Gallery

This page showcases some of the posts we make on our Facebook page as well as some interesting stories to allow anyone interested in collecting cigarette packets the chance to learn from our advanced collectors. We will endeavour to update his page as often as possible.

We're often asked how collections of cigarette packets can be stored and displayed. Large collections can take up a lot of space and so most collectors store them flat in albums. A wide range of albums and page sizes can be found at Roy Roy Albums

Some of our members like to collect packets which still have the original contents .... we call them "live". This packet dates to about 1905. The Black Cat was Carreras trademark and here he has to suffer the indignity of the chick perched on his head. No wonder he looks a bit grumpy. It's nice that the cigarettes each have the trademark design printed on the papers too.

In the days when cigarette smoking was universal many businesses had their own packets made up to give away at corporate events or as promotional material. This packet of five cigarettes was produced for a Leicester company that manufactured fully fashioned nylon stockings for women in the 1930s. Not only did they have the packet designed but they also had their brand name and logo printed on each individual cigarette paper.

This is a rare survivor from the archives of Mardon Sons & Hall the Bristol printers for the Imperial Tobacco Co. Ltd. It shows a sample and job card for 1379 sheets of Fearless cigarette packets printed using 6 colours in December 1912 for British American Tobacco.

At the beginning of the 20th century many brands of cigarettes were sold by weight. This example shows a counter box of Mitchell's Oriental Blend which retailed at 6½d per ounce. The customer asked for how many he wanted and they would be put into one of the paper bags shown.

Around 1900 a schoolgirl named Ethel Brady amused herself by picking up empty cigarette packets which she then cut apart to lay flat and paste into an old school exercise book. We know her name because it was written on the front of the book. This packet helps to date her collection because after the death of Queen Victoria and accession of her son Edward VII in 1901 the brand name changed to "Soldiers of the King". Her scissors did a bit of a hatchet job on the packets but she can't have imagined that 120 years later her story would appear on the world wide web. I wonder if she was the first cigarette packet collector?

Not too much information available about this brand which was produced by William Clarke and Sons Ltd of Liverpool. The company became part of Imperial Tobacco in December 1901 and so this packet predates that. There is a price on the side panel of 20 cigarettes for 3d. Advertising on the slide is for their "new" 5 for 1d brand Lifeguard which was introduced about 1900.

Early cigarettes were often packaged in bundles, either unwrapped or in paper or foil with a band around. Made of paper, and broken to access the cigarettes, it's no surprise that almost none of these bands have survived. This one by Ebeneezer,Samuel and Alfred George Goodes was around a foil wrapped bundle of 10 cigarettes. The company was active at 51 Newgate St, London from 1885 to 1901.

During the First World War a number of schemes were set up to send cigarettes to soldiers serving at the front. This packet was sent by the firm of Abdulla & Co. Ltd. Along with the cigarettes it includes a gift card showing girls who made the cigarettes and a patriotic verse. Turkey joined on the German side and fighting at the Battle of Gallipoli was fierce. At the time there was strong sentiment against anything of Turkish appearance and Abdulla's name and trade mark became a bit of an embarrassment leading to them adding a declaration to their packaging that "Abdulla is and always has been an entirely British Firm".