Project TF

This article is part of the Tobacco portal on Sourcewatch funded from 2006 - 2009 by the American Legacy Foundation.

R.J. Reynolds' Project TF (which stands for "Tomorrow's Female") was an effort to design and market a cigarette to poorer, young, less-educated women. RJR felt it was important to market towards this group since the smoking rate among women wasn't declining as quickly as the rate among men:

Female smokers represent an increasingly important source of business. While smoking incidence among both 18-34 male and female smokers has declined since 1980, the rate of decline is greater for male smokers versus female smokers.

Market research showed that these women didn't like smelling bad or offending others with secondhand smoke, so the TF cigarette would be designed to "address female smokers' cosmetic and social acceptability concerns about cigarette smoke." Specifically, "The TF target has strong wants for the type of product that is currently being developed, i.e. a smooth, satisfying taste, a pleasant smoke arome, aftertaste and less offensive to non-smokers ... "

Race of the "target" was also considered: "Most of TF's target is white; the inclusion of menthol within the target brings a large proportion of black smokers."

The TF cigarette contained a chemical called EVG, which was an aroma precursor coated onto the paper used to modify the sidestream (or secondhand) smoke aroma. A spearmint pellet was contained in the filter to "deliver desirable level of minty taste." The final brand name chosen for the Project TF cigarette was "Chelsea."

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