Imperial to Close Factories in UK and France

My wife used to love Gauloises nails, along with Camels. I'm a fan of Altadis, notably at present their

aromatics and Cavendish. And I make an annual pilgrimage to J-R for tins of pipe tobacco. I hope they

keep supplying the products I know and love.
My wife, years ago, went to a newsstand near her workplace in NYC and asked for the daily racing form and a pack of

Camels, and the clerk called to his assistant, "Pack 'a camels and a bible."

Another blow for French smokers, sacre bleu.

The Beeb has an article on this as well.

Nice to see that the Brits have moved beyond just circling the drain.

Philip Morris has announced a week ago that hey will shut down their factory here in The Netherlands. 1200 employees get fired and double that number for people from the cleaning, transport companies etc. Now they are going to Spain where the salaries are lower (they don't say this is the reason of course). The Dutch employees shot themselves in the foot at the beginning of the year by striking for a higher salary..

Arno, only companies can be greedy, not people. Didn't you know that?

Shame you linked that article. Typical of the guardian to try blame the tobacconist for it being so sheerly uneconomical to ruin a tobacco business in the UK for laying off jobs. Shame the business is closing and jobs are being lost, but they should try blame the UK government for driving overheads for tobacco companies so far above standard businesses. Not fit to wipe my arse on isn't that paper.

Arno, only companies can be greedy, not people. Didn't you know that?

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Well, I know enough people who are greedy so.. :? But I think I know what you are trying to say. Philip Morris made a profit with the Dutch factory. They only wanted more profit.. The Dutch employees wanted more money, so they relocated.

Well, businesses are, in general, in business to make money. This comes as a rude shock to some people. And if they can not make money, they either change their operating practices or cease to be in business. Unlike government, which exists to a large extent solely to spend other people's money that it has taken by decree, a business has to continue to attract customers, and their money, by the customer's choice. When customers stop choosing to buy a product or service, then things have to change.
In other words, businesses do not exist to serve customers. They exist to make money. Businesses serve customers solely in order to take their money. I just don't understand why some people have trouble understanding that.
BTW, Arno, you have a kick-ass website. Thank you.

For examples of greed on both sides one only needs to look at Detroit ,or what is left of it . :crazy:

I'm not sure how to react to this news, of course I'm somewhat saddened, but it's the ultramodern Horizon factory they're closing, so it really doesn't tie in with pipe tobacco, and it seems Imperial may actually come out better financially in the end?
Anyway, this is what happens when a business is facing an extremely hostile environment, like woodsroad said, but I would add that many businesses are also about family and the extended families of their workers.
The UK tobacco industry was very progressive regarding the social welfare of their employees, much more so than any of their contemporaries in late Victorian England - whatever misgivings one might have about industrial paternalism, I think this fact should be noted.
It was some time ago that the proper Player's factory closed, that is the Castle factory, and pipe tobacco production of Player's brands was shifted to another Imperial arm, Ogden's of Liverpool.
circa 1984,

Ogden's was still producing a wide variety of the good stuff, like:
Aintree Mixture

Bulwark

Capstan

Digger

Grand Cut

No Name

Cut Golden Bar

Walnut Player's Navy

Exmoor Hunt

Redbreast

Player's Whiskey

Tom Long

Royal Hunt

Sherwood Flake

St. Julien

St. Bruno
The Ogden's factory was closed sometime around 2007, I think?
The only surviving pipe tobaccos were St. Bruno and Walnut, which were (and still are) farmed out to Orlik (STG) in Denmark.
Tony Benn's favorite baccy was St. Bruno, yet he was an avowed socialist, did he lament the dismantling of the UK tobacco industry I wonder? Did he care that his beloved St. Bruno was no longer made on British soil?

“The train to Sheffield is the one that Benn takes to Chesterfield, and everyone from the passengers to the ticket collector greeted him like an old friend. We sat in a non-smoking carriage, but Benn opened his briefcase and took out an old BR sticker that read "smoking" and placed it smack on top of the "non-smoking" sign on the window pane. He held up his pipe: "No one minds, do they?" he asked of the carriage at large. A chorus of "Go ahead Tony" greeted him: rules simply don't apply to Benn. “

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The consequences of social engineering are of a bad sort and often aren't felt until all is lost.
I read this report on a few different sites, reading the comments section makes my blood boil.
At HuffpostUK one would expect to see the busybodies in full force, but when I read this comment I LOL'd, I had thought it was clever irony, I then sadly realized this guy was dead serious, a mindset like his will lead to doom for us all...

"A complete and total Labour victory, saving countless lives and eventually trillions of pounds and dollars. The Conservatives fought the ever tightening tobacco restrictions put in place by Labour tooth and nail but once passed here in the UK, such restrictions were taken up by the United States as good Policy and for the betterment of us all. Killed the Pub industry, but those closures were worth the lives saved. Labour should be forever remembered and praised for the bravery and wisdom of getting millions off the addiction of tobacco."

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Not only is he misinformed, but he is lacking logic.
This comment is much more on point:

And predictably, all the anti-smoking zealots crawl out like lice from under the woodwork to gloat and cheer and spew out their braying bullshit bollocks.
I don't smoke, but I'd rather spend a day in a smoky room full of 60 a day people than waste five minutes with the likes of you boring bloody bastards.
Pipe down and have a wank or something.

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I agree that the press are often the quisling wormtongues of utter idiocy,

but The Daily Mail did a pretty good job, going a bit more in depth:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2605804/Stubbed-Nottingham-factory-shutdown-marks-gasp-thriving-British-tobacco-industry-gave-cigarette-girls-cards-thousands-jobs-cost.html
Nottingham Post did a good job too,

http://www.nottinghampost.com/tobacco-industry-played-vital-Nottingham-s/story-20965749-detail/story.html
Similar to the Gallaher's Girls, the female workers at Player's had a nickname too, the Player's Angels.


Here's a really good Player's related slideshow:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/50284741@N02/4906606685/in/photostream/
And an interesting advertising archive article:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/local/nottingham/hi/people_and_places/history/newsid_8377000/8377101.stm




Lest we forget.

My caps off to you, lowercase....

lowercase, I hate to get political, but you've hit right on the money there. My father never has, and never will vote tory because they decimated the industry of vast areas of northern England (where I'm from). Equally, I'll never vote labour because of their offensively leftist agenda, matched with the equally offensive attitude towards civil liberties, i.e, smoking and drinking.
People in the pub were bemoaning the 'patronising' 1p/pint reduction in beer duty under our tory government, and I had to just stand and scoff at anyone willing to complain about a price reduction, however small, and yet won't turn a blind eye to tobacco and fuel duty rising far above inflation under ten years of labour leadership.
It is a shame the nottingham factory closed, though inevitable. Twenty odd years of tax increases for tobacco (led majorly by labour) makes it impossible to run a tobacco manufacturing business in Britain, and the worst of it is, it's political suicide to ever lower the tobacco duty, so this is just the beginning of the end.

The Dutch employees shot themselves in the foot at the beginning of the year by striking for a higher salary.

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Employees always do, as a quick history of the American auto industry will reveal... "it sounds good" is not equal to "it will end well."

Deathmetal, I agree with you wholeheartedly. I will add a qualifier, though. Workers react based on their knowledge of the situation. It is the failure of the American educational system, that workers are often led around by the nose, gonads and pocketbook, and generally fail to think critically. As a former union organizer and contract negotiator, I've seen it all go down. Mostly down.

Unions are the inevitable downfall of the American worker. They were needed when wages were paid by companies that printed their own money that was only good in their own shops. I make $12 an hour and do well for myself. No Union needed.