Norwich Bulletin Newspaper, January 30, 1917, Page 9

i pe— fl. i FH i i S %’ § g e g:_': At the packing tables These girls throw aside any cigarettes m-uu-‘f'-ump-m Passing ameng the packing tebles, a score of exmmin of the cigaretics put up by each O every A statement byThe AmencanTohacco We have been asked how ic is pos- sible to make a high grade cigarette of fine Turkish and Ameri- can tobacco for only five cents a package. Here are the facts—we. beliesve the public has a right to know them. Sixteen years ago, three Turks came to New York from Egypt with a few bales of Turkish Tobacco. They rented a small store on Broadway and began to make and sell their-cigarcttes. ‘This was the beginning of the Turkish cigarette business in this country. Till then there were no Turkish cigarettes on the market. The only big scllers were made of American tobacco. The new Turkish cigarettes caught on well at first—they had a rich flavor hitherto unknowh to the American smoker. But they were very expensive. Moreover, smokers soon found that straight Turkish tobacco lacked that “something” which they found in American tobacco. It had the flavor, but it lacked the character. Straight American tobacco, on the other hand, lacked the mellow flavor of the Turkish leaf. Made to order—the “blended”, cigarette It was then that, a member of The American Tobacco Company, seeing how which show ers open at random some packer. 2 The new Mecca factory In m to meet the fmwuv‘rdcmanz t‘;ru Mecca this big eight-acre factory hasjust been’ o e AL manufacture of this popular brand. eempleted for the The old way Not long ago, all cigarettes were made .by hand. A skilled cigarette maker could turn out 2,500 a day. the Turkish flavor had caught on, got the idea of “blending” Turkish and American tobacco, and giving the public what it was really asking for—a fair priced cigarette, combining the flavor of the Turkish with the body and character of American. He knew that if we could get our volume of sales big . .enough, we could put out a good “blended’’ cigarette at a Iow price. After many tryouts with‘high grade American and Turkish tobaccos the Mecca blend was finally made. The new way — 56.875 miles an hour At the rate of 400 finished cigarettes a minute, ONE machine does the work of 76 hand operators. 56.875 miles of Mecca are made in an hour. It was named Mecca because we believed it would be the cigarette that more people would want to smok§ than any other — the goal of all cigarette smokers. Public confirms choice of name The public soon proved the fitness of the name. From the very start the sales of Mecca cigarettes have grown steadily. This “blended” cigarette is today sell- ing by the billion. We have given the public what it wanted — the character of American tobacco with the flavor of Turk- ishleaf. It's a real man’s cigarette—the goal of all cigarette smokers. We set the price of Mecca cigarettes at five cents, We figured we could afford’ that price when the sales \ reached into the billions. We profit; you get; i ,value ¢ _ .+ It isn’t generosity that makes us sell at this price. | ‘We do it because it's good * business. ' The lower price means bigger sales and pays us better than a high price and small sales. ‘With these big sales we buy in great quantities at better prices. ‘We manufacture oh a big scale, so the “overhead” or indirect costs are low. We profit by this while you get bigder value for your money than would be possible otherwise. A triumph of right business methods ‘We believe that this success is one of the re- markable achievements of modern industry; a triumph of right busi- ness methods consistently applied. ‘We could not have done all this if the public hadn’t liked the cigarette —if the blend had not been exactly right. But from the day it was put on the market, the public did like the Mecca blend. That is why your dealer sells so many Mecca cigarettes. ‘We recommend Mecca to the most critical smoker. , We want you to see for yourself why this business achievement has been possible. In the handy slide box, 5c for 10; in. the oval foil package, 10c-for 20. e Ftvioees Ben D 455 miles of Mecca are made and sold every day. If Mecca were not a goad cigarette. all the advertising in the world could not make it sell at that rate. /|