| "A marlboro kretek makes sense," Andrew White, Sampoerna's director, told The Associated Press in an interview. "What consumers are telling us is that they like Marlboro, they like the brand, but they also want kretek." The Marlboro Mix 9 is the strongest Marlboro currently on the market, packing 1.8 milligrams of nicotine and 30 milligrams of tar. That is comparable to other full-strength kretek on sale in Indonesia, but twice as much as regular Marlboros on sale elsewhere in the world, White said. White said that no cigarettes were safe, but that there was no evidence kretek were more dangerous than regular cigarettes. The eugenol in cloves causes a numbing of the throat in smokers, making harsh tobacco smoke easier to swallow. They are normally sold in packs of 12 and take much longer to smoke than ordinary cigarettes. White said he was confident Mix 9 would sell well, but noted that competition in Indonesia's kretek sector was intense. Last year, some 500 new brands were launched in the country, he said. Indonesia is the fifth-largest tobacco market behind China, the United States, Russia and Japan. |