Just spend a few hundred…million, that is

“Hey, Phil.” Morris caught the attention of his brother as they exited the revolving glass doors at a major bank building. “Hold on. I want to ask you something.”

“Sure,” Phil said. “What’s up?”

“Everything is up,” Morris replied, “but I was thinking especially about our new research center.”

[The new Philip Morris Center for Research
and Technology in Richmond, VA]

“Quite a bird, isn’t it?” Phil said. “What did you want to ask me?”

Morris: “Well, you were at the meeting when the board decided to spend $350 million for the Center for Research and Technology.’

“That I was. What a beautiful beast. Morris, we have close to half a million square feet for offices and laboratories and…”

“…And investing in the future.”

“Exactly.”

“That’s what I wanted to ask you about, Phil. How in the world can we make billions of dollars in the future if people stop smoking?”

“You must have dozed off at that point in the presentation. The point is that we’re going to pay serious attention to people’s health concerns. We’re going to take the health risk out of tobacco.”

“We’re going to make tobacco a health product? You’ve got to be kidding!”

“Not exactly. We’re going to go one better. We’re going to market our cigarettes as less risky than they’ve ever been. That’s a lot easier than making smoking a health trip, and it will work.”

Morris chewed his lips for a moment. “But will they really be less risky?”

“Depends on how you measure risk,” Phil replied. “By some measurement, in some way, using some pieces of technology and some set of marketing terms, yes. We can make tobacco that has less of a health risk.”

“Or make it seem to be less risky.”

“It’s all in the eye of the beholder,” Philip replied. “You know what, bro?”

Morris: “No, what?”

“I’m getting tired of people blaming all these diseases and deaths on the nicotine in cigarettes. It just isn’t there. Isn’t!”

“Right! The nicotine doesn’t kill you, just makes you addicted so you hit on four thousand or so chemicals that give you cancer.”

“You’ve got in in big letters.”

Morris was still puzzled: “So what are we going to do about it? Figure out a way to get the nicotine without getting the tar and all those other bad things as well?”

“Something like that. You know there’s always the skeptic who comes along and says if we get rid of a thousand of those bad chemicals it’s like falling out a 7-story building instead of a 10-story building.”

“And it’s not that easy to get rid of even a dozen or two of them. Talk is cheap. Advertising sells. Research is credible. I get it. Hey, thanks for the info, bro. Now give me some advice for facing the future, okay?”

“Sure. Never underestimate the willingness of the public to smoke more or not quit if they think the health risks are down. That’s the power of nicotine.”

“Sounds like we win whichever way the wind blows.”

Links:
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Presented by Griffith Publishing

Adoption papers for Phil and Morris

Phil and Morris were talking the other day about changes in their business.

“You know,” Phil said as he took a long draw on a cigarette, “our names are getting us in trouble.”

“Not any more,” Morris countered. “We aren’t the Philip Morris company any more. Now we’re the Altria Group.”

Phil sputtered. “Oh, yeah. That’s right. I keep forgetting we’ve been brought into the Altria family. That happened three years ago, didn’t it?”

“Yes, it did, but you know what? I don’t think it matters one bit. The name change is pure PR,” Morris said. “The brand names of our products is what sells.”

“Like Marlboro,” Phil said with a chuckle. “Did you know that more kids smoke our Marlboro brand cigarettes in this country than all other brands combined?”

“Get ‘em young and get ‘em good,” Morris said.

“Really, Morris,” Phil said. “We’re going to keep our names associated with tobacco products. The Altria Group name, that’s just for window dressing.”

“Right. And all that matters is that they’re buying a Philip-Morris brand.”

“Like Marlboro.”

Philip and Morris are doing fine, thank you!

Philip and Morris were having lunch the other day.

“How are we doing, Phil?” Morris said as he flipped a piece of distintegrating ash into a silver receptacle.

“Not bad,” Phil replied. “Not bad at all. Take a look at these numbers.” Phil rolled out a spread sheet, and Morris leaned over to get a better look. Phil carefully moved his hand holding a cigarette away from the flammable papers.

“Wow!” Morris said. “Is this for real? Look at that. With all the hoopla about cancer and smoking and all the programs trying to get people to quit, whaddya know? Since we spun off from Altria this year we’ve sold $15.6 billion worth of tobacco products! What about that?”

“Looks good. Same quarter the year before we sold just $13.2 billion.”

“Better than that, bro. Our net profit, what we take home in our collective pockets, was $1.86 billion for the same quarter this year, up from $1.47 billion in 2007.”

“Not to get gruesome about it,” Phil said, taking a drag on his cigarette and then pushing into the fine pile of sand in the silver ash tray, “but in a crazy way we’re also helping with the overpopulation problem.”

“How so?”

“Well, you and I both know that for every 100 smokers, 50 to 67 of them will die from the habit.”

“I’ve heard that number,” Morris replied. “I’ve also heard that half of the folks who die from smoking pass on before age 69.”

“That’s not all good,” Phil said. “Once they die, they quit smoking. Forget the population problem, Morris. Let’s get real.”

“Yeah, you’re right. We’ve got to work harder on the kids and teenagers. They’ll last a little longer smoking two packs a day, and some of them will keep on smoking for their whole life of maybe 65-70 years.”

“All in all, we’re winning the fight,” Phil said. “Our lobbyists have state and national legislators scared to pieces to do anything about dying or getting sick from tobacco because they can’t afford to lose the money they get when we sell cigarettes. The more America smokes, the more jobs and money we provide. It’s nice being the Number One seller of tobacco products,” Phil added. “We have 15.7 percent of the world market outside of the U.S. Plenty of marketing growth out there. “

“Even the undertakers win,” Morris said.