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Non-Tech : Philip Morris - A Stock For Wealth Or Poverty (MO) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Jim Oravetz who wrote (6298)	11/29/2001 5:35:06 AM
From: Theo Karantsalis	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 6439

Hi Jim, Didn't we predict this would be the course a couple years back? I guess the big question now is how long this will be tied up in the court system. Doc, et al, Check out the latest: jitneyads.com On our 'wall of fame' you can see a framed photo of Philip Morris exec (below Kramer). Peace, Theo

To: Jim Oravetz who wrote (6298)	12/4/2001 12:56:09 PM
From: Jim Oravetz	Respond to of 6439

Philip Morris Launches 'M,'New Holiday Tobacco Blend By GORDON FAIRCLOUGH Staff Reporter of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL Running out of Christmas gift ideas? Philip Morris Cos. is selling a new cigarette just for the holidays. It's called M, and the company is touting it with the slogan "A Special Blend for a Special Season." To promote the brand, Philip Morris is decking the halls of convenience stores and other retailers with signs that have green and red paisley backgrounds reminiscent of gift-wrapping paper. One says: "Season's Greetings from Marlboro Country." The company says it will sell the cigarettes through the end of the year and hopes they will lure smokers away from rival brands during the holidays. "It's really intended to create some extra excitement in the marketplace," says Michael Pfeil, a Philip Morris spokesman. But antitobacco activists are livid. "It's selling cancer for Christmas," says Matthew L. Myers, president of the Washington-based Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids. Mr. Myers says his group plans to ask Philip Morris to withdraw the product and is considering placing ads attacking the company's new marketing campaign. He quips that the slogan should be: "M is for murder." Mr. Pfeil responds: "We're committed to acting responsibly in the way we market our products to adult smokers and that includes the way we're marketing the special blend." M's arrival comes as Philip Morris and other big tobacco makers fight to maintain their share of the U.S. premium cigarette market, where profit margins are fattest. Competition has become especially fierce in the wake of sharp price increases related to the companies' $246 billion in legal settlements with state governments. So far, the higher-priced premium brands, like Marlboro, have held their own. But companies worry that smokers, especially in these recessionary times, could start trading down to a growing number of low-price competitors. Philip Morris is not the only cigarette maker to try to stretch one of its top-end brands to hold on to customers. R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Holdings Inc. this year has launched a new menthol version of Camel, called Turkish Jade, as well as an updated Winston, known as S2. As a result, some analysts suspect that M, which contains a different tobacco blend than Marlboro, won't disappear after the New Year. Bonnie Herzog, a tobacco analyst at Credit Suisse First Boston, believes that the holiday promotion is actually a market test for a year-round extension of Philip Morris's flagship Marlboro. She points to M's packaging, which is decidedly more hip than festive, and predicts that Philip Morris could try to turn M into a more upscale, edgier offshoot of Marlboro. The new smokes are sold in slick, black boxes emblazoned with the signature chevron of the New York company's top-selling Marlboro brand -- tilted at a jaunty angle -- and the initial "M." Ms. Herzog speculates that Philip Morris might eventually try to position M as a "super premium" brand and sell it at a higher price than regular Marlboro. But Mr. Pfeil, the Philip Morris spokesman, denies that the company has long-term plans for M. "It's a very limited promotional offering for adults who choose to smoke," he says. Marlboro is the nation's best-selling cigarette brand, accounting for more than one in three cigarettes sold in the U.S. Philip Morris' extensive distribution network has helped Marlboro boost its retail market share to 38.4% in the third quarter from 36.8% a year earlier, according to Ms. Herzog. Philip Morris isn't doing any mass-market advertising for the new cigarette, relying instead on signs in stores and mailings to adult smokers. But one trade-magazine ad tells retailers that M "will surely get your store and adult smokers in the spirit of the season." Special packaging for holiday cigarettes became common as early as the 1920s and remained popular for decades, when cigarettes were a common gift, before largely being phased out in the late 1960s and early 1970s. R.J. Reynolds often printed cartons in red and green and used holiday emblems such as bells and Christmas ornaments. One year, the packaging featured a red-brick house with a snow-covered roof. Around Christmastime in the 1960s and 1970s, Brown & Williamson Tobacco Corp. packed cigarettes in cartons decorated with holly leaves and the phrase "Happy Holidays." The company, now a unit of British American Tobacco PLC, doesn't do that anymore. But for two years, it has sold packs of Kool cigarettes with special plastic wrappers for Mardi Gras in New Orleans. Spokesman Mark Smith says it is considering similar promotions tied to special events in other locales. Michael Washo, owner of Carolina Tobacco Emporium in Enfield, Conn., says that M customers who have tried the new cigarette like it better than regular Marlboro. "It's a great product with a nice package," he says. Still, he says M hasn't done as well as he expected. Mr. Washo blamed the lackluster performance on Philip Morris's failure to give the new brand a proper send-off.