November 5, 2018
ASIA / PACIFIC
THE ASIAN REPORTER n Page 3
Philip Morris woos puff-happy Japan for post-smoking era
NEW VICE. A visitor tries an iQOS (EYE-kose)
device at a store in Tokyo. While New York-based
Philip Morris is hoping to woo the world with its
penlike “heat-not-burn” device as a better option
than old-style smoking, nowhere else has it scored
greater success than in Japan. (AP Photo/Eugene
Hoshiko)
By Yuri Kageyama
AP Business Writer
OKYO — Philip Morris, maker of
Marlboro and other major cigarette
brands, is maneuvering to keep
itself in business in a post-smoking world
with an advertising blitz in puff-happy
Japan and other tobacco-loving markets.
One of the biggest purveyors of tobacco
products, it says making the world
“smoke-free” is its goal. The company is
renewing its effort to win over new
generations of tobacco users to its iQOS
(EYE-kose) devices, which heat tobacco
without burning it.
It’s found a warm welcome in Japan,
home to 5 million of the nearly 6 million
users of the product.
“Japan is a country where people like
innovation, like to experiment, and try
new products,” chief executive Andre
Calantzopoulos told The Associated Press
during a trip to Tokyo to promote new
iQOS products.
By heating tobacco without burning it,
iQOS gives users vapor and flavor without
the hazards of smoke and tar from
cigarettes, cigars, and pipes, the company
says. It’s different from e-cigarettes,
another popular “reduced-risk” product,
which don’t contain tobacco but instead
vaporize a liquid usually containing
nicotine.
The iQOS has yet to win U.S. Food and
Drug Administration approval, but it’s
sold in much of Europe, Turkey, South
Korea, New Zealand, and Colombia.
The company’s rebranding effort seems
to be paying off in Japan, where the
company has opened nine iQOS stores
offering free Wi-Fi and drinks in trendy
T
districts nationwide.
Mami Kugishima, a 32-year-old hair
stylist and iQOS user standing in a
designated smoking area near a train
station, said she likes the way the smell
doesn’t get in her hair.
“It calms me down,” she said, sucking on
her crystal-decorated iQOS, while
acknowledging it would be best to quit. “I
like it when I go out for drinks.”
The World Health Organization points
to tobacco as a leading cause of death,
killing up to half its users, or more than 7
million people every year. Of those, about
890,000 deaths are nonsmokers exposed to
secondhand smoke.
Philip Morris says research it has
funded shows health risks are reduced
with iQOS, although they are not zero. The
device’s lower temperatures release less
cancer-causing substances than when
tobacco is burned in regular smoking,
while still providing nicotine to the user.
Calantzopoulos says wider use of the
device would help people’s health. Critics
accuse the company of glossing over the
hazards in its effort to lure new genera-
tions of tobacco users, an allegation it
denies.
Bungaku Watanabe, a former smoker
who has led a campaign against smoking
for 40 years, believes Japan is going too
easy on tobacco, including iQOS.
The government has a big stake in the
tobacco business, owning a third of stocks
in major cigarette company Japan Tobacco
Inc. as its top investor. The industry was a
government monopoly until 1985, and is a
huge source of tax revenues.
Cigarette packs don’t carry graphic
pictures and warning labels about the
“risks of a stroke” or “addiction to nicotine”
are in fine print.
“This is really an unusual situation for a
developed country,” said Watanabe, 81.
Philip Morris is still one of the biggest
makers of conventional tobacco products.
Apart from Marlboro, its brands include
Parliament, L&M, and Chesterfield. It
sells the local “heritage” brands Dji Sam
Soe, Sampoerna A, and Sampoerna U in
Indonesia; Fortune and Jackpot in the
Philippines; Belmont and Canadian Clas-
sics in Canada; and Delicados in Mexico.
A basic iQOS kit, which includes a
charger, starts at 7,980 yen ($71) in Japan.
Fancier versions cost more. Refills, made
of tobacco leaves that are ground, made
into sheets, and then crimped, look like
tiny cigarettes. They go for 500 yen ($4.40)
a pack — about the same as a pack of
Marlboros at 510 yen ($4.50).
In Japan, as elsewhere, smoking is
gradually tapering off. Forty years ago, 75
percent of adult men were lighting up and
non-smoking spaces were a rarity. Now
most office buildings confine smoking to
designated rooms or spaces outside. About
28 percent of Japanese men smoke these
days, and 18 percent of adults overall.
That’s lower than Indonesia or Russia, but
higher than Brazil or Mexico. In the U.S.,
the rate is 14 percent.
Shunichi Ihara, a medical doctor at a
Tokyo clinic that helps people stop
smoking, says some of his patients are
trying to wean themselves off iQOS.
“It’s best if people all stop smoking,” he
said.