Purpose: This investigation applied the Product Life Cycle (PLC) and Product Evolutionary Cycle (PEC) frameworks to the nicotine and tobacco market to predict the impact of television commercials for electronic cigarettes (e-cigarettes) on youth.
Design/methodology/approach: Surveys were administered over a three-year period to 417 alternative high school students from southern California who had never used e-cigarettes, cigarettes, or cigars at the baseline. Covariate-adjusted logistic regression causal mediation models were employed to test competing hypotheses from the PLC and PEC frameworks.
Findings: Results support a refined version of the PEC framework where e-cigarette commercials increase the odds of e-cigarette use, which leads to subsequent use of competing products including cigarettes and cigars.
Originality: Regulations in the United States that permit television commercials for e-cigarettes but restrict the promotion of cigarettes and cigars have created an opportunity to study product adoption among youth consumers when one product has a strategic marketing advantage.
Practical implications: This investigation demonstrates the utility of frameworks that conceptualize youth-oriented marketing as a two-part process in which potential customers are first convinced to adopt a behavior and then enticed to use a specific product to enact the behavior.
Social implications: Rising rates of nicotine and tobacco product use among youth may be partially attributable to e-cigarette commercials.
Keywords: Advertising; Electronic Cigarettes; Product Evolutionary Cycle; Product Life Cycle; Television Commercials.