What's the best country to buy Cigs in?

[Kidorry]

In Ukraine 200 Marlboro for 11 pounds.

[Dogs Of War]

cigs and Bacca are cheap as chips in the Canary Islands ,BUT you are limited to how many you can bring back OFFICIALLY .;)

 

If your happy to take the gamble of filling a suitcase with them , it can be a very worthwhile gamble.

[foxy lady]

Hello

 

Do any of you make the odd trip overseas to buy cigs? If so where's the best place to go, bearing in mind the cost of flights etc.....?

 

Thanks

 

If you are such a cheap skate and it worries you that much why not grow your own. It grows like tomatoes and will thrive in our climate.

[callippo]

cheapest cigarettes in the developed world, i.e. a proper first world country, is probably still Japan, though they heavily raised the duties recently. It's still only about 400 yen a packet though - £3. Before they raised the duty it was more like £2.

 

in poor countries in Asia and Africa Marlboros can be as low as £6-7 for 200 and local brands can be a cheap as £2 for 200.

[daftlad]

i can remember being in singapore in 2005 and bought 200 bensons for nearly £7.00

[scottcross]

In Ukraine 200 Marlboro for 11 pounds.

 

Thats what i was paying in Lithuania last week.

[matsalleh]

i can remember being in singapore in 2005 and bought 200 bensons for nearly £7.00

 

I can remember Singapore 1962 buying 100 bidi for 1 dollar.£1=$8.57,I can't be bothered to work it out.Capstan full strength were menthol cigs compared to them.

It seems they are still being made (thanks Google)

http://quitsmoking.about.com/od/teensmoking/f/bidi.htm

[callippo]

i can remember being in singapore in 2005 and bought 200 bensons for nearly £7.00

 

20 Marlboros in Singapore, most expensive of the 10 south east Asian countries, are now about 10 Singapore dollars a pack, that's about £5.50, just a little bit less than here. I can't believe even a local brand in Singapore was as cheap as that, even in 2005, and certainly not Marlboros. Prices for most things in Singapore are roughly on the level with first world countries.

 

Malaysia is a bit like Japan, prices have gone up quite a bit there recently as they upped the duty a lot. Their most popular 'decent' brand, which you see everywhere is Dunhill, they were 5 ringitt back in 2004 (about 80 pence in those days, with the stronger pound then), but they've almost doubled to about 9 ringgit (about £1.80 at today's rate of exchange) now. They've realised they have to tax cigarettes more because of the health costs it causes, and now that they're not dirt-poor anymore and getting richer, they can put the prices up.

 

I flew into Kuala Lumpur last year and got 200 Marlboro's for about £10 from the duty free on the plane. Much cheaper than they sell them in the city itself.

 

in real terms, according to wages, 9 ringgit is a lot more in Malaysia than £6 pounds is here. A casual worker like a waiter in a restaraunt would take 2.5 hours to earn 9 ringgitt, the price of a packet of premium cigs, in Malaysia. Somebody doing the same low-paid job here would take only an hour to earn the price of a pack of Marlboros.

 

in that respect, when you compare the prices of cigs to local wages in these poorer countries, they're not actually cheaper than here, but more expensive for locals to afford.

 

in Thailand cigs are a little cheaper than Malaysia, about 60-70 baht, £1.40 a pack. They've gone up quite a lot there in the past few years as well.

 

in the Philippines Marlboros are probably among the cheapest you are likely to find anywhere in the world, possibly even in Africa or the poorest Latin American countries. They're only 40 pesos, about 1 dollar, or 70 pence. And that's for the premium foreign brands.

 

local brands that you never heard of are cheaper in all these places than foreign brands like Marlboro, Winston, Camel, etc. In the Philippines the biggest selling is called Fortune, and sells for 12 pesos a pack. That's less than 20 pence. The biggest selling brand in Egypt, called Cleopatra's, is also about 20 pence for 20 - but most people from the developed world wouldn't want to smoke them - they're rough.

[callippo]

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/japan/7991933/Japanese-panic-buy-cigarettes-ahead-of-anti-smoking-tax-rise.html

 

Japanese panic buy cigarettes ahead of anti-smoking tax rise

 

Japanese smokers are panic buying as the nation's tobacconists run out of the most popular brands of cigarettes ahead of the country's biggest ever tax increase on tobacco.

 

By Julian Ryall in Tokyo

Published: 4:32PM BST 09 Sep 2010

 

The record-breaking tax rise enters into force in three weeks time with prices rising by over 30 per cent.

 

"Inevitably we have heard of people buying up large amounts ahead of October 1, but we had anticipated increased demand and that consumers will be stocking up prior to the excise hike with the equivalent of one month’s volume,” said Hideyuki Yamamoto, a spokesman for Japan Tobacco Inc.

 

The cost of a packet of Japanese cigarettes will increase by £1.09 to around £3.10, prices, which while still cheaper than many other countries, have come as a shock to Japanese smokers.

[gnvqsos]

Hello

 

Do any of you make the odd trip overseas to buy cigs? If so where's the best place to go, bearing in mind the cost of flights etc.....?

 

Thanks

 

It does not matter where you buy them,its the place where you smoke them that really matters