Georges Bizet's opera, Carmen, based on Merimee's novel about a cigarette girl in an Andalusian factory, opens. Trading cards and coupons begin being widely used in cigarette packs. Discusses evils of tobacco, especially cigarettes. Improvements in transportation, manufacturing volume, and packaging lead to the ability to sell the same branded product nationwide. What can be sold nationwide can and must be advertised nationwide.
Advertising agencies sprout like wildflowers.
In this year Duke produces 744 million cigarettes, more than the national total in 1883. Duke's airtight contracts with Bonsack allow him to undersell all competitors. Don Vicente Martinez Ybor opens his first cigar factory. A traveler reports that the Arabs of the Syrian Desert get giddy and headaches from a few whiffs of tobacco. They smoke a local plant 'Hyoscyamus'.