Thrilled to see the Forest Christmas card reproduced in The Times.
The paper's Business Diary applauds us for "mustering some Christmas spirit" in our fight against plain packaging, noting that we "did not forget to include Stephen Williams, the MP spearheading the campaign [for PP], on [our] Christmas card list".
"Forest," the paper reported, "sent the above specially printed card to Mr Williams' office last week to wish him a Merry Christmas. Still, we're not sure that comparing cigarette packets to children's Christmas stockings is necessarily a winning strategy."
Actually, the card reads 'Hands off our presents' (not 'Hands off our stockings') and 'Plain packaging? You must be crackers' with no reference to children (not even visually), but it's the season of goodwill so I'll let it pass.
Worth noting, though, that the only way The Times could have known that we sent Stephen Williams a card is if his office told them. So perhaps it was Williams – the old devil – who suggested the "children's Christmas stocking" angle.
They never stop trying to smear us, do they?!
PS. Three years ago another Forest Christmas card inspired this article by columnist Vicki Woods in the Telegraph: The pubs that died after giving up smoking.
It began:
In a year when the postman brought me fewer handwritten, stamped and posted Christmas cards, the corporate ones stood out. I liked a depressed Santa sitting under a pub sign saying NOBODY'S INN. It was a Merry Christmas from Forest (the pro-smoking people), hand-signed in different biros by Nicky, Sue x and Squiggle.
Squiggle? That was me!
Update: Stephen Williams (below left) is pictured alongside Deborah Arnott, CEO of ASH, in the ASH Annual Review 2012. And yes, we sent Deborah a Christmas card too!
