Imperial Tobacco

Encyclopedia : I : IM : IMP : Imperial Tobacco

Imperial Tobacco PLC (LSE: [IMT]) is the largest cigarette manufacturer in the UK (but the second largest UK based tobacco company by global sales after British American Tobacco), second largest in Germany and fourth worldwide, following its purchase of Reemtsma Cigarettenfabriken GmbH, adding brands such as Davidoff, Peter Stuyvesant and West to its line-up. The company's headquarters are in Bristol, England.

For the year ended 30 September 2004 Imperial Tobacco had turnover of £11.005 billion, or £3.032 billion excluding tobacco duty. It made profits before tax of £688 million and net profit of £445 million.

Contents

1 History
2 Cigarette brands
3 Other products
4 External links

History

Imperial Tobacco was created in 1901 from a merger of a number of British tobacco and cigarette companies who were being threatened by competition from the United States. The original merger was between W.D. & H.O. Wills of Bristol and Stephen Mitchel & Son of Glasgow. The company's first chairman was William Henry Wills of the Wills company. Later mergers swallowed Lambert & Butler, Wm Clarke & Son, John Player & Sons, Franklyn Davey company, Edwards Ringer, J & F Bell and F & J Smith.

In 1902 the then Imperial Tobacco Company and the American Tobacco Company agreed to form a joint venture, the British-American Tobacco Company Ltd. The parent companies agreed not to trade in each other's domestic territory and to assign trademarks, export businesses and overseas subsidiaries to the joint venture. American Tobacco sold its share in 1911 but Imperial maintained an interest until 1980.

In 1973, having become increasingly diversified (restaurant chains, food services and brands, distribution etc), Imperial Tobacco Company became Imperial Group Limited, later Imperial Group PLC. The company was acquired by the conglomerate Hanson Trust plc in 1986, who paid £2.5 billion for the group. Hanson undertook a major reorganisation of the group; divestitures netted £2.3 billion, leaving Hanson with the hugely profitable tobacco business for "next to nothing." These sales included:

Courage Limited to Elders
Golden Wonder to Dalgety
Finlays
Wholesaling arm of Sinclair and Collis
Imperial Hotels and Catering to Trust House Forte
Ross Frozen Foods to United Biscuits

In 1996, following a decision to concentrate on core activities Hanson demerged Imperial and it was listed as an independent company.

Cigarette brands

Davidoff - its leading premium brand
Embassy
Excellence
John Player Special (JPS)
Lambert & Butler - the UK's top selling brand
Peter Jackson (cigarettes)
Peter Stuyvesant
Prima - a cheap Eastern European brand
R1 - a very low tar & nicotine brand
Regal
Richmond
Route 66
Superkings
West - its leading brand

Other products

Drum 'roll-your-own' shag tobacco
Van Nelle 'roll-your-own' tobacco
Golden Virginia 'roll-your-own' tobacco
White Ox (Superior Dark Cigarette Tobacco) 'roll-your-own' tobacco
Rizla rolling paper

External links

From Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. Original article here. Support Wikipedia by contributing or donating.
All text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License See Wikipedia Copyrights for details.