R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company (RJR), based in Winston-Salem, North Carolina and founded by Richard Joshua Reynolds in 1874, is the second-largest tobacco firm in the global tobacco industry, and the second-largest U.S. firm (behind Philip Morris). RJR is an indirect wholly owned subsidiary of Reynolds American Inc.
During the 1980s and 1990s, the firm was part of a corporation called RJR Nabisco, but Nabisco was spun out of RJR Nabisco in 1999, in part due to pressure from tobacco-related lawsuits.
In 1987, a bidding war ensued between several financial firms to acquire RJR Nabisco. This was documented in several articles in The Wall Street Journal by Bryan Burrough and John Helyar. These articles were later used as the basis of a bestselling book, Barbarians at the Gate: The Fall of RJR Nabisco, and then into a made-for-TV movie. As a result, in February 1989, RJR Nabisco paid executive F. Ross Johnson US$53,800,000 as part of a golden handshake clause; this payout was the largest golden handshake ever.
In October 2002, the European Union accused R. J. Reynolds of selling black market cigarettes to drug traffickers and mobsters from Italy, Russia, Colombia and the Balkans.
On July 30, 2004, R.J. Reynolds merged with the U.S. operations of Brown & Williamson. A new parent company, Reynolds American Inc., was established as part of the transaction.
Winston was introduced in 1955 and became the first nationally popular filtered cigarette. By 1966, Winston became the best-selling cigarette in the nation, a position it held for 10 years. Today, Winston remains one of the country's top-10 cigarette brands. Winston's "Leave the Bull Behind" attitude is backed by its unique, additive-free product point-of-difference – naturally smooth tobacco taste. |
|
