PM History/2 - Legacy Tobacco Documents Library

PM history/15 INSERT
--PM ANNOUNCES 'MAJOR SCIENTIFIC BREAKTHROUGH, LEADING TO HIGH FLAVOR,
LOW TAR CIG,' 12-Yr research effort isolates high flavor constituents
in tob . smoke . . .9 mg. Merit introduced by PM following "most exhaustive
taste tests ever conducted by co," . .,Qress conf . 1__2-16-Zi= JFCIII introduces
w/plug for "full & satisfying flavor" adding " erit is lower in tar
than 98° of all cigs sold in US" ., . D center in Richmond did it d s
W~akeh ~ : , .-t~gb s~„~ .
y3""employing mod . filtration technology & rea.~oduca.ng thoseh £lavor
components s back into the blend, PM has achieved a full flavor in a 9 mg .
cig." I
(RK= ask EW re this) . . .Wakeham says a key to PM's going beyond prior
knowledge was "by innovativel~employing_the tecnoogy hl available thru
1 the mg_2e of two i,};s rumnts. w ~
nti£
nsxm'•:.
lat~_,n,_~g~m~o~s o'~ he i
s e exis~ . ~~ in
"'- moka~ e _ ---ie EI'
as chromato ravh & mass s ectrometer *~ u~
mean anything . * e a s tha,~ , gisolaing
the v~ .~,j,o : in
"WE LEARNED THATTHERE AR~ ~ M R ' . ~'~'A'S'2C"i+tiA'Vli`12"'t7N7
~
.'T ~~
TASTE WAY OUT OF PRO~RmtoN TO TAR," etd . ., e frui s of PM's mi lion
Research Tower on grounds of its giant operations center, Industrial Research
search mag dubs it Lab of the Yr for '74//WAKEHAM'S TEXTs as longas.~5
yrs earli.e ('60) "we beEan to reco ise a. t,-end to lower tare+-v cig,.
GUESSED THAT UNDRR_PR RE FROM HEALTH RITICS THE DOWNWARD
TREND WOULD CONTINUE ; so we addressed ourselves to the,p€obe of making
a low tar ci that was acce table to a broad spectrum of the smoking
public . . .panel tes ing en s owed that even a 15 mg cig "would meet a
lot of sales resistance becaise of its poor taste" & thus "IT WAS CLEAR
THAT IF WE WERE EVER GOING TO PRODUCE A LOW TAR CIG W/THE FULL BODIED
~ TRADITIONSL TOB . FZAVOR . . ,lye wo_ __haue tR.. Slo [cro s~-y~basic rese h~
brands w/10 mg or less were selling poorly . . .big team effort require~
see t3 how they broke down the task, evaluating various blend components
romf- arou~t e world, rhemis~s separatin4 smoke elements by smel
t~aste.flavor experts f`ocu . . .aoouz ~ yrs ago we oegan to see some''Alime5n
r o2' light," they observe that much of mainstream smoke "is not the product
of combustion processes (but) . . .rather the result of a distillation
process in which the high temp of the burning coal cooks out of the tob .
~ behind it many of the substances in the tob leaf . . . We began heating
t4_.~e~pbe1Qwo the,.k~ki?c~ .~J.rig
~ were . . . in extremel the ~esiraUle hi h aroma &`31 avor com on nts," etc .,
' so oun a~'~~iese same'"`~Yav'or" components- "'coul~"be` ~oun~ in a volatile
fraction of the so-called tar" (RK : they'd isolated it)/next breakthrough :
ble to uantitativel evalua e the flavor intensit of the com on s
in he flavor fraction of the smo e (the fractionation eing carried out
by a high resolution gas c roma ograph) . next ste e determined thQ
chemical structures of these flavor substan6~~°°'jT~3ng mxz xor low tars
was r~ying orow-u~s~~by taste failure, "We were also challenged
in this direction by a number of critics of the industry" who said
co .s had failed to respond to "the needs of the smoker as they saw them"/
to make Merit, PM sought tobaccos high in flavor, low in tar + "the total
engineering of the cig to yield low tar required efficient filtration,
k
the uee,,,,t2~,oorol7:w„Ix~?,ge aerating filtration systems" . . . "IN THIS ENTIRE
~ Pk"SC~L`'E:I3L~RE NOTHING NEW OR FOREIGN HAS BEEN ADDED -- JUST MORE OF THE -PRE-
FERRED ELEMENTS T T AL EXISTED N TOB . SMO "& calls dev . of Merit
~ "a grea s ep forward in tob . research" RE RCH CENTER : 250,000 sq ft,
has miniature production lines . . .430 scientrs s ec i i s
& admin personnel, O P R&D ept estab . 'S2, one o£ key contribution
was a 2opart smkg mac'Ine which established basic uniformity for worldwide
industry testing of cigs (in 'S9)///TASTE TEamTNG by firm of Canter,
Achenbaum, Heekin, Ine „ remarks by Alvin Achenbaum, says PM undertook
"what may well be of x carefully condticted consIImeT"'Yn=uRSe
p"ro3LY~'~"esting programs on a single program in commercial
history," . . .says he ws of "no co hat has ever retained i ed,
~ im 32 artialth' a researeh project for the sole purpose
of making sure" everything's on the up & up/interesting details b2 : how
cigs~,w~e~„re~acked~,,,~~es A,~.d~g~~ ..,,,,abuut--3 QOf~ &makers tPG+P~ & Merit reg .
~"VJ`as perceivea"~i~` reg, ~'il~er smokers to have more taste than the five
leading reg low tar filter brands tested, which deliver as much as 60% ~p
more tar/54ib of testees felt reg . Merit had more taste, 13% perceived p~
no diff ., 33% thought other brands tested had more taste . . .with Merit ~7
Menthol, ~O% thought Merit had more taste than others vs . which it was ._p
tested while 39% thought other brands had-more taste///Wash Post 5-6-76 p~
PM THRUSTS NEW CIG BRAND INTO FRAY : hvy promotion of low tars to make rn
money but also "to get off the defensive" . . .noting the ~i200 mi~~inn PM O~
~ p~lant in Richmond desi~ned by Gordor B+~nshaf+, every worker gets a free O~
? car~on biwee y, t ey can shop in co . store . . .HUOTING GORIi "I'm going
to take the bull by the horns & say yes, a person who smokes a cig of 5 mg
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