Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, December 7, 1994 TAG: 9412070106
SECTION: BUSINESS PAGE: B-8 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: SANDRA BROWN KELLY
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
He tuned one of the radios on display to 96.3, frequency of his classic-rock station.
"It was just time for a commercial break, and the condom ad was playing," Slenski said.
Slenski, 46 and father of three, said he wondered what the reaction would be from fellow shoppers when they heard the commercial for Sheik condoms that uses as its punch line "Use one, or get none."
"A guy about 30 walked by and smiled," Slenski said.
Then, after the commercial break was over and music was back on the air, a fellow in his 50s came by and turned the radio down.
"I don't know if he didn't care for the music or the ad," Slenski said.
The spots, which target the 18- to 24-year-old crowd, air between 7 p.m. to midnight, Monday through Saturday, and 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. on Sundays.
The commercial has been running on the Roanoke station since Oct.1 and is scheduled through March 19.
"It was not easy to make the decision to run it," Slenski said.
In fact, the first version of the commercial submitted to the station was rejected after Slenski played it for staff and his 14-year-old son.
Its language was somewhat provocative with claims of the product's strength and thinness. Background sounds of squeaking bedsprings didn't help. Slenski said his son thought that version was "outlandish" and his staff was "embarrassed."
A second version got an immediate OK from everyone, though, and apparently also has been acceptable to listeners.
Station workers have received no complaints about content, Slenski said. "A few women called to say we needed new ads, though."
If the commercial were running in the daytime, it might not be as appropriate, he said, because of a different audience.
At least one other Roanoke-area radio station rejected the Sheik campaign, said John Blutenthal, vice president for marketing with London International U.S. Holdings Inc. of Sarasota, Fla. The station feared that other advertisers would not want their commercials to air along with the condom promotion.
London operates as Schmid Laboratories in the United States. Its condoms are manufactured in Anderson, S.C.
Schmid began, however, as a New Jersey company and manufactured its first condoms, made of rubber, in 1900. Latex products were introduced in the 1930s.
London's other, more expensive, U.S. brand is Ramses. The company also makes the Durex brand, which is sold worldwide.
Retail sales of condoms total about $250 million annually, and London-Schmid has about 22 percent of that market, the company said.
Campaigns for both of its U.S. brands are an effort to use humor to get away from the scare tactics that have been used to promote condom use, Blutenthal said. Trojan, the best-selling condom brand in the country, has used the theme: "The heat of the moment can burn you a lifetime."
"People have fear fatigue," Blutenthal said. "They've been warned so many times that if you don't use a condom you'll get AIDS and can die. Eighteen- and 20-year-olds don't think of themselves as vulnerable. They are tired of hearing all the gloom and doom.
"We wanted to make a positive message funny," he said.
Because the condom-advertising campaign veers from the "warning" approach, at least 30 publications have written about it. Blutenthal estimates that about 6 million people have been exposed to information about the campaign, either through the ads or stories.
Blutenthal said he has received only one complaint letter - about a poster distributed to colleges, not the radio ad. A college official thought the poster did not sufficiently convey a safe-sex message, he said.
Sheik commercials are playing on radio stations in 20 markets that serve college communities. They also run on MTV nationally, but have been refused by network television, Blutenthal said.
Print ads also are part of the campaign and have appeared in this area in publications at Virginia Tech and Radford universities and Virginia Military Institute. Posters were sent to 62 colleges around the country, and condom samples were distributed to groups for use in community AIDS awareness projects.
December is AIDS Awareness Month, and WROV's Slenski has 1,000 Sheik condoms to give away Dec.23 at an AIDS benefit concert at the Iroquois restaurant in downtown Roanoke.
London's Ramses "Best Friend" campaign, which is aimed at an older audience, has been less successful because the ads have been rejected by some major magazines including Rolling Stone, Ebony Man, Jet and Men's Journal, Blutenthal said. Sports Illustrated and Golf also refused the ads, but Blutenthal said their rejection was less surprising.
by CNB