Ross: Perhaps a little magic can stop teenage vaping
Jul 24, 2019, 7:19 AM | Updated: 9:21 am
The FDA’s latest strategy to get kids to stop vaping is an online ad which stars Julius Dein, a magician and Instagram phenom who meets up with some tough-looking kids.
“Who here vapes…” Dein asks. “How come you don’t smoke cigarettes?”
“Because it’s not 1950 anymore bro,” one kid answers.
No it’s not. So Dein takes one of their vape sticks.
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“I’m gonna put it into my hand like this, and if I just push like this…” Dein says, and as he pushes the vape stick into his fist, it comes out the other end as a disgusting-looking, old school cigarette.
“You just went back in time,” one of the vaping bros said.
The vaping bros are immediately changed.
“Vaping could lead to trying cigarettes,” Dein said.
“That’s gross,” replied a vaping bro.
I count myself fortunate to have grown up in a time and place where the only available addictive substances were Hostess cupcakes and bubble gum. But if some marketer back then had thought to spike them with nicotine, they’d be a billionaire today — I’d be unconscious in a doorway surrounded by cupcake crumbs and Bazooka Joe comics.
For some reason, it is perfectly legal to infuse kid-friendly treats with addictive substances as a way to create customers for life. Isn’t that cheating? How lame is your product if the only way you can keeps customers is chemical enslavement?
If you want to create customers for life – run radio ads!
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Tune in to KIRO Newsradio weekdays at 5am for Dave Ross on Seattle's Morning News.
