Cigarette maker Philip Morris organised a massive party for 600 tobacconists and bar owners, featuring ‘scantily clad girls’ and top Dutch band De Jeugd van Tegenwoordig, just days before announcing the closure of its Bergen op Zoom factory, the AD says on Monday.

The party, at Amsterdam event centre Undercurrent, took place just five days before the tobacco giant said it was stopping production in the southern town, with the loss of 1,230 jobs.

The AD says attendees were forced to sign a secrecy declaration about the party but the decision to shut up shop in Bergen op Zoom set tongues wagging. ‘There were no signs of crisis at Sunday’s party,’ one women, described as a ‘promotional model’, said on Twitter.

Marketing

One person involved in the party told the AD: ‘You can’t ignore the mass job losses. If the marketing people had been aware of this, they should have cancelled the party.’

Philip Morris said in a reaction the marketing department is in Belgium and the job losses had been kept quiet. The party was to launch a new product, a spokesman said.

‘In retrospect you can think what you like, but I would not use the term “regret”. Sacking our workers is to be regretted enough,’ the AD quoted him as saying.