Grand Prix in 2004.
As has already been seen in Australian sport, particularly football and cricket, any hole left by tobacco sponsorship is quickly filled by others. The evidence, in Australia, is that the sponsorship has increased markedly since tobacco advertising was banned.
message to Michael
Schumacher is an occasional cigar smoker—during holidays or after important victories. According to Salvatore Belgiovine, one of Schumacher’s bodyguards, “Generally, Michael hates the cigarette smoke.”
So, in his personal life, he’s not a strong recommendation for the tobacco industry. And, it could be argued that he is sponsored by a legal product, and is within current laws.
But it goes further than that, says Jones. Does he want to be exploited by the tobacco companies and be responsible for an increase in cancer and heart disease on a global scale, and contribute to the four million deaths a year caused by tobacco?
“He is the messenger for the tobacco companies and is personally helping to promote the smoking rate and take-up of smoking by young people who will go on to have premature deaths, and a whole range of diseases.”
Her message to Schumacher is “find another sponsor whose product doesn’t kill people. He could make that decision,” she suggests.
Perhaps there is another role he could play—something suggested after a controversial move in 2000 by BAT and Philip Morris to take a lead in teenage anti-smoking initiatives. Professor Gordon McVie, director of the London-based Cancer Research Campaign, and Clive Bates of ASH, UK, responded angrily to the suggestion.
“BAT and Philip Morris placed great emphasis on the role of parents, teachers, health educators, governments and companies,” said Bates. “But they failed to mention the importance of aspirational role models such as F1 drivers, actors and pop stars in the promotion of cigarettes.
“It’s blatantly obvious they want to associate the anti-smoking message with . . . ‘boring’ representatives of adult authority, but reserve the people who make a difference, like racing drivers and other celebrities, for promoting smoking.”
McVie challenged them to make their superstars available for anti-smoking initiatives. “If they cared about youth smoking at all, they would be funding massive TV ad campaigns featuring Schumacher and [Jacques] Villeneuve, and leaving the content and message to genuine professionals who know how to make anti-smoking commercials that reduce smoking rather than encourage it.”
Schumacher an anti-smoking campaigner? He wouldn’t be the first Marlboro man to turn.
Sources: www.ash.org.uk; www.cnnsi.com; www.globalf1.net; www.grandprix.com; www.F1i.com; www.mschumacher.com; www.theprancinghorse.co.uk.
cigarettes: more than a puff of smoke
They don’t call cigarettes coffin nails for nothing. Following are some of the more significant chemicals of the more than 4000, many of which are poisonous and carcinogenic, found in cigarette smoke. Cigarettes also contain up to 600 secret additives aimed at keeping smokers hooked, either on a certain brand or smoking in general.
- Acetone (nail polish remover)
- Dimethylnitrosamine
- Methanol (rocket fuel)
- Pyrene*
- Tar
- Carbon monoxide (car exhausts)
- Napthalene
- Cadmium* (car batteries)
- Hydrogen cyanide (gas chamber poison)
- Benzopyrene*
- Ammonia (toilet cleaner)
- Urethane*
- Toluene (solvent)
- DDT (insecticide)
- Polonium-210*
- Arsenic
- Phenol
- Nicotene (more addictive than heroin)
- Napthylamine
- Butane (lighter fluid)
- Vinyl chloride*
For more information on the effects of smoking or to request help to quit smoking, call the Quit line on 131 848 or visit www.quit.org.au.
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