Top Tips from No Smoking Day Prize Winners

In 2010 one of the most successful No Smoking Day (NSD) campaigns was run by NHS Barking and Dagenham. Their refreshing and energetic approach helped to generate real buzz and proven results.


They achieved this in a number of ways including using the whole week in the build up to the day and four different locations throughout their Borough. They contacted local leisure centres to organise NSD themed exercise classes, and to offer a scheme whereby people signing up to quit received one month’s free membership. They also helped trained occupational nurses to hold drop-in ‘are you fit to quit’ sessions from the council’s transport & cleaning depots. This helped raise awareness about quitting & encourage access amongst routine & manual workers.

All of these activities were widely publicised using internal communications and promotional materials in all council buildings in the lead up. They also placed NSD materials at all the local Pharmacies, GP’s and health centres.


Young People
One of their main focuses for the campaign was young people. To do this they ran two messages. ‘Save your skin’ was used for young women to help them realise the effect smoking would have on their appearance. For young men the message was ‘what’s your game plan’ highlighting the impact of smoking on performance on and off the pitch.

Nine local secondary schools facilitated stalls which were staffed by students and assisted by the schools health advisors. The NHS marketing team supplied promotional resources including banners, posters, t-shirts & business cards promoting NHS Barking & Dagenham youth health website & the local stop smoking service. April Age Progression software was used in three of the schools to help demonstrate the aging effects of smoking and was particularly well received by staff and students alike.

An intensive advertising campaign was integral to the success of this campaign. The team issued press releases both before and after NSD week, using the templates on the NSD website. A real success was having these picked up by several local media, and also in getting a 2 page spread in the local newspaper.

5 top tips for running a successful campaign.
• Plan well in advance
• Promote local services as free
• Track website hits to help determine which advertising is most effective.
• Schools are very enthusiastic – get in there early!
• Create opportunities to link in with more partners.

Here Comes the Quitting Season

It’s official – more people try to quit smoking in January and March than in any other months of the year.

First up are the New Year quitters – keen to make the most of their New Year’s resolutions and kick the habit. Then comes the ‘No Smoking Day effect’, with the high profile media coverage supported by hundreds of stop smoking events being held all over the UK. Add together the quit attempts for January and March, and we should see around 15% of smokers – over 1.5million people – making a ‘serious’ attempt to stop smoking.

Research by Professor Robert West et al, published in the BMJ in 2010, looked at the cost-effectiveness of No Smoking Day as a method of encouraging smokers to quit. The research used data collected since 2006 from the ‘Smoking Toolkit Study’ – a monthly survey of smoking behaviour in England. It shows clear ‘peaks’ in quit attempts each New Year, and again each March as No Smoking Day hits the headlines as it has done every March since 1984. The next No Smoking Day falls on Wednesday 9th March 2011.

GASP's all new 'Calibration Service'

The final special offer for August is a reduced price on a great new service that GASP are offering. Just click on the image or read below for more details

Let GASP calibrate your Smokerlyzer for you!
To ensure the advice you give is backed up with accurate CO readings, we recommend that you recalibrate your CO breath monitor every six months. If your CO monitor is not regularly recalibrated there is an increasing risk of it giving inaccurate readings.

If you send us your piCO+ or Micro+ Smokerlyzer, whatever its age, GASP will calibrate it and check it is in full working order. We will then fit a brand new D-piece or T-piece and send it back to you with a pack of 50 disposable flat pack mouthpieces. All postage & packing charges are included in the price. We will supply you with suitable pre-paid packaging so that you can send it to us.

Simply send us your address in the comments form when ordering and we will send you the pre-paid packaging.

Normally this would be £24.95+VAT but for a limited time all this is available for just £19.95+VAT per calibration.

See the GASP Website for full terms and conditions

Gasp August Special Offers

A massive 9 Special offers are featured on the gasp website this month. Below you can find 8 of them with the 9th to have its own feature in the next post. Click on the pictures below for more info on how to buy.

1. Smokefree Poster Pack

A colourful selection of 5 posters using a smokefree theme. These include 2 smokefree home posters, the original GASP poster, You Smoke I Choke smokefree home, and two interesting No Smoking posters. Use to give away or in displays.

2. Smokfree Homes Fridge Magnet Pack

A pack of 10 Smokefree homes fridge magnets for families to use in their kitchen as a simple but cheerful reminder to keep the home smokefree. Use for handouts on stalls, in goody bags or as a small gift to families signing up to make their homes smokefree. Reduced to just £3 for a limited time

3. 50 Great reasons to have a smokefree home & car Pack

A pack of 25 leaflets with 50 great reasons why the car and home homes should be a smokefree zone at all times. Children and pregnant women are particularly at risk from the harmful effects of secondhand smoke. The smokefree home message is for smokers and non-smokers who may allow visitors or family members to smoke indoors. The 50 reasons include the health risks of passive smoking to adults and children, as well as reasons of smell, damage to furniture, cleaning and being a good role model. The 50 reasons are followed by some helpful tips on how to make your home smokefree.

4. Quit Kit Pack

A selection pack containing 10 copies of the 12 most popular Quit Kit handouts. An ideal resource pack for anyone who advises and helps smokers to stop smoking. The Quit Kit handouts guide smokers through the steps to stopping, from listing their reasons and deciding how addicted they are to nicotine, to planning their quit day, dealing with withdrawal symptoms and coping with stress, weight concerns and increasing exercise. They can be given out as a set or individually as and when a person requires them. The list of included Quit Kit handouts are on the gasp website, just click the image above.

5. Fact File Pack

This pack contains 10 of each of the 10 most popular Fact Files. A broad range of tobacco and smoking related topics are covered including; a summary of the diseases related to smoking, a brief outline of the poisons in tobacco smoke, details of how smoking damages the lungs and information on roll ups, marijuana, pipes, cigarette butt litter, pets and passive smoking and more. Ideal for teachers, campaigners and health workers who are looking for answers to common questions about smoking and health. The full list of included Fact Files can be seen on the GASP website


6. Smokefree Homes Action Pack

Over 25% of GASP's popular pack which features ideas and information to help you to educate parents and to use a range of resources to promote and run community-based campaigns to reduce children's exposure to secondhand smoke.

7. Smokefree Homes Powerpoint CD

For a limited time this great teaching aid is available with over 20% off

8. Tobacco trap DVD

Now with over 25% off!

Excellent documentary looking at the true cost of tobacco in developing countries, with a focus on East Africa. Interviews with tobacco farmers, smokers, health advocates and Government representatives reveal that a farmer makes one dollar a day from growing tobacco while the tobacco industry make a clear 12 million dollars a day.

Product Focus: TobacAlert

TobacAlert is an accurate and cost effective way of testing the levels of cotininea biproduct of the body's breakdown of nicotine, the active ingredient found in tobacco products and tobacco smoke.

Available as both a urine and saliva test.

Click here for more details

June Special Offers on the GASP website (Prt 2)

6 more excellent value special offers from GASP for June 2010:


NEW Give tobacco the sack race (5)


Set of 5 sacks with benefits of a being smokefree printed on the sacks. Give tobacco the sack and keep fit at the same time.

For adults or children.

For details on the special offer click HERE


Splat the fag tube, 3x Fags and stick

Hang the large cigarette tube and challenge people to ‘Splat the Fag’ with the stick as they drop out of the bottom of the tube.

This includes a large cigarette tube, 3 stuffed ‘Fags’ to drop down the tube one by one, and a stick to try and ‘splat’ the fags with.

To find out about this great special offer click HERE


Effects of smoking pairs



20 pairs of full colour cards showing the effects of smoking. The cards are laid face down and players are invited to turn over two cards at a time. If you turn over a pair you can take those cards and continue playing. Fun way to look at the serious subject of the risks of smoking. The cards can also be used for darts games or as a prop for the for a fortune teller.

For a limited time only save 25% on this product. Click HERE for details


Stick the No on the Smoker

Stick a NO on the Smoker is an adaptation of Stick the Tail on the Donkey. People are blindfolded and are invited to stick a transparent sticker printed with a red prohibition sign onto the poster of a man smoking. The name of each person is noted onto the poster near their sticker. The person whose sticker makes the cigarette into a no smoking sign wins!

Set comprises an A4 poster and 12 stickers.

Click HERE to buy at a reduced price

Hook the smokefree ducks

12 ducks swimming in a pool to hide their toxic or tobacco-free status. Invite people to hook 3 ducks. Award prizes if they get 1, 2, or 3 of the smokefree ducks. All the others display toxic hazard signs to remind people of the chemical cocktail contained in tobacco smoke. Set includes 12 ducks with metal loops and signs on their underside, six sticks and hooks and an inflatable duck pool for the ducks to swim in. Use with information about the toxins in tobacco smoke.

Click HERE for more pictures and details on how to buy


Smokefree Bunting

Multi-coloured 10 metre lengths of polythene bunting with a no-smoking sign. Use to decorate and attract attention to your smokefree events, No Smoking Day stalls, stop smoking recruitment events, Smokefree Homes projects and any tobacco control campaign. Adds instant colour and sets the scene. One is enough for a small space but larger spaces will need more than one.

Again click HERE for all the details of the special offer and more pictures .

June Special Offers on the GASP website (Prt 1)

GASP have announced another 9 brilliant special offers on their site and you can find details below. Just click on the link for details on how to take advantage.

Young People Leaflet Selection

A popular selection of 100 leaflets on tobacco prevention issues for young people. Each pack contains ten leaflets of ten different titles.

The leaflets cover factual information about smoking and health such as Looking Closer at Smoking and Smoking and your Mouth and Smoking Kills Your Looks. Others are more light-hearted such as Joking about Smoking and I’d Rather Eat a Hair Sandwich than Smoke a Cigarette. There are ones that cover a wide range of facts about tobacco and smoking. These include Smoking’s History, Frightening Facts about Smoking, and Ten Top Reasons to Stay Smokefree. Finally ‘For Real’ booklet covers a range of facts about smoking including ten tips for stopping smoking. There is something for every young person to encourage them to stay smokefree or to stop smoking if they do smoke.

A taster bundle of information at a special price.

Ten Top Reasons
Smoking and your mouth
Looking closer
For Real
I'd rather eat
Kills your looks
Smoking's History
What's in tobacco smoke
Joking about smoking
Frightening facts

Click on the links above for details on the individual leaflets or click HERE take advantage of this great offer.


Mixed Poster Selection
GASP posters with a black, red and yellow colour theme. Display together or separately. For maximum impact display with a black, yellow or red colour background or boards. The selection of 20 posters include 2 each of best selling posters covering a range of tobacco related issues. This includes:

Smoking prevention and education, staying smokefree, the health risks of smoking, reasons to quit and a warning about the damage tobacco companies inflict on our families and communities. Here is a list of the posters:

Lies
Big
Kiss
Stronger
Poisons
Reasons
Proud
Big Tobacco
Filters
John

Click HERE for details on how to buy


Skittles & Balls Set


Set of 9 Ciggie Skittles or pins that look like lit cigarettes. Can be used for skittles, hoopla or knocking off a ledge or just for decoration! Knock resistant.

Now for available with a set of 3 small, hard, wooden balls to roll at the skittles for a limited time at a reduced price of £25.00

Both skittles and balls are small and are more for use in confined spaces.

Click HERE for details on how to buy



Come back soon for details soon more of GASP's great June special offer