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Double Happiness

An old Hong Kong pack of Double Happiness cigarettes with a Hong Kong text warning and nutrition facts
Product type	Cigarette
Owner	Shanghai Tobacco Corporation
Country	China
Introduced	1906; 118 years ago (1906)
Markets	See Markets
Previous owners	Nanyang Brothers Tobacco Company

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Double Happiness (cigarettes).

Double Happiness (simplified Chinese: 红双喜; traditional Chinese: 紅雙喜; pinyin: Hóngshuāngxǐ) is a China brand of cigarettes, currently owned and manufactured by the Shanghai Tobacco Corporation. It is one of the oldest Chinese cigarette brands currently on the market.

Double Happiness was launched in Hong Kong in 1906 by Nanyang Brothers Tobacco Company, and has been one of the most influential cigarette brands in China. In its early days it was known as Happydays in English, but its Chinese name, which means literally "Red Double Happiness", has never changed. After the Communist Party of China won the Chinese Civil War and established the People's Republic of China, Nanyang Brothers was nationalized in two stages: first partly in 1951 and then completely in 1959. The "Double Happiness" brand is now owned by the state-owned Shanghai Tobacco Corporation.^[1]

In China, the brand, with its yellow and red packaging, evokes tradition, good luck and high status. Because it is culturally iconic and one of the more expensive brands, it is highly popular as a gift during the Lunar New Year and weddings. During the 1980s and 1990s, Double Happiness cigarettes played an unexpected role in Chinese weddings: the bride had to light a cigarette for every man attending the wedding banquet as a token of gratitude. After the 2000s, this custom slowly started to dissapear, most likely due to the health hazards that smoking can cause.^[2][3][4]

The brand is also known to be used as a "social currency" in China. "A person who wanted to buy a bicycle in the early 1980s often had to obtain a ration coupon from his unit, and in such a situation it often made sense to hand the individual responsible for issuing coupons a carton of Double Happiness cigarettes and a couple bottles of erguotou baijiu (white liquor)" wrote Andrew Wedeman, in his book "Double Paradox: Rapid Growth and Rising Corruption in China". In 2009, Chinese legislators decided that "tobacco consumption had led to an increase in rampant corruption" and drafted a bill that would make it illegal for government officials to accept cigarettes as gifts. The bill failed to pass.^[5]

In May of 2015, it was reported that Double Happiness is specifically targeted towards the growing numbers of Chinese tourists and diaspora and is sold in more and more duty free shops around the world. The brand is specifically popular because it evokes tradition, good luck and high status.^[6]

In November 2016, five Chinese nationals were put on trial at the Boroko District Court for allegedly being in possession of 133.500 Papua New Guinean Kina worth of counterfeit Double Happiness cigarettes into Papua New Guinea.

Zhaodong Xeng, 46, Huiyi Lin, 48, Lele Li, 27, Kaiwn Lin, 21, and Shenghai Wu, 38, all from the Fujian Province, China, were charged with assembling for the purpose of smuggling under section 77 of the Criminal Code Act. Committal Court Magistrate Cosmas Bidar at Waigani ordered the transfer of their case to the Boroko District Court to deal with their case. They made their first appearance on November 21st 2016, Mr Bidar said the distribution of counterfeit products, including cigarettes, was a genuine concern especially as duties were not being paid. According to the police summary of facts, a tip off from a reliable search led the police to a warehouse at the Goron industrial area where 26 cartons and 35 inners of counterfeit Double Happiness cigarettes were found. PNG Customs Service officers confirmed that the products were fake, unhealthy cigarettes and had escaped duties by Customs.

The five men were arrested and released on 1000 Kina bail each. They made their first committal court appearance in October 2016 when they were ordered to surrender their passports to the District Court Registry as part of their bail conditions.^[7]

In April 2017, Three Chinese nationals were arrested at the Walvis Bay Airport after they were caught trying to smuggle undeclared cartons of cigarettes into Namibia. The trio was spotted throwing the cartons of cigarettes through a toilet window in an attempt to circumnavigate the watchful eyes of customs officials and the police. Li Suifen (50), Wu Jinhai (41) and Zeng Xianggui (54) are from the South-east Chinese province of Guangdong. They were taken into custody and charged with the breach of security measures at an airport. The eleven car-tons of cigarettes represented 2200 individual cigarettes. The brand they smuggled was: "Shuangxi", also known as Double Happiness. The trio was eventually fined 3000 Namibian Dollars each in the Walvis Bay Magistrate court.^[8]

In September 2017, Australian Border Force (ABF) officers arrested a fifth person in an investigation into a tobacco-smuggling syndicate in Sydney.

The officers arrested the 32-year-old Sanctuary Point man after he arrived at Sydney Airport from Thailand on the 28th of August 2017. He is suspected to be the ringleader of a syndicate that attempted to smuggle 4.5m cigarettes into Australia in June. The plot was up when the ABF intercepted a container originating in Malaysia on June 8. Its cargo was declared as boxes of paper cups, but officers found it contained the 4.5m cigarettes, at least some of which were of the Double Happiness brand. The container was delivered to an address in Wetherill Park where five people began unpacking it. Officers then arrested three men and a woman, while a fourth man was identified as an “unlawful non-citizen” and was deported, according to the ABF. The other four were charged with crimes relating to smuggling the cigarettes and were refused bail.

ABF Acting Commander Investigations Garry Low said the ABF had again stopped a significant criminal syndicate from distributing illicit cigarettes on the black market. "We know these illicit cigarettes would have been sold on the black market without the appropriate taxes which would have cost the Commonwealth millions in potential lost revenue".^[9]

In September 2017, Chinese cigarettes, barred from legal sale in Canada, were being briskly bought and sold by black-market vendors in Vancouver and Toronto, some of whom are getting the product from travellers purchasing cigarettes duty free and then exchanging them for services in Canada.

An examination by The Globe and Mail found more than 300 advertisements selling Chinese cigarettes in one week on VanSky, a popular Chinese-language website that caters to the Chinese population in the Vancouver area. About 180 of them clearly noted the cigarettes were duty free or bought at airports. The market is less active in Toronto: Nine posts were found selling cigarettes on a Chinese website iASK and six of them mentioned their goods were from duty-free purchases. It is illegal in Canada for anyone to sell tobacco products without a permit. Anyone purchasing duty-free goods can do so only for their own personal or household use.

The RCMP would not comment on any investigation into the online sales. However, the force noted in an e-mailed statement that Richmond RCMP seized approximately 1,500 cartons, the equivalent of 300,000 contraband cigarettes, in a bust last month. Two suspects had been arrested. Chinese brands cannot be legally sold in Canada. But the volume of ads, especially in the Vancouver area, suggests the demand for them is substantial.

The Chinese-language advertisements say a traveller to Vancouver can exchange one carton of cigarettes for transportation into the city from the airport. Anyone with two or more cartons would be paid cash for the cigarettes. Cigarettes can also be used to pay for other services, such as accommodation in Vancouver or for sightseeing tours, according to some of the ads. Meanwhile, duty-free cigarettes are being marketed for almost double the prices they command in China. The duty-free price of one kind of Chunghwa cigarettes is about $60 to $70 for a carton. The same carton is being sold on the website for around $110. A carton of Double Happiness costs about $11 at airports in China, but the prices online were at least $50.

Jennifer Fang, project co-ordinator of the Global Tobacco Control Project, Faculty of Health Sciences at Simon Fraser University, said the buying and selling of the Chinese cigarettes represent a lucrative market. "Chinese smokers tend to prefer Chinese-made cigarettes because of the taste: Chinese cigarettes are usually higher in tar content and taste stronger" she said. "People that purchase these cigarettes for resale would make a sizeable profit right away at no extra cost for themselves." Ms. Fang said in an e-mail. "[Travellers] are coming through the borders and have this duty-free exemption which would've just been 'wasted' otherwise". Ms. Fang said she personally experienced cigarettes as "a form of currency" a few years ago. "I found a driver offering airport transfer services on a Chinese website, and his quote was either $50 or a carton of cigarettes".^[10]

Double Happiness cigarettes are mainly sold in China, but also were or still are sold in Hong Kong, Malaysia, Poland and Russia.^[11][12][13]

• Cigarette
• Tobacco smoking
• Chunghwa