Camel Brand Silver Round and Candy Cigarettes?

In my younger years in the late 1970's my family lived in suburban community and I had a good friend who lived right behind our home. Our families were good friends and we even had a gate in the backyard fence that connected our yards. At this point I might have been six or seven years old. Once or twice a week my friend and I would walk down the street to a corner gas station and buy candy that cost about a quarter ($0.25) at the time. I would usually buy something chocolate but my friend would often get candy cigarettes because his father was a smoker.

Looking back now having been a parent, there are so many thing wrong with that story... Why were six year old kids walking to the store by themselves? That would be number one. Number two, how on earth was it legal for companies to market and sell candy cigarettes to children? I do realize that it was a different time and it was a safe area, but I never would have let my young son to walk with friends to store even down the street. I would have had Children's Protective Services knocking on my door...

I remembered this story over the weekend and it reminded me of some silver I had bought years ago and stored away. Fortunately I still had some pictures of it because I took images of my precious metals for insurance purposes at the time. It took about half an hour to figure out which folder I had placed the pictures, but I did find them!

This silver round was produced for the RJ Reynolds Tobacco Company back in the 1990's as a marketing ploy. They produce Camel brand cigarettes. Apparently customers were given "Camel Cash" for purchases which could be used toward promotional items, one being this silver round with camels on it. I found this in a shop somewhere around ten or fifteen years ago, I don't even remember where anymore. Being a non smoker I had no attachment to the brand. I bought it because it was weird, and it had an animal on it, so why not?

About the round:

From numista.com

These are interesting rounds because for one they are solid silver and two it has some nice looking camels. On top of that they aren't real common, so it adds some nice collector value. Beyond that I'm not overly attached to it, as a matter of fact I'm not even sure where I have it stored away! But it is a testament to how big tobacco companies are relentless marketers of their brand!

Candy Cigarettes

reddit.com

Talk about a seriously sick idea... But the world was a different place back then. These were marketed to children with the goal of converting them into smokers when they grew up. Studies found that children who ate candy cigarettes were twice as likely to smoke as adults than children who didn't eat them. It appears they were successful with "grooming" children to be smokers...

Since that time most countries have outright banned the sale of candy cigarettes. Interestingly in the US and Canada they aren't banned, but can't be labelled as "cigarettes". There are also several European countries that have similar laws, but some still allow them to be sold as candy cigarettes. If you're interested to see where they are legal check out the Wikipedia article on candy cigarette in my references.

So what happened to my old friend who used to buy candy cigarettes you may ask? He's a full fledged smoker as of the last time I talked to him. Although I have to admit we haven't talked much in years now. Once you have a kids sometimes you lose track of old friends, I regret that now. I'll have to look him up again and see how he's doing.

Did any of you have personal experience with candy cigarettes?

That will just about do it for today's post. If you have any questions or comments feel free to leave them below. Thank you so much for all of your support, I greatly appreciate it! Have a good week everyone!

Disclaimer:

I'm not a financial advisor and this isn't financial advice, please always do your own research before spending your hard earned money.

All pictures are mine unless otherwise stated.

The Camels on the silver round are the intellectual property of the RJ Reynolds Tobacco Company.