Barking Dog + Barking Fish: San Diego Focus Groups 000307 - 000309

This report, prepared in 1994 for Philip Morris by a company called Marketing Perceptions, Inc. relates the results of focus group testing done to evaluate two proposed names for a new brand of cigarette targeted at young men: "Barking Dog" and "Barking Fish" brand cigarettes.

The name "Barking Dog" was meant to convey images of loyalty, "tried and true," "never bites" and "man's best friend."

It backfired completely. Instead, the document says in each focus group,

"Most of the men rejected the positioning. They weren't certain if, these days they could think of their cigarettes as 'my best friend.'... Some also suggested that there could be a 'negative spin' in interpreting the positioning, 'being dependent on your DOG'...In each group, men noted that a Barking Dog is angry, vicious, noisy, annoying or an intrusion."

As for "Barking Fish" cigarettes, as might be expected, "...Most found the images unsettling."

"There was general agreement that the pack with the fish graphic was 'the worst," immediately bringing to mind smelly, fishy, wet-tasting cigarettes."

Title	 Barking Dog + Barking Fish: San Diego Focus Groups 000307 - 000309 Per. Author	 Halpern, M. Date	 19940412 (April 12, 1994) Type	 Memorandum Bates	 2041490669/0681 Collection	 Philip Morris Pages 13 URL: http://legacy.library.ucsf.edu/tid/txh91a00

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