[Federal Register Volume 79, Number 234 (Friday, December 5, 2014)]
[Notices]
[Pages 72176-72178]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2014-28597]


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FEDERAL TRADE COMMISSION


Agency Information Collection Activities; Submission for OMB 
Review; Comment Request

AGENCY: Federal Trade Commission (``FTC'' or ``Commission'').

ACTION: Notice.

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SUMMARY: The information collection requirements described below will 
be submitted to the Office of Management and Budget (``OMB'') for 
review, as required by the Paperwork Reduction Act (``PRA''). The FTC 
seeks public comments on proposed information requests by compulsory 
process to a combined ten or more of the largest cigarette 
manufacturers and smokeless tobacco manufacturers. The information 
sought would include, among other things, data on manufacturer annual 
sales and marketing expenditures. The current FTC clearance from the 
OMB to conduct such information collection expires January 31, 2015. 
The Commission intends to ask OMB for renewed three-year clearance to 
collect this information.

DATES: Comments must be submitted by January 5, 2015.

ADDRESSES: Interested parties may file a comment online or on paper, by 
following the instructions in the Request for Comment part of the 
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION section below. Write ``Tobacco Reports: 
Paperwork Comment, FTC File No. P054507'' on your comment. File your 
comment online at https://ftcpublic.commentworks.com/ftc/tobaccoreportspra2 by following the instructions on the web-based form. 
If you prefer to file your comment on paper, mail your comment to the 
following address: Federal Trade Commission, Office of the Secretary, 
600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW., Suite CC-5610 (Annex J), Washington, DC 
20580, or deliver your comment to the following address: Federal Trade 
Commission, Office of the Secretary, Constitution Center, 400 7th 
Street SW., 5th Floor, Suite 5610 (Annex J), Washington, DC 20024.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Requests for additional information 
should be addressed to Shira Modell, Division of Advertising Practices, 
Bureau of Consumer Protection, Federal Trade Commission, 600 
Pennsylvania Avenue NW., Mailstop CC-10528, Washington, DC 20580. 
Telephone: (202) 326-3116.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: 
    Title: FTC Cigarette and Smokeless Tobacco Data Collection.
    OMB Control Number: 3084-0134.
    Type of Review: Extension of currently approved collection.
    On August 13, 2014, the Commission sought comment on the 
information collection requirements associated with the Cigarette and 
Smokeless Tobacco Data Collection. 79 FR 47463 (``August 13, 2014 
Notice''). Pursuant to the OMB regulations, 5 CFR part 1320, that 
implement the PRA, 44 U.S.C. 3501 et seq., the FTC is providing a 
second opportunity for the public to comment while seeking OMB approval 
to renew the pre-existing clearance for the information the FTC 
proposes to seek from cigarette manufacturers and smokeless tobacco 
manufacturers.
    In response to the August 13, 2014 Notice, the Commission received 
comments from Altria Client Services (``Altria''), the Campaign for 
Tobacco-Free Kids (``CTFK''), Legacy, and Professor M. Jane Lewis 
(``Lewis'') of the Rutgers School of Public Health.
    Three of the comments (Legacy, Lewis, and CTFK) specifically noted 
the utility and importance of the Commission's Cigarette and Smokeless 
Tobacco Reports, and urged the agency to continue collection and 
reporting industry sales and marketing expenditure data.\1\ Legacy and 
CTFK also noted that these data are not available from other sources.
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    \1\ CTFK and Legacy also urged the Commission to collect and 
report sales and marketing data for cigars and electronic 
cigarettes, as well as for conventional tobacco cigarettes and 
smokeless tobacco. CTFK, at 2-3; Legacy, at 5-6. The Commission will 
consider those recommendations.
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    Three of the commenters (Altria, CTFK, and Legacy) responded to 
questions raised in the Commission's 60-day notice concerning the 
future collection of data on cigarette tar, nicotine, and carbon 
monoxide yields. Altria stated that the Commission should not require 
the manufacturers to provide yield data on all varieties of cigarettes 
they sell and should cease requiring the cigarette manufacturers to 
report any smoke constituent data, given the Food and Drug 
Administration's (``FDA'') new statutory authority to collect such 
data. Altria stated further that if the Commission retains or expands 
the existing reporting requirements (which require the companies to 
provide yield data only for those varieties for which such data already 
exist), it should require all cigarette manufacturers, not just the 
major companies, to submit those data. Altria, at 3.
    CTFK acknowledged that tar, nicotine, and carbon monoxide yield 
data may be important for researchers and regulatory agencies, but 
noted that ``the tobacco industry's history of manipulating this self-
reported data raises concerns about its accuracy and validity,'' and 
urged the Commission to coordinate with FDA ``to establish a coherent 
set of product testing requirements that will best serve the statutory 
missions of both agencies.'' CTFK, at 3.
    Legacy encouraged the Commission to cease its collection and 
reporting of these cigarette yield data, citing their potential to 
mislead consumers about health risks, the limitations of existing 
testing methodologies to produce yield results consistent with those 
actually experienced by smokers, and the ``potential unintended 
consequences among people of low literacy and low numeracy'' to 
understand information on smoke constituent yields. Legacy, at 2-3. 
Instead, Legacy noted, the Commission and the FDA should work together 
to determine the best methodology for determining the yields of harmful 
or potentially harmful smoke constituents, and the best means of 
disseminating that information in a way that protects public health.
    The FTC and FDA staff have long worked together on the many areas 
where the two agencies share jurisdiction, and the Commission fully 
expects this tradition to continue now that the agencies share 
jurisdiction over cigarettes and smokeless tobacco. The Commission 
further agrees that FDA should be the primary agency to determine the 
best test methodology. The Commission is not aware, however, of another 
means of preserving the existing record of cigarette yield trends 
unless it continues to collect these data. Freedom of Information Act 
requests filed with the Commission also suggest that researchers remain 
interested in these data. Accordingly, the Commission intends to 
continue collecting the data to the extent recipients of the 6(b) 
Orders possess them.\2\
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    \2\ The Commission will consider Altria's recommendation that 
all cigarette manufacturers be required to provide yield data if the 
major manufacturers are required to do so, although it believes that 
the five major cigarette manufacturers that have received its Orders 
in recent years already represent at least 95% of domestic cigarette 
sales.

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[[Page 72177]]

    Two commenters (CTFK and Lewis) suggested modifications to the 
Commission's reports. CTFK recommended that the Commission: (1) Report 
price discount expenditures for retailers and wholesalers separately; 
(2) clarify the definitions of certain expenditure categories--
specifically, in which category coupons obtained online are to be 
counted; (3) report data on a company-specific or brand-specific basis, 
rather than on a fully aggregated basis, and on a state-level basis, as 
well as nationally; and (4) require manufacturers to report 
expenditures related to corporate sponsorships and advertisements, and 
expenditures related to promotion of their youth tobacco prevention 
programs. CTFK, at 2.
    The Commission agrees that separating the existing category for 
price discounts (which have accounted for more than 70% of cigarette 
industry expenditures and more than 20% of smokeless tobacco industry 
expenditures in recent years) into two separate categories would be 
useful, and consistent with past decisions to disaggregate certain 
expenditure categories when they represent a significant proportion of 
overall spending.\3\ Regarding CTFK's suggestion that data be reported 
on other than a fully aggregated, nationwide basis, the cigarette and 
smokeless tobacco companies assert that those data are confidential 
and, as CTFK acknowledges, the Commission cannot publicly release trade 
secrets or certain commercial or financial information. Id. at 2 n.2. 
CTFK's contention that much of the information that the companies claim 
to be confidential is actually available from other sources seems 
inconsistent with its assertion that:
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    \3\ For example, the Commission reported spending on a single 
``promotional allowances'' category through 2001, at which time 
separate categories were created for price discounts and promotional 
allowances paid to retailers, wholesalers, and others.

The FTC is currently the primary source for data on cigarette and 
smokeless tobacco companies' marketing and promotional expenditures. 
No other agency collects and publishes such information directly 
from the companies, making the FTC reports the most accurate and 
reliable assessment of tobacco marketing and promotion expenditures 
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available.

Id. at 1. Similarly, when the Commission has previously inquired about 
the feasibility of requiring expenditures to be reported on a state-by-
state basis, rather than nationally, the major cigarette companies have 
stated that this was not possible. The Commission again asks for 
comment on this question.
    The Commission already requires the recipients of its 6(b) Orders 
to report certain expenditures made in the name of the company, rather 
than any of its brands,\4\ although it does not include them in its 
Cigarette and Smokeless Tobacco Reports. The Commission will consider 
whether those expenditures should be reported in the future. Similarly, 
the companies do report to the Commission the amount they spend on 
advertising directed to youth or their parents that are intended to 
reduce youth smoking or smokeless tobacco use (depending on the Order). 
The Commission includes this information in the textual portions of its 
industry Reports (unless only one company reported such spending), not 
in the annual expenditure-by-category tables.
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    \4\ Both the cigarette and smokeless tobacco Orders require 
submission of data on ``Public entertainment events (including, but 
not limited to, concerts and sporting events) bearing or otherwise 
displaying the name of the Company or any variation thereof but not 
bearing or otherwise displaying the name, logo, or an image of any 
portion of the package'' of any of its cigarettes or smokeless 
tobacco products, or otherwise referring to those products.
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    Lewis noted that the Commission's reports do not define the term 
``expenditure,'' and she recommended that the reports clearly state 
what costs (e.g., contracted outside services, in-house costs, and 
personnel) are covered. Lewis, at 2. The Commission agrees that this 
would be a useful addition to its Reports.
    Lewis stated that the Commission's reports underestimate direct 
mail spending because the costs of items distributed by direct mail 
(e.g., coupons and specialty items) are reported in other categories, 
and recommended that the Commission require the companies to include 
the costs of those items in their calculations of their direct mail 
expenditures.\5\ Lewis also recommended that the Commission clarify 
whether spending for brand-specific Web sites should be reported as 
advertising on the company's Web site, or as spending on the Internet 
other than on the company's own Web site, and specify whether 
expenditures for electronic mail messages should be reported as direct 
mail or as advertising on the Internet other than on the company's own 
Internet Web site.\6\ Lewis, at 2-3.
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    \5\ As noted above, CTFK also asked about the reporting of 
coupons obtained online.
    \6\ Lewis correctly noted that the category for spending other 
than on the company's Web site specifically references ``direct mail 
advertising using electronic mail messages.'' Based on her review of 
recent Commission reports, however, she questioned whether the 
companies might actually be reporting those costs as direct mail.
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    The Commission will clarify in future Orders that spending on 
brand-specific Web sites should be counted as spending on the company's 
Web sites. However, the Commission does not believe that its Orders 
should distinguish between, for example, expenditures on coupons 
delivered through direct mail and coupons delivered by other means. The 
full impact of couponing by the major cigarette and smokeless tobacco 
manufacturers can be seen only if expenditures for all coupons are 
reported together, regardless of how those coupons are delivered to 
consumers.
    The Commission believes that its Orders have been clear that 
spending on electronic mail messages should be reported as advertising 
expenditures on the Internet other than on the company's Web site, and 
that the absence of reported expenditures does not mean that those 
costs are being categorized incorrectly.\7\ However, Lewis's comment 
raises a question about whether spending on electronic mail messages 
should continue to be reported in the ``other Internet'' category or 
should be reported as direct mail expenditures. The Commission requests 
comment on that question.
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    \7\ For example, companies do not report the costs of employing 
full-time employees. If those employees are producing the electronic 
mail messages, their salaries would not show up in the companies' 
submissions to the Commission.
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    Finally, the Commission requests comment on two additional 
subjects: (1) Its intention to have the cigarette and smokeless tobacco 
companies that receive these Orders submit two separate datafiles (one 
containing sales-related data, the other containing data on marketing 
expenditures), rather than one; and (2) whether it should cease 
collecting expenditure data on transit advertising.
    The Commission's Orders require that sales data be reported in 
actual dollars, while advertising and promotional expenditures are 
reported in thousands of dollars; sales data are also reported for each 
individual variety of cigarette and smokeless tobacco sold by the 
company, while expenditure data are reported at the brand level. The 
Commission believes that requiring the recipients of these Orders to 
submit separate datafiles for sales and marketing expenditure data will 
both help avoid errors in the preparation of the companies' submissions 
and expedite the agency staff's processing of those data, without 
imposing additional costs on the Order recipients.

[[Page 72178]]

    The Commission has collected and reported data on transit 
advertising (currently defined as ``advertising on or within private or 
public vehicles and all advertisements placed at, on or within any bus 
stop, taxi stand, transportation waiting area, train station, airport 
or any other transportation facility'') for decades. However, the 1998 
Tobacco Master Settlement Agreement prohibited transit advertising, and 
the major cigarette manufacturers have reported no such spending since 
2000, while the major smokeless tobacco companies have never reported 
any transit spending.\8\
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    \8\ See Federal Trade Commission Cigarette Report for 2011 
(2013), at Tables 2B--2E, available at http://www.ftc.gov/sites/default/files/documents/reports/federal-trade-commission-cigarette-report-2011/130521cigarettereport.pdf; Federal Trade Commission 
Smokeless Tobacco Report for 2011 (2013), at Tables 3B--3H, 
available at http://www.ftc.gov/reports/federal-trade-commission-smokeless-tobacco-report-2011.
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    Burden Statement: \9\
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    \9\ The details and assumptions underlying these estimates were 
set forth in the August 13, 2014 Federal Register notice.
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    Estimated Annual Burden: 2,100 hours.\10\
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    \10\ The Commission intends to use this PRA clearance renewal to 
collect information from the companies concerning their marketing 
and sales activities for the years 2014, 2015, and 2016. The 
Commission expects to issue compulsory process orders seeking this 
information annually, but it is possible that orders might not be 
issued in any given year and that orders seeking information for two 
years would be issued the next year. The figures set forth in this 
notice for the estimated hours and labor costs associated with this 
information collection represent average annual burden over the 
course of the prospective PRA clearance.
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    Estimated Number of Respondents: 15 maximum.
    The estimated number of respondents include any time spent by 
separately incorporated subsidiaries and other entities affiliated with 
the ultimate parent company that has received the information request.
    Estimated Average Burden per Year per Respondent: 140 hours.
    (a) Information requests to the five largest cigarette companies 
and five largest smokeless tobacco companies, at a per company average 
each year of 180 hours = 1,800 hours, cumulatively, per year; and
    (b) Information requests to five additional respondents, of smaller 
size, at a per company average each year of 60 hours = 300 hours, 
cumulatively, per year.
    Estimated Annual Labor Cost: $210,000.
    Estimated Capital or Other Non-Labor Cost: de minimis.
    Request for Comment:
    You can file a comment online or on paper. For the FTC to consider 
your comment, we must receive it on or before January 5, 2015. Write 
``Tobacco Reports: Paperwork Comment, FTC File No. P054507'' on your 
comment. Your comment--including your name and your state--will be 
placed on the public record of this proceeding, including, to the 
extent practicable, on the public Commission Web site, at http://www.ftc.gov/os/publiccomments.shtm. As a matter of discretion, the 
Commission tries to remove individuals' home contact information from 
comments before placing them on the Commission Web site.
    Because your comment will be made public, you are solely 
responsible for making sure that your comment does not include any 
sensitive personal information, like anyone's Social Security number, 
date of birth, driver's license number or other state identification 
number or foreign country equivalent, passport number, financial 
account number, or credit or debit card number. You are also solely 
responsible for making sure that your comment does not include any 
sensitive health information, like medical records or other 
individually identifiable health information. In addition, do not 
include any ``[t]rade secret or any commercial or financial information 
which is obtained from any person and which is privileged or 
confidential . . ., '' as provided in Section 6(f) of the FTC Act, 15 
U.S.C. 46(f), and FTC Rule 4.10(a)(2), 16 CFR 4.10(a)(2). If you want 
the Commission to give your comment confidential treatment, you must 
file it in paper form, with a request for confidential treatment, and 
you have to follow the procedure explained in FTC Rule 4.9(c), 16 CFR 
4.9(c).\11\ Your comment will be kept confidential only if the FTC 
General Counsel grants your request in accordance with the law and the 
public interest.
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    \11\ In particular, the written request for confidential 
treatment that accompanies the comment must include the factual and 
legal basis for the request, and must identify the specific portions 
of the comment to be withheld from the public record. See FTC Rule 
4.9(c), 16 CFR 4.9(c).
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    Postal mail addressed to the Commission is subject to delay due to 
heightened security screening. As a result, we encourage you to submit 
your comments online, or to send them to the Commission by courier or 
overnight service. To make sure that the Commission considers your 
online comment, you must file it at https://ftcpublic.commentworks.com/ftc/tobaccoreportspra2 by following the instructions on the web-based 
form. If this Notice appears at http://www.regulations.gov/#!home, you 
also may file a comment through that Web site.
    If you file your comment on paper, write ``Tobacco Reports: 
Paperwork Comment, FTC File No. P054507'' on your comment and on the 
envelope, and mail it to the following address: Federal Trade 
Commission, Office of the Secretary, 600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW., Suite 
CC-5610 (Annex J), Washington, DC 20580, or deliver your comment to the 
following address: Federal Trade Commission, Office of the Secretary, 
Constitution Center, 400 7th Street SW., 5th Floor, Suite 5610 (Annex 
J), Washington, DC 20024. If possible, submit your paper comment to the 
Commission by courier or overnight service.
    The FTC Act and other laws that the Commission administers permit 
the collection of public comments to consider and use in this 
proceeding as appropriate. The Commission will consider all timely and 
responsive public comments that it receives on or before January 5, 
2015. For information on the Commission's privacy policy, including 
routine uses permitted by the Privacy Act, see http://www.ftc.gov/ftc/privacy.htm. For supporting documentation and other information 
underlying the PRA discussion in this Notice, see http://www.reginfo.gov/public/jsp/PRA/praDashboard.jsp.
    Comments on the information collection requirements subject to 
review under the PRA should additionally be submitted to OMB. If sent 
by U.S. mail, they should be addressed to Office of Information and 
Regulatory Affairs, Office of Management and Budget, Attention: Desk 
Officer for the Federal Trade Commission, New Executive Office 
Building, Docket Library, Room 10102, 725 17th Street NW., Washington, 
DC 20503. Comments sent to OMB by U.S. postal mail, however, are 
subject to delays due to heightened security precautions. Thus, 
comments instead should be sent by facsimile to (202) 395-5806.

David C. Shonka,
Principal Deputy General Counsel.
[FR Doc. 2014-28597 Filed 12-4-14; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 6750-01-P