Premier was a smokeless cigarette

Cigarette

A cigarette is a small roll of finely cut tobacco leaves wrapped in a cylinder of thin paper for smoking. The cigarette is ignited at one end and allowed to smoulder; its smoke is inhaled from the other end, which is held in or to the mouth and in some cases a cigarette holder may be used as well...

 released in the United States in 1988 by the R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company

R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company

The R. J. Reynolds Tobacco Company , based in Winston-Salem, North Carolina and founded by R. J. Reynolds in 1875, is the second-largest tobacco company in the U.S. . RJR is an indirect wholly owned subsidiary of Reynolds American Inc...

. It worked by heating and aerosolizing tobacco flavour and was intended to reduce or eliminate the unhealthy side effects associated with smoking, both to the smoker and to the people around the smoker

Passive smoking

Passive smoking is the inhalation of smoke, called secondhand smoke or environmental tobacco smoke , from tobacco products used by others. It occurs when tobacco smoke permeates any environment, causing its inhalation by people within that environment. Exposure to secondhand tobacco smoke causes...

.

The project took several years to develop at a cost of more than $1 billion.

While RJR itself questioned whether the device functioned adequately as a nicotine

Nicotine

Nicotine is an alkaloid found in the nightshade family of plants that constitutes approximately 0.6–3.0% of the dry weight of tobacco, with biosynthesis taking place in the roots and accumulation occurring in the leaves...

 delivery device, activists derided it for its potential for use in delivery of other drugs. It never achieved popularity, as smokers complained about a charcoal

Charcoal

Charcoal is the dark grey residue consisting of carbon, and any remaining ash, obtained by removing water and other volatile constituents from animal and vegetation substances. Charcoal is usually produced by slow pyrolysis, the heating of wood or other substances in the absence of oxygen...

-like aftertaste, and although it looked like a conventional cigarette, special instructions were required to teach smokers how to light it. RJR estimated that it would take two or three packs for a smoker to acquire a taste for Premier, but in practice many smokers only smoked one cigarette and shared the rest of the pack. It was withdrawn from the market in 1989, less than a year after its introduction.

R.J. Reynolds reintroduced the concept behind the Premier cigarette as the Eclipse

Eclipse (cigarette)

Eclipse is an American cigarette brand that was developed and is marketed by R.J. Reynolds Tobacco. They were first tested with consumers in 1994, and brought into limited market distribution in 2000. They contain a carbon tip, which when lit heats tobacco, giving off a vapor. Unlike in traditional...

brand in the 1990s.

External links

• RJR's Secret Project Spa - initial development concept of a safer cigarette
• Search For a Safe Cigarette: A History