Beijing Cigarette Factory enlarges production capacity of famous brand

Source from:  New Capital City News newspaper 03/14/2007

Beijing Cigarette Factory - a subsidiary to Shanghai Tobacco Group - is planning to enlarge the annual production capacity of its famous Zhongnanhai blend-type cigarette brand to 280,000 cases (14 billion cigarettes) by the end of 2007, to maintain the status of Zhongnanhai as the biggest blend-type cigarette brand in China. According to sources with Beijing Cigarette Factory, the target of significantly enlarging the annual production capacity of Zhongnanhai was set at the time when Shanghai Tobacco Group was acquiring Beijing Cigarette Factory in November 2003. Presently, Zhongnanhai - the biggest Chinese blend-type cigarette brand - takes 24 percent of the blend-type cigarette market shares in China. Annually, Beijing Cigarette Factory produces 15 billion cigarettes (300,000 cases), with 75 percent of them being Zhongnanhai brand cigarettes. According to Director Qu Zhigang of Beijing Cigarette Factory, Beijing Cigarette Factory is striving to enlarge the annual production capacity of Zhongnanhai to 280,000 cases (14 billion cigarettes) by the end of 2007. Since 2001, the tobacco industry of China has been undergoing a fundamental structural reform to develop more than a dozen leading tobacco manufacturing enterprises and more than a dozen leading competitive cigarette brands. Therefore, all Chinese tobacco manufacturers are vying with one another in ranking themselves among the dozen. For Beijing Cigarette Factory, it wishes to successfully rank itself among the dozen by taking advantage of the strong competitiveness of Zhongnanhai. Qu explained that blend-type cigarettes take 90 percent of the global tobacco market shares, and that the sales of blend-type cigarettes in China has kept growing year-on-year. Enditem