As a smoker, I basically grew up with Gudang Garam Filter International, one of cigarette brands of PT Gudang Garam (GGRM) Tbk. That was also my first cigarette, stealing from my father’s pack at the high school. I tried basically almost all brands during college years, but the most regular brand was GG International.
That means almost 30 years since high school. The taste and flavor of GG Filter International were pretty much stable until recently I purchased the new GG International.
I initially thought that the change was only for the packaging and design, as you can see in the picture. When I opened the first pack, however, I immediately smelled the difference. Flavorless!
As a loyal customer for almost three decades, I started to express my disappointment and thought the vendor had given me the wrong GG Filter International.
I lit up the cigarette, tastes lighter, especially the clove flavor…I initially thought that this might be related to GGRM’s effort to reduce nicotine and tar. Turned out that the new GG International has higher tar and nicotine contents (31 mg and 2.2 mg respectively) than the old one (30 mg tar and 1.8 mg nicotine).
Curious, I tried to ask fellow GG International smokers for their review. “I like the old one” is the popular comment I got so far.
Unfortunately that the old one is difficult to get now….
Others have expressed their plans to ‘move to other brands’…