ABSRACT
An Assessment and Redesign of the British American Tobacco Poster Designs in Nigeria: The British America Tobacco (BAT) is an international company that operates domestically in Nigeria but whose advertising posters seem to differ in content from the conventional advertisement that consumers are used to or familiar with and which to large extent, negate graphic communication practices. The posters under survey which hitherto fall within the ambit of three years (2009-2012) have their visual contents codified to make the messages incomprehensible. The research therefore set out to investigate the contentious unconventional style of BAT posters to find out whether the average consumer to whom the advertisements are directed, understands the message delivery. Data were collected based on purposive and cluster sampling technique with the respondents drawn from the general public. Questionnaire and interview methods of collecting data were employed using Hopkins (1980) statistical table and Adogbo‟s (2009) statistical formula to summarise the result. Quantitative and qualitative descriptive analyses were adopted to explain the findings and to draw up conclusions. The findings from the respondents prompted the redesign of the sampled BAT advertising posters based on their observation wherein, the identified problems were eliminated to improve the visual quality of the message delivery. The redesigned posters were subjected to a survey. Findings showed that, there was no difference between the message delivery and the consumers understanding of the message of the redesigned BAT posters. This implies that, the message deliveries were presented comprehensibly to be understood without necessarily having to temper with the graphic norms. Conclusively, it was established that, illustration that negates graphic communication norms tends to be misleading and deceptive.
An Assessment and Redesign of the British American Tobacco Poster Designs in Nigeria: The British America Tobacco (BAT) is an international company that operates domestically in Nigeria but whose advertising posters seem to differ in content from the conventional advertisement that consumers are used to or familiar with and which to large extent, negate graphic communication practices. The posters under survey which hitherto fall within the ambit of three years (2009-2012) have their visual contents codified to make the messages incomprehensible. The research therefore set out to investigate the contentious unconventional style of BAT posters to find out whether the average consumer to whom the advertisements are directed, understands the message delivery. Data were collected based on purposive and cluster sampling technique with the respondents drawn from the general public. Questionnaire and interview methods of collecting data were employed using Hopkins (1980) statistical table and Adogbo‟s (2009) statistical formula to summarise the result. Quantitative and qualitative descriptive analyses were adopted to explain the findings and to draw up conclusions. The findings from the respondents prompted the redesign of the sampled BAT advertising posters based on their observation wherein, the identified problems were eliminated to improve the visual quality of the message delivery. The redesigned posters were subjected to a survey. Findings showed that, there was no difference between the message delivery and the consumers understanding of the message of the redesigned BAT posters. This implies that, the message deliveries were presented comprehensibly to be understood without necessarily having to temper with the graphic norms. Conclusively, it was established that, illustration that negates graphic communication norms tends to be misleading and deceptive.
