Some cigarettes to rise 2c from Monday

Press, 25 June 1983, Page 2

Some cigarettes to rise 2c from Monday

PA Wellington All brands of cigarettes made by W. D. and H. O. Wills will cost 2c a packet more from Monday. The company’s director of finance, Mr Joe Desmond, said the rise was necessary to recover the cost of imported leaf and packaging since the start of the price freeze. The managing director of Rothmans, Mr Murray Umverricht, whose company makes about 70 per cent of all cigarettes sold in New Zealand, said yesterday that his firm was not planning to increase its prices at this stage. The 2c rise is the second for Wills products since the start of the freeze. Three hours before the price freeze was announced on June 22, 1982, the com-

pany announced that it was lifting prices 4c on a packet of 20 and 5c on a packet of 25, in line with earlier increases announced by Rothmans. The Department of Trade and Industry ruled the increase out of order, but 12 days later the company won an increase under the hardship provisions of the freeze. Mr Desmond said the latest 2c rise would not cover the full costs of increases sustained by the company. Imported cost increases equated to about 2.5 c a packet. He said that the price of tobacco was not increasing. The director of Commerce with Trade and Industry, Mr Des Gasson, said that overseas cost increases were recoverable under the freeze.