Final smoko break

After 48 years, Sandra Paulin has nearly a lifetime’s worth of memories tied up in Petone’s Imperial Tobacco factory.

Last week, demolition started of the cigarette plant that closed last year. It had employed generations of workers for more than a century. It will make way for housing and a commercial development.

‘‘I suppose I don’t want it to go – it was my life. I always thought when I retired I’d be able to drive past and still see it going,’’ Paulin said.

In July last year, Imperial confirmed it would cease manufacturing by the end of last year with the loss of 122 jobs. It was opened in 1919 by WD & HO Wills.

Paulin began boxing soft packets of cigarettes there as a 15-year-old, just six months after her family arrived in Lower Hutt from Glasgow. By the time she finished in September last year, she was operating a machine pumping out 8000 cigarettes a minute.

Despite working with tobacco for nearly half a century, she isn’t a smoker herself. ‘‘I tried it – didn’t like it. It was a job.’’

However, her time at the factory was more than just a job to her. She recalled years gone by with fondness. Workers were picked up each day on a bus provided by the company and the plant used to have its own sports teams.

‘‘It was a real community – all the factories were back in those days. I made friends for life.’’

The relaxed times were also reflected in the health-and-safety measures of the day.

‘‘People used to work in jandals. If you dropped something on your toe, it was your own fault.’’

The plant was bought by Imperial Tobacco in the 1990s to make brands such as JPS, Riverstone and Horizon for the Australasian market. It was that company that closed the plant last year.

In mid-2020 the 2.25-hectare site was bought by developers Richard Burrell and Craig Stewart.

Stewart is building 95 townhouses, while Burrell is marketing an 85-unit business park.

Stewart said the factory’s demolition would take three to four months, with construction scheduled to begin in September. Two and three-bedroom units go to market this week, with most being priced between $800,000 and $920,000.

ROSS GIBLIN/STUFF The Imperial Tobacco plant in Petone is being pulled down to make way for 95 townhouses and a business park. Former Imperial employee Sandra Paulin worked there for 48 years until last year when it closed.

Demolition of the former Imperial Tobacco factory began last week (above); part of the old factory site will become a 95 townhouse development (below).