Elita (cigarette)

Elita cigarettes were launched in 1967. The cigarettes were mostly distributed in Russia, Latvian SSR and Lithuanian SSR. For the production of Elita was used American blend of the tobacco. During Soviet period the cigarettes were produced in the soft packs but after the restoration of independence of Latvia, it was produced in the hard packages with twenty cigarettes in each and was distributed in the blocks consisting of ten packs. There were more than twenty kinds of the packs between 1967 and 2009 belonging to the types KS-20-S and KS-20-H.[2] Trade mark Elita was owned by British American Tobacco.

In 2004 Light branch of the brand was discontinued due to restrictions introduced by European Union's directive 2001/37/EU; the packages were modernized: health warning area was increased and inscriptions were changed to “Smoking kills” or any other of thirteen variants on the choice of the vendor, also was added an inscription with a volume of tar, nicotine and CO. On the package must be depicted a colorful picture, a barcode and black Der Grüne Punkt are also shown.[3]

The brand was mainly sold in the Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic and Latvia, but was also sold in Italy, Lithuania and Russia.[4][5][6]

From the start of production of Elita the cigarettes were produced in Rīga, Latvia, in the factory at Miera st. 58 owned by the state by the company "Rīgas Tabakas Fabrika", which was founded in 1887. The capacity of the factory was 5.6 billion cigarettes per year. Output was distributed into different types of the cigarettes, from which Elita took a notable place. In 1992 Rīgas Tabakas Fabrika was sold to the Latvian-Denmark company House of Prince Latvia. In 1997 volume of production of Elita was about 24 million packs, a new variant of the cigarettes was introduced: “Elita Plus”.[1] From 2002 Elita is produced on the new production line using king size (84 mm) tubes. In 2003 House of Prince was renamed into Scandinavian Tobacco and two years later was sold to the British American Tobacco. Production at Rīga factory was stopped in 2009 due to the 30% drop in sales and increase of illegal sales.

An old Latvian pack of Elita Full Flavour cigarettes. Note the USSR (or CCCP) on the bottom of the pack.

Elita was not actively advertised in the mass media, TV advertisement was only once, then the factory was closed. Also some influence to the mark was introduced in the 1970-es. The factory made a special edition of Elita for the users of Latvian National Film Festival and after 2005 issued different types of the packages with the depictions of the famous Latvian castles and palaces. On the packages was printed the following sights:

• Cesvaine Palace
• Jaunpils Castle
• Rundāle Palace
• Turaida Castle
• Bridge through Venta in Kuldīga

Also was issued a special package dedicated to the 40 years of independent Latvia.

According to the data submitted by the Latvian State Revenue Service, Elita was the most sold brand of the cigarette with a filter in Latvia for the period of about twenty years, mostly because of affordable price.[7] Among the other most popular cigarettes were Wall Street and Winston. Market share of Elita is shown in the following table:

• Cigarette
• Tobacco smoking