Röda Lacket is a popular brand of Swedish

snus Snus (, ; ) is a Swedish smokeless tobacco, tobacco product. It is consumed by placing a pouch of powdered tobacco leaves under the lip for nicotine to be absorbed through the Mucous membrane, oral mucosa. Snus, not to be confused with Nicoti ...

(moist snuff), a

pasteurized In food processing, pasteurization ( also pasteurisation) is a process of food preservation in which packaged foods (e.g., milk and fruit juices) are treated with mild heat, usually to less than , to eliminate pathogens and extend shelf life ...

smokeless

tobacco Tobacco is the common name of several plants in the genus '' Nicotiana'' of the family Solanaceae, and the general term for any product prepared from the cured leaves of these plants. More than 70 species of tobacco are known, but the ...

product. It is made from a recipe invented in the 18th century. Registered in 1850, it's one of the oldest snus brands in existence.

Origins

Petter Swartz (1726–1789) grew up in the

Bergslagen Bergslagen is a historical, cultural, and linguistic region located north of Lake Mälaren in northern Svealand, Sweden, traditionally known as a mining district. In Bergslagen, the mining and metallurgic industries have been important since t ...

mining region up north. When arriving at the town of

Norrköping Norrköping ( , ) is a city in the province of Östergötland in eastern Sweden and the seat of Norrköping Municipality, Östergötland County, about 160 km southwest of the national capital Stockholm, 40 km east of county seat Lin ...

, he first introduced the Italian double-entry bookkeeping, then he started his own snus factory in 1753. Together with his brother, Olof Swartz, they transformed the small business by implementing an efficient manufacturing process. Among other things, they constructed a horse-propelled grinder with a giant cog-wheel. Later they would use water for powering their factory complex. When production was at its peak, the Norrköping tobacco fields covered an area of almost 395000 square meters. Harvested tobacco was air cured in three large wooden barns. Seven different recipes were the backbone of the Swartz empire. The most famous and also most successful was Röda Lacket (The Red Seal) which was soon sold in

Stockholm Stockholm (; ) is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in Sweden by population, most populous city of Sweden, as well as the List of urban areas in the Nordic countries, largest urban area in the Nordic countries. Approximately ...

and later all over the country.

The company

The company, along with the snus recipes, was passed on from father to son through six generations. The family became very wealthy and started to contribute to the development of the town of Norrköping; most notably through financing the public library and the town's arts museum. In 1772, Petter Swartz founded a private school where students were taught both

double-entry bookkeeping Double-entry bookkeeping, also known as double-entry accounting, is a method of bookkeeping that relies on a two-sided accounting entry to maintain financial information. Every entry to an account requires a corresponding and opposite entry to a ...

and carpentry – skills that were needed in the snus business. After the

monopolization In United States antitrust law, monopolization is illegal monopoly behavior. The main categories of prohibited behavior include exclusive dealing, price discrimination, refusing to supply an essential facility, product tying and predatory prici ...

in 1915, the Swedish snus manufacturing was

centralized Centralisation or centralization (American English) is the process by which the activities of an organisation, particularly those regarding planning, decision-making, and framing strategies and policies, become concentrated within a particular ...

. The success of Röda Lacket, however, delayed the closing of the tobacco harvesting in Norrköping by several years.

Products

Röda Lacket has a mild, fruity taste, with tones of licorice. It's a fine-grain type of snus, which has earned it a reputation among Swedish snusers for being the easiest snus to hand mold. Today it is sold in one quality: * Röda Lacket Vit Portion (discontinued) – a white portion snus in cans of 24 portions of 0,9 gram * Röda Lacket Lössnus – loose snus; 42 grams per can

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Roda Lacket (Snus) Snus Swedish brands Tobacco brands