Marlboro  is an American brand of cigarettes, currently owned and manufactured by Philip Morris USA (a branch of Altria) within the United States, and by Philip Morris International (now separate from Altria) outside the United States. Richmond, Virginia, is the location of the largest Marlboro cigarette manufacturing plant. Marlboro is the global best-selling cigarette brand since 1972.

Six major international brands are manufactured by Philip Moris International. They are Parliament, Philip Moris, Bond Street, Lark and Chesterfield along with Malboro. All the brands of cigarettes have local and international markets. The products are sold in more than 180 countries around the world. Other local brands are sold in local markets like Russian – Optima, Mexican – Delicados, Indonesian – Sampoerna, Philipines Fortune.Estimated share of cigarette market is around 15.5%. This percentage excludes the sales in United States.Malboro cigarettes started as a small shop in London’s Bond street with Mr.Philip Moris selling cigarettes and tobacco products back in 1847. After almost a decade and change of the owners of the company, in 1950 it became Philip Moris International with the launch of the Malboro cigarettes. There was no looking back since then. Malboro became a part of the American culture itself and its products found an international market.

Manufacturers of Malboro clearly understand the effects of smoking. They know that smoking is injurious to health and can cause a great deal of diseases like cardio vascular disease, emphysema and lung cancer. To help smokers who are addicted, Malboro cigarettes are developed by using regulated tobacco. This ensures that the cigarettes have the feel and taste like conventional ones, but are not as harmful.These are few of the ways that manufacturers of Malboro have projected themselves as a socially responsible company both locally and globally.

History

Philip Morris cigarette maker, opened a New York subsidiary in 1902 to sell many of its cigarette brands. The mark “Marlboro” was registered in the United States in 1908 although no cigarette was marketed under this name until 1923. In 1924, the brand was launched. They are first marketed as “America’s luxury cigarette” and were mainly sold in hotels and resorts.

Around the 1930s, it was starting to be advertised as a women’s cigarette, based on the slogan “Mild As May”. The name was taken from a street in London where Philip Morris’s British factory was located.However, as early as 1885, a brand called “Marlborough” was already being marketed as a “ladies’ favorite” by Philip Morris & Co.

In the 1930s, advertising for the cigarette was primarily based on how ladylike the filter cigarette was, in an attempt to appeal to the mass market.To this end, the filter had a printed red band around it to hide lipstick stains, calling it “Beauty Tips to Keep the Paper from Your Lips”.

Shortly before World War II, the brand’s sales stagnated at less than 1% of tobacco sales in the US and was briefly withdrawn from the market. After the war, Camel, Lucky Strike, and Chesterfield were the only common cigarettes.

After scientists published a major study linking smoking to lung cancer in the 1950s, Philip Morris repositioned Marlboro as a men’s cigarette in order to fit a market niche of men who were concerned about lung cancer. At the time, filtered cigarettes were considered safer than unfiltered cigarettes, but had been until that time only marketed to women. Men at the time indicated that while they would consider switching to a filtered cigarette, they were concerned about being seen smoking a cigarette marketed to women.

The red and white package was designed by the designer Frank Gianninoto. The emblem is placed on top of the pack and has the popular Latin expression Veni, vidi, vici (“I came; I saw; I conquered”), authored by Julius Caesar. The repositioning of Marlboro as a men’s cigarette was handled by Chicago advertiser Leo Burnett. The proposed campaign was to present a lineup of manly figures: sea captains, weightlifters, war correspondents, construction workers, etc. The cowboy was to have been the first in this series. While Philip Morris was concerned about the campaign, they eventually gave the green light.

Marlboro’s market share rose from less than one percent to the fourth best-selling brand. This convinced Philip Morris to drop the lineup of manly figures and stick with the cowboy,ater known as the Marlboro Man. From 1963, the television advertisements used Elmer Bernstein’s theme from The Magnificent Seven.

In the late 1960s, Marlboro “Longhorn 100’s” were introduced. Although colour-coded with gold, they were full flavor cigarettes, not lights.In 1972, Marlboro became the best-selling brand of tobacco in the world.

In order to comply with a 2006 court ruling in United States v. Philip Morris USA, Inc., et al.,Philip Morris (and all other cigarette companies) is now prevented from using words such as “Lights”, “Ultra-Lights”, “Medium”, “Mild”, or any similar designation that yields a false impression that they are safer than regular full flavour cigarettes. Thus Marlboro and other cigarette companies must use only color-coding instead; for example, Marlboro Lights are now called Marlboro Gold Pack.