Marlboro Ranch, formally Crazy Mountain Ranch

choi

One can use images.google.com to search the ranch.

Jennifer Maloney and Omar Abdel-Baqui, Sale of Marlboro Ranch Snuffs Out Smokers' Vacation Dreams; Tobacco firm's move put some in a funk; 'I decided now's a good time to try to quit.'  Wall Street Journal, Aug 2, 2021 (front page).
https://www.wsj.com/articles/sal ... -dreams-11627832239

Note:
(a) "Sale of Marlboro Ranch Snuffs Out Smokers' Vacation Dreams"

(i) snuff
• (n; from Middle English): "the charred part of a candlewick
• (vt): "1: to crop the snuff of (a candle) by pinching or by the use of snuffers so as to brighten the light
2a: to extinguish by or as if by the use of a candlesnuffer —often used with out"
• (vt; from Dutch verb snuffen to sniff, snuff): "to draw forcibly through or into the nostrils"
• (n; from Dutch verb right above): pulverized tobacco
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/snuff
(ii) Definition 2a fits the bill. But the title is a pun, alluding to snuff as pulverized tobacco, too.

(b) "Tobacco firm's move put some in a funk"

funk (n; "mid 18th century (first recorded as Oxford University slang): perhaps from funk in the slang sense 'tobacco smoke' "):
"1: North American informal   a state of depression.
1.1 British informal   a state of great fear or panic"
https://www.lexico.com/en/definition/funk

The phrase "in a funk" can mean either. In US, it means depressed.


(c) "Christine Dorgan has a box full of swag and gear

swag (n): "1a: [stolen goods] c: promotional goods or items d: goods given to people who attend or participate in an event"
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/swag

(d) " 'I decided now's a good time to try to quit. I'm disheartened by the whole Marlboro sale so I'm just going to lay them down,' she said."

Lay down (vt): "1: to give up : SURRENDER  <lay down your arms>
* * *  
2 b: to assert or command dogmatically  <lay down the law>"
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/lay%20down
(e) "smoking-related ills"

hill (n): "1 b (1) AILMENT, SICKNESS;
                   (2) something that disturbs or afflicts: TROUBLE  <economic and social ills>"
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/ill
(f) "Altria Group, Inc, which owns Philip Morris USA"
(i) "The company states its history is traced to a London tobacconist, Philip Morris, opening a single shop on London's Bond Street in 1847 which sold tobacco and cigarettes."  en.wikipedia.org for "Philip Morris International."
(ii) "The name "Altria" is claimed to come from the Latin word [adjective masculine altus, whose feminine counterpart is alta] for 'high.' "  en.wikipedia.org for Altria.

---------------text
Christine Dorgan has a box full of swag and gear she ordered with points from the back of her Marlboro cigarette packs: a watch, a dart board, a portable picnic table. And last year, just as the pandemic hit, she won her most coveted prize: a trip to the Marlboro Ranch.

The trip, like so many vacations, was canceled by Covid-19. And now she will never get the chance to go. In June, cigarette maker Philip Morris USA sold the 18,000-acre Montana property where the company for two decades had hosted loyal customers on all-expense-paid trips. As cigarette smoking declines, so does its trappings.

“I signed up for that thing I don’t know how many times,” said Ms. Dorgan, a 54-year-old diesel mechanic who lives in Windom, Minn. A smoker since the age of 12, she quit last year shortly before she won the Marlboro trip in a sweepstakes, but still wanted to go. “I wanted to see a real cowboy,” she said.

The getaway, formally known as Crazy Mountain Ranch, was a real-life incarnation of the cigarette maker’s Marlboro Man marketing campaigns, which featured gruff cowboys riding horses and snowy Western peaks.

It was Disneyland for smokers. Guests stayed in a faux ghost town, with a mining office, bank, sheriff’s office and saloon. When they arrived, their beds were piled with gifts: Stetson hats, cowboy boots, jackets, bandannas, digital cameras, sunglasses, ashtrays and, in earlier years, packs of cigarettes.

Visitors also received stainless portable litter devices, or PLDs, and leather cases with belt loop, to carry cigarette butts rather than flick them and risk a fire.

The property is now owned by a subsidiary of private-equity CrossHarbor Capital Partners, which owns other reports in Montana. It said it would continue to operate the cattle operation and resume operating the guest ranch, closed since last year.

But the Marlboro Ranch sweepstakes are done.

Theresa Harvey of Lynnville, Ind, went to the ranch in 2019 and enjoyed herself. "I decided now's a good time to try to quit. I'm disheartened by the whole Marlboro sale so I'm just going to lay them down," she said.

The idea of sending smokers on a cowboy-themed getaways emerges in the 1990s, when discount cigarettes were eroding Marlboro's market. Philip Morris was also negotiating a resolution to litigation by states against tobacco companies for costs to treat smoking-related ills. It knew advertising would be curbed.

The ranch was owned by publisher Glenn Patch, who made his fortune with magazines such as Computer Shopper and MacWeek. Mr Patch, who died in 2017, fell in love with Montana in the 1980s and bought the ranch, according to his brother Burrell Patch.

He also bought neighboring parcels and built guest residences and a event hall -- all in the style of an Old West town. He named it Deadrock, after a fictional town in Thomas McGuane novels. He sold it to Philip Morris in 1999, his brother said.

Philip Morris held sweepstakes to win a trip to the ranch and sent surprise invitations to adults who had registered on the Marlboro website.

Ben McCormick 's wife got one on April Fools' Day in 2007 at their home in Mobile, Ala. "I tossed it to the side," he said. Later, he searched for "Marlboro Ranch" on Google and found it was real.

At the ranch, they rode horses and drove Humvees offroad. She sang karaoke one night, which was "definitely out if her comfort zone," Mr McCormick recalled.

The cigarette maker provided guests with plane tickets, spending money, even luggage for the trip. Tobacco companies for more than a decade have been prohibited from giving free cigarettes samples. So in recent years, Philip Morris gave prize winners coupons to buy five cigarette packs at the local airport for $1 each.

Keith Greene, a 30-year-old truck driver from Windham, Maine, was supposed to go last year but his trip, too, was canceled because of the pandemic.

"My uncle had won twice," ​he said. "Everyone I've heard from said it was an utterly world-changing experience * * * For 10 years, I entered every chance I had. Finally I won it and -- nope.

He got a prize substitution check for $5,166.

A broker for Philip Morris this year began approaching potential buyers for the Montana property, according to a person familiar with the matter. The company decided to reallocate the money it spent on the ranch to other priorities, as part of its plan to convert adult cigarette smokers to alternative tobacco products that don't generate the harmful smoke that cigarettes do, said a spokesman for Altria Group, Inc, which owns Philip Morris USA.

"We didn't host ranch trips during the pandemic and recognize that decision was disappointing to some of the individuals who had won a chance to attend," he added.

Ms Dorgan, the Minnesota mechanic, received her prize substitution check in December. She and her boyfriend decided at the last minute to get married on a New Year's Eve trip to Sioux Falls, SD.

The day of the wedding, she walked into David's Bridal shop in her steel-toed boot, jeans and checkered shirt, carrying a stack of her Marlboro cash. She walked out with an off-the-shoulder gown.