Evangelos Papastratos ΕΥΑΓΓΕΛΟΣ ΠΑΠΑΣΤΡΑΤΟΣ
Born 1884 Died 1974
Section
14, Number 80
The story of Evangelos Papastratos is a success story on so many levels and at the same time it illuminates an entire epoch in Greece when tobacco was king and taxes from tobacco would account for twenty percent or more of government revenues. It is the story of a poor lad who through hard work became a baron of industry, and in that role proved to be a generous benefactor not only to his own workers but to the country. His gifts changed the face of his home town and the enlightened practices in his Piraeus factory set a high bar for other wealthy Greek industrialists to follow. It is, in many ways, a very Greek story.
His Life
It all started in Agrinio, a small agricultural town on a rocky plateau just north of Lake Trichinida in the hard to pronounce prefecture of Aitaloarkanania, an area in Greece that tourists tend to pass through rather than visit. The land in the area had proved to be suitable for the growing of tobacco, a popular crop at the time and one that required many hands and hard work. Local farmers preferred tobacco to olive groves or grape vines because it produced far more income per square metre than any other crop. Evangelos was the youngest of five children. His father, Anastasios, ran a grocery store in town. He and his wife Charikleia had five children, four boys and one girl.
When Evangelos was four, his father died leaving his family in difficult circumstances. To raise her family his mother turned to grape cultivation, her own family’s business, and produced quite a local favourite named Mrs. Papastratos’ Wine. She managed to scrape together enough money to educate her three older sons. The eldest, Epameinondas, studied at the University of Athens and went on to Lausanne and Leipzig. He became a mathematician. The next youngest, Giannis, became a lawyer, and the next, Sotiris, an army officer. That left Evangelos (girls were not considered university material in those days). Unlike his brothers he did not wish continue formal schooling but was eager to become a wage earner and help with the family finances.
In his 1964 autobiography, Evangelos recalls smoking his first cigarette at the age of eleven in the town’s main square. At that time, smoking had none of the stigma it has today. Whether that first cigarette gave him the idea or it was the simple fact that, in a town like Agrinio, the only career for a likely lad would have to have been in tobacco, he decided to begin his career working at the Tobacco firm of Rozis and Varnava. He was twelve years old...
Native intelligence and hard work soon made him a trusted employee. At 17 he changed firms, not because he was unhappy, but because he wanted to gain wider experience in the business. His plan was to go into business for himself one day. The problem, of course, was capital. He needed a wealthy partner.
Enter Avgerinos:
Sotirios Avgerinos was a wealthy cheese merchant looking for a good investment opportunity. He was far above Evangelos’ social class at the time but, with the help of his lawyer brother, Evangelos managed to wangle an interview. He convinced him that a substantial investment of 300,000 drachmas in the new venture would be a good one. So in 1906, the tobacco firm of Avgerinos and Papastratos was born. Papastratos was a 22 years old...
Their company concentrated on improving the quality of the wide leafed plant that was already the area’s hallmark and they chose to work directly with the local farmers themselves rather than their agents in Patras which had been the established custom. They did well. In 1911 Evangelos travelled to Hannover in Germany which, at the time, was a large and expanding market. There he struck a deal for Agrinio tobacco with Thracian born Angelos Konstantinos, already a successful cigarette manufacturer there. Konstantinos was so happy with its quality that he began to promote the Agrinio product in Germany and elsewhere. Never one to miss a business opportunity, Evangelos determined to take French lessons with an eye on the lucrative market in France.
Agrinio gold...
The company did well until the death of Avgerinos in 1913 caused the company to fold. At that time, it was valued at 150,000 drachmas and Papastratos, with some cash in hand, was ready for his next move: his own company.
The Papastratos Brothers (Αδελφοί Παπαστράτου Ο.Ε.)
This new venture was a family affair, involving his three brothers, the mathematician, the lawyer and the soldier. It would prove to be a winning team and an amazing family success story.
The brothers at the height of
their success
The timing helped. By the advent of the First World War, tobacco, grapes, and figs were Greece’s top agricultural exports with tobacco at the top of the list.
The First World War
The war created problems, but opportunities as well. Thanks to the diplomacy of Prime Minister Elefterios Venizelos, the Allies agreed that Greek tobacco, grapes and figs could be exported (even to the enemy!) providing the trading was done through neutral ports. Holland, a huge trading hub, was neutral during this conflict, and the Papastratos company thrived in spite of the conflict
In 1920 the company would set up their own offices in Amsterdam, in 1921 in Dresden, and offices in Austria, Sweden, France, even Iceland, followed. In Greece they would build warehouses in Piraeus, Volos, Nauplio, Karditsa, Kavala, and Thessaloniki.
The Papastratos warehouse in Volos
1919 to 1931
In 1919, Greece was riding on a wave of euphoria. Thanks to the diplomacy of Venizelos, the entire coast of Asia minor was within their grasp. But not for long. The defeat of the Greek army in Asia Minor in 1922 and the fiery debacle in Smyrna proved a blow to the company and the nation. Huge quantities of tobacco in their warehouses went up in smoke as the city burned. But the resulting influx of Greek refugees during the population exchange which followed proved to be a boon for the industry. Large numbers of these refugees, both men and women moved to Thrace, Thessaly, and Aitoloarkanania and found work in a growing tobacco industry, an industry that was able to expand rapidly because of this worker windfall. It helped that many refugees were already skilled and familiar with the crop which had been popular in the Ottoman empire as well.
Between the years 1921 and 1929, the Bothers Papastratos annually exported well over 3000 tons of tobacco, roughly ten percent of the production of the entire country.
Although the firm’s headquarters had moved to Athens, the brothers never forgot their roots. Agrinio continued to grow because of tobacco. In the nineteen twenties any bank worth its name had a branch there and even those banks did not suffice to service the booming agricultural sector there and elsewhere in Greece. Papastratos was instrumental in the solution, the founding of a new bank, the Agricultural bank of Greece, a bank which began in 1929 as a non-profit organisation to provide credit to the agricultural sector. Not even the Wall Street Crash could dim their prospects for long.
The brothers did realize however, that yet another step was necessary to ensure their prominence in the industry: the production of the cigarettes themselves. Casting his eyes on likely venues for a factory, Evangelos decided on the port of Piraeus. A new era was opening up for the Papastratos brothers and the Greek consumer.
Piraeus and the Golden Years
The brothers erected a state of the art factory which became the envy of the Middle East, the Balkans and Europe. It was built in an astonishing 10 months thanks to the use of modern methods and reinforced concrete.
It opened to huge fanfare on May 29, 1931. Prime Minister Elefterios Venizelos and government officials attended. One spoke at the inaugural saying,
Tobacco is without doubt our national product. It comprises 60% of our exports; it encompasses 200,000 tobacco farmers and 100,000 tobacco workers, providing one fifth of government revenue.
In 1931, Tobaccos was indeed ‘king’.
The workers at the Piraeus Factory found themselves in what can only be called a Utopian working environment for the time. This was all down to the brothers’ insistence on the most up to date machinery and on treating their employees more like partners than dispensable workers. The Piraeus factory could produce one and one half million cigarette in a single day.
This distinctive art piece was designed and executed by sculptor Michaelis Tombros for the company.
The building was impressive for its facade, its cleanliness, its ventilation and facilities. It offered bathing rooms, exercise rooms, even a radio room, and a large cafeteria where food was served for very little money.
The white capped women’s work force looked more like nurses than factory workers of the day. A job at the Papastratos factory was highly sought. There was a doctor on site and an area for the workers’ children to stay.
The factory produced its own packaging and graphics:
One fascinating aspect of their philanthropy was the dowries they provided for their worker’s daughters. There is a wonderful picture of the four brothers standing in a row in 1938, looking upon a mass marriage in their factory. Cherakleia, their mother, was present and must have felt immense pride in her sons’ achievements.
In 1933 the Papastratos brothers built a cigarette factory in Berlin (using Greek tobacco of course) and one in Cairo in 1937. The Berlin factory, due to the darkening political situation in Germany, closed in 1936.
The Second World War
The Nazis denuded Greek warehouses of tobacco just as they grabbed up everything else of value during their occupation, leaving just a small amount for local consumption. Tobacco production dropped dramatically during the war years. In Aitoloarkanania alone, the land in production fell from 85,000 stremma in 1941 to 14,000 stremma (1/4 acre) by 1944. The brothers suffered along with everyone else, but still managed to provide a soup kitchen for the needy in Piraeus.
The Last 70 Years
After the war, the company had to face the fact that tastes had changed in many of their former markets. The new American blends became popular. There were economic factors too. Germany, which had been Greece’s largest foreign market before the war, had ceased buying Greek tobacco because of their crushed economy and when they did buy, they too preferred new blends. The Cairo cigarette factory closed in 1957 for similar reasons. While Greeks themselves (who still hold the record as the biggest smokers in Europe) remained loyal to the Papastratos brand, it was clear that the company would not regain its former glory. In 1975, the company began a co-operation with Philip Morris and in 2003 that company bought it out while still keeping the company name in Greece.
Still, the company has had its moments. A large warehouse was built in the Agrinio area in 1978. In 2009 a new factory was built in Aspropygos near Athens with a capacity of 20 billion cigarettes annually.
And a new production plant was officially launched in 2018 at Aspropyrgos, this time to manufacture Philip Morris’ IQOS (heated
Evangelos Papastratos, the Benefactor
Young people starting in life have to believe in something more than mere economic success. (From his 1964 autobiography pubished in 1964)
It would take a very long article to list the gifts of Evangelos Papastratos. He was determined to give back. He never forgot his home town. In 1928, 60,000 francs was gifted to the University of Paris so that promising students from Agrinio could have the opportunity to study there. In 1932 the brothers funded a modern elementary school and gymnasium in Agrinio. Again in 1932 they funded the Papastratos Asklepeion with 60 beds. They bought a huge area of property in Agrinio and gifted it to the city for a public park.
A municipal library and archaeological museum were funded by the company as well.
There is so much more: contributions to the Greek air force, for student residences and so on. One small act of generosity sticks in my mind and speaks to the quality of the man. Evangelos Papastratos paid for the funeral of Alexandros Papanastasiou, a socialist reformer and former Prime Minister, who had died while under house arrest by the Metaxas regime. It was an act of daring as well as one of homage to a great man in troubled times.
Evangelos died in 1973 at the age of 89. At the time of his death, his company was still proudly independent
The Grave
A Small Footnote to our Research
1. There seems to be no end to Papastratos contributions. Just last year, his grandson, Dimitris Gkertsos donated Glory a wonderful painting by Nikolaos Gyszis to the Greek presidential art collection.
2. Old Cigarette Factories and Warehouses: factories and warehouses were huge and many have become derelict or worse. That is until someone realized what amazing art spaces or city spaces these fossils of a past era could make. The Papastratos site in Piraeus is also undergoing a make over as the ‘Piraeus Port Project’ and will revitalize the area that old residents still refer to as Papastrateio.
The Map
Poly kalo koritsia!
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