Davidoff throws the towel! A press release issued on 9th August announces that "Swiss Indoors AG, organizer of the Davidoff Swiss Indoors, and the Oettinger Davidoff Group, its sponsor, have reached a joint decision to allow the title sponsorship of the event to expire after this year’s tournament."

This is a great victory for OxyRomandie, and a fantastic reward for the joint efforts deployed over the last three years by our association and our sister organizations in France, CNCT (Comité national contre le tabagisme), and in the United Kingdom, ASH UK, and ASH Scotland. Although Mr. Brennwald, the owner and president of the Basel tournament, and his tobacco sponsor will not admit it, the decision of ATP that “the tournament would no longer be marketed in Europe under its previous name due to advertising restrictions in the tobacco industry” results directly from the pressure we collectively put on the world tennis organization (based in the UK) and from the legal procedures launched in France against TV broadcasters (Eurosport, Canal+) and the sponsors of the tournament.

As direct consequence of the Davidoff/UNESCO incident that took place in 2009, the United Nations Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) requests "a review of the United Nations Goodwill Ambassador Programme to ensure that no [tobacco] industry-sponsored person represents the United Nations." In 2009, opera singer Monserrat Caballé, UNESCO Goodwill Ambassador, accepted a cheque from the Davidoff Swiss Indoors in spite of the clear instructions from the Director General of UNESCO that such tobacco money be refused (see our article UNESCO flatly rejects donation from Davidoff Swiss Indoors). The action point submitted to the 53 members of ECOSOC who meet this month in New York further reminds them that "Goodwill Ambassadors and Messengers of Peace, are expected to be 'persons of integrity who demonstrate a strong desire to help mobilize public interest in, and support for, the purposes and principles of the United Nations'". This clearly suggests that such expectation was not met in the case of the Davidoff Swiss Indoors donation to Ms. Caballé.

In brief, this is yet another Basel gaffe, which will no doubt create great embarrassment for Swiss diplomacy and which doesn't contribute to project a good international image of our country. This shows that the Davidoff Swiss Indoors is becoming, with each passing day, more and more shameful for Basel and for Swiss sport. It's high time that an end be put to this ludicrous and highly damaging situation. Are you listening, Mr. Brennwald?

The Davidoff Swiss Indoors logo is a registered trademark. The official Swiss trademark registry (SWISSREG) lists tobacco company Davidoff & Cie SA as owner of the logo. Under "Goods and services", the registry record provides the following information: "Publicité, distribution de prospectus et d'échantillons, y compris d'échantillons de produits du tabac" ("Advertising, distribution of promotional leaflets and free samples, including free samples of tobacco products"). This is very interesting: an ATP 500 tournament whose purpose is to advertise tobacco products and distribute free samples of cigarettes and cigars!

"If they have lips, we want them!"

We will refrain from saying that the young ball girls and ball boys, who receive medals struck in the effigy of Davidoff as reward for being human billboards for the trademark, also get samples of cigarettes and cigars. However, at the tournament shop, parents can buy for their toddlers teddy bears (see picture) decorated with the Davidoff logo. After all, there is no reason not to accustom future smokers from the earliest age with their future cigarette brand of choice, by having its logo on their most loved object - their teddy bear. This is indeed consistent with the philosophy of the tobacco executive who once said, when asked if his company maketed its products to kids: "If they have lips, we want them!"

Extract from ATP website, page on Basel tournament

The Basel tournament is the only one of the ATP tour whose official name is not used on the ATP website. The ATP must feel very embarrassed by the fact that one of its tournaments promotes tobacco products, notably to the youth.  Actually, the global tennis association must recognize that they are even in an illegal situation. Indeed, ATP, as owner of the broadcasting rights for the Davidoff Swiss Indoors outside Switzerland, violates the law in many countries, including European law, when they make arrangement with TV channels for the satellite broadcasting of the Davidoff Swiss Indoors. This unlawful practice must also come to an end, and soon, otherwise ATP will run the risk of being subjected to a flurry of legal actions.

By selling the soul of their tournament to tobacco dealers, the organizers of the Basel tournament are the ones to be blamed for mess in which ATP finds itself with the Davidoff Swiss Indoors. This is really a sad state of affairs and a  shame for the city of Basel and for Swiss sport in general!

Isn't this beautifully said? The merchants of Davideath do not only stretch their brand, they also stretch their advertising rhetoric beyond irony and antiphrasis, exploring new territories of human gullibity: "The Good Life" - a trademark officially registered in the tobacco category - is their "open Sesame" to profitability from selling a deadly product to those influenceable enough to buy this kind of B.S. Just in the same way they are selling Gauloises (another Imperial Tobacco brand), a product that traps people in addiction, under the slogan "Freedom forever."

However, reality has a strong tendency to strike back, often at the moment least expected.

When you see Davidoff The Good Life, Davideath The Ugly Death may not be far away. Actually, it just takes a pack of Davidoff Gold cigarettes sold in Switzerland to have that experience. The back side of the pack offers an extraordinary juxtaposition where reality does hit hard indeed. But at least, Zino Davidoff being quoted saying that "these carefully selected tobaccos have been skillfully blended to assure your pleasure" does not run the risk of being contradicted by the corpse of the former smoker in the morgue!

In Basel, from 31st October to 8th November 2009, the Swiss tennis event of the year has been hijacked once more by the tobacco multinational Imperial Tobacco and their like and turned into a global advertising operation for their strategic cigarette and cigar brand, Davidoff. An operation aimed at selling a deadly product. In brief: selling death.

Organisers of the Swiss Indoors and some other people try to justify sponsorship of the Basel tournament by denying or minimizing its link to tobacco, claiming instead that Davidoff sells "fragrances and other accessories" and describing it as a "luxury good provider". This is simply a Big Lie.

 In terms of revenues, Davidoff is first and foremost a tobacco brand. Luxury items, however, are also sold under the Davidoff name. This is the result of an elaborate brand stretching strategy.

Indeed, according to an internal BAT document, the non-tobacco Davidoff products provide "alibi advertising opportunities" for the cigarette brand, especially in countries with tobacco marketing restrictions (see Davidoff brand stretching).

But the two brands, although they use the same name, can hardly be confused: since 2005, they have different logos. And it is the Davidoff tobacco logo that appears in the Centre Court in Basel and decorates the uniforms of the tournament staff.

It is not arguable that the Basel tournament is sponsored by the tobacco branch of the Davidoff group. The sponsor makes no secret that his business is tobacco. On the website of the Davidoff Swiss Indoors, the page dedicated to the welcome word from the title sponsor shows Reto Cina, the chairman of all the tobacco companies of the Oettinger Davidoff group, smoking a cigar in a tobacco shop. His welcome text is simply a variation on the theme "Davidoff The Good Life", which is a registered trademark of tobacco company Davidoff & Cie SA in Geneva.

The presentation of the title sponsor on the tournament website is even more blatant. This is nothing but a marketing pitch for the "Davidoff The Good Life" brand name.

Davideath - The Ugly Death

The UK Intellectual Property Office classifies goods into 45 classes. Class 34 is exclusively dedicated to tobacco products. Among the 94 registered trademarks which contain the word "Davidoff", 62 are in non-tobacco classes, with individual trademarks often covering several non-tobacco classes, while the remaining 32 trademark are uniquely in the tobacco class. Furthermore, the non-tobacco trademarks have all as proprietor Zino Davidoff SA in Fribourg (Switzerland), while the tobacco trademarks have as their proprietor Davidoff & Cie SA in Geneva. The two types of trademark, tobacco and non-tobacco, are very clearly separated. Things are well done: the Davidoff trademark diversification scheme is neatly elaborated.

The UK Intellectual Property Office lists two entries for "Davidoff The Good Life" (M692896 and U00000692896), both of which belong to class 34, tobacco goods.

Finally, the link indicated on the title sponsor page shown above, www.davidoff.com, points to website of Davidoff & Cie SA, the tobacco company of the Davidoff group, which handles the tobacco Davidoff trademark on behalf of Imperial Tobacco. It is interesting to note that, when clicking on such link, you get different messages depending on the country where you are.

In Switzerland and France, for example, you get a screen containing nothing but the minimalist welcome message shown on the right. When you click on "Welcome to Davidoff", you are subjected to the age check below, in the same illusory vein as the protection used for porno sites!

In the UK, accessing www.davidoff.com gives an entirely different result. You get a screen displaying the following message: "We are sorry but due to UK legislation we are not allowed anymore to show you our website www.davidoff.com. Thank you for your understanding." and you are blocked from proceeding any further.

Given all what precedes, a sponsor who, for his presentation, uses "Davidoff The Good Life" and the www.davidoff.com website, leaves no place for doubt that he is in the tobacco business. Saying and repeating the contrary in the face of evidence is nothing but resorting to the infamous Big Lie propaganda technique.