The first Rembrandt cigarette was made by AP (Pappa) Thierack, who had met Rupert in 1945 and two years later installed the first steam kettle and standard packaging machines in the old mill. Among those who helped assemble the first cigarette machines were Moos du Preez and James Martin, two coloured workers who would remain with the group for decades. According to Thierack the initial output was 100 000 cigarettes a day. Mrs HJ Muller relates how she sealed the cellophane around the first packet with a flatiron and affixed the first excise duty sticker by hand; ‘after much pondering and measuring, Bakoor Smit then built a machine that consisted of a sewing-machine wheel and a bicycle chain’.10
The first cigarette was taken off the conveyor belt in the factory in Paarl by Dr MS (Tienie) Louw, president of the Afrikaanse Handelsinstituut (AHI), on 4 June 1948. It was still the old format of 70mm, 15mm shorter than the eventual king size. ‘The first Afrikaans cigarette is on the market’, Tegniek reported joyously. The new cigarettes were released on the market a week after Dr DF Malan’s National Party, which had entered into an election pact with Klaas Havenga’s Afrikaner Party, ousted Gen. Smuts’s SAP in the May 1948 elections. Nationalistic feelings were rampant among Afrikaners. Some political analysts contend that the NP’s policy of ‘apartheid’ had been the decisive factor in the new Afrikaner government’s victory at the polls. Others hold the view, however, that far more important factors had been Smuts’s decision about participation in the war that had not been subjected to a referendum, the hardship in the war years after the Depression, discrimination against Afrikaners in the public service and elsewhere, as well as the grievances of ex-combatants who felt Smuts’s promises to them had not been kept. Malan expressed the emotions of many Afrikaners when he said: ‘We feel at home again in our own country.’
At first Rembrandt concentrated on the Western Cape. Wary of overextending themselves, they literally fought their way northwards area by area, creating a demand for the new group’s products. From the Western Cape the outposts shifted to the Southwestern Districts, the Karoo, Namaqualand, the Eastern Cape, Kimberley, the Free State. A year later they crossed the Vaal River to reach Johannesburg, the City of Gold.
Manufacture of Rothmans’ cigarettes under licence, with all the benefits of the overseas company’s technical know-how, forged ahead from 1949 onwards, giving Rembrandt a significant competitive edge. Initially, Rembrandt paid royalties to Rothmans for its expertise. In the end it would take control of Rothmans of Pall Mall in England.
In the early stages there was not much cash, but the employees were fired by the conviction: ’n Boer maak ’n plan (An Afrikaner makes a plan). A poster on the Rembrandt factory wall bore a likeness of the great artist, with his name and the slogan: ‘Every cigarette must be a masterpiece.’ Quality, not protectionism, was Rupert’s recipe for success. The caption of a drawing in the group’s offices depicting the race between the hare and the tortoise read: ‘It’s the last ten paces that count’. The message was intended to make employees aware that ‘one shouldn’t rest on one’s laurels and lie down to take a nap.’11 This was typical of Rupert himself, who never became complacent. Always impatient with the status quo, he challenged it in his constant search for new possibilities and opportunities.
Another characteristic for which Rupert became known was his capacity for hard work. His unflagging energy and powers of concentration were legendary. A twelve-hour working day was nothing unusual, his brain racing all the while − notably in the late afternoon. His work rate put pressure on his senior staff, but also inspired them to put in long hours themselves. Did this put his marriage under stress? Not at all, says Huberte. ‘Other men also get home late, but maybe via the golf club or the pub. It’s ridiculous to complain if you know your husband is hard at work.’12
The staff in the Paarl factory was small because money was tight. The little band worked day and night. The mill was far too small for what they had in mind, but construction work was not allowed to interfere with production. Walls for extensions were erected around the existing building while work continued. Then, over a weekend, the inside walls were demolished and the debris removed. The cornerstone of the Paarl building was laid by Mrs Annie Stals, widow of Dr AJ Stals, first chairman of Rembrandt, on 22 September 1951, but expansion continued and eventually all that remained of the original building of 1948 was a solitary wall and two palm trees.
One of the most serious problems Rembrandt faced at the outset was the quota system that continued to exercise a stranglehold on industrial development. After the wartime rationing of goods, the new government reimposed this system that was based on the status quo – established manufacturers benefited, but new entrants were hamstrung by the restrictions. In 1948 Rupert joined forces with other Afrikaans enterprises in establishing a new business journal, Tegniek − the second Afrikaans publication of its kind. He used it to launch an attack on the quota system.
The first issue contained an outline of his vision of the Afrikaner’s role in industry, plus an article under the heading ‘Phenomenal success of the First Afrikaans Cigarette’, which quoted a report from the Central News lauding Rembrandt’s success and its strategies for achieving it. The second issue in December 1949 went on the offensive with a scathing attack under a banner headline: ‘QUOTAS ARE KILLING US! The Afrikaner merely asks for the right to compete.’ The article, by an anonymous jurist (presumably James Yeats), argued that protracted rationing with fixed allocations based on past production militated against new enterprises, perpetuated old monopolies, created a black market in quotas and fostered other economic evils. In South Africa, it went on, this was aggravated by the fact that the vested interests that benefited from the system were owned by foreigners, whereas emerging businesses belonged to Afrikaners and their English-speaking compatriots. The state, the article averred, was protecting foreign interests at the expense of nationals by preventing the latter from developing their businesses to the full.13 The article enraged Eric H Louw, minister of economic development and mines, but the logic was irrefutable – the article emphasised that the Afrikaner ‘is not asking for protection or favouritism, merely for the right to compete’.
Rupert went further. He threatened the secretary for trade and industry that he would close the factory in Paarl if he did not get his rightful quota. He also proposed sending girls in Voortrekker dresses to demonstrate at the opening of parliament, carrying posters with the slogan, ‘Quotas are killing us!’ and to picket there for up to a year. His threats caused quite a hubbub in government circles, supposedly well disposed towards Afrikaner business, and proposals were invited. These led to the introduction of a far more flexible system and the eventual abolition of quotas. Henceforth manufacturers could submit their own assessment of their requirements, which would then be adjusted up- or downwards twice a year, depending on their output in the preceding six months. The battle was won at last, and the increased ability to compete served as a further boost to Rembrandt.
Typical of Rupert who was never one to wait for things to happen but instead made them happen, he registered Rembrandt’s trademark in 70 countries. This was something rare at the time – among Afrikaans businesses, only the KWV’s trademark had been registered outside of South Africa. Rupert’s early grasp of the importance of trademarks, something that would become almost an obsession, was to prove a crucial factor in the global success of his group.
In the early years, Rembrandt’s sales representatives did not travel in flashy cars and mostly visited dealers carrying boxes of cigarette cartons on their shoulders. Competitors tended to joke about the activities on the banks of the Berg River. While there was not much money for advertising, Rupert and his associates were inventive, initially on a shoestring budget. Company vehicles, once they could afford them, were painted green and red and acted as mobile billboards, a brand-new technique at the time. Stationary billboards were put up at strategic points. Marketing, and especially advertising, would become a major power source for the Rembrandt Group. Rupert was ahead of his contemporaries in grasping the realities of post-war capitalism. Where they still concentrated mainly on production, he put a new emphasis on marketing. He built up a substantial library on marketing and advertising, requiring his partners and colleagues