Talk:Vector Group

Fix Request for Incorrect/Outdated Content

Hi, I’m an employee of Vector Group and noticed a number of incorrect and outdated references on this page. Also, some of the page is written like a laundry list of uncited, outdated, or incorrect investments, which I understand is against Wikipedia rules (see Wikipedia’s policy against directories). I would propose removing and rewriting that section in prose with correct and cited content. I cannot make the fixes myself because of my COI. Would someone be able to help? I’ve outlined my proposed changes along with sources below. (I’ve used strikeouts to denote a proposed deletion, and bold to denote a proposed addition): Thank you for your consideration.

• In the InfoBox, the year the company was founded is wrong and not cited. It should be 1986, not 1999.

• The “Key people" section of the InfoBox is outdated. Please see below for an accurate version:

Key People

Bennett S. LeBow, Chairman

Howard Lorber, President and Chief Executive Officer

Richard Lampen, Executive Vice President

J. Bryant Kirkland III Senior Vice President, Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer

Marc N. Bell Senior Vice President, General Counsel and Secretary

Ronald J. Bernstein President and Chief Executive Officer of Liggett Group LLC and Liggett Vector Brands LLC

• The “Products” section of the InfoBox is not accurate. See below for an accurate version:

Alcoholic beverages, hotels, mortgage services, property management, Tobacco, real estate, property management

• Financial numbers in the InfoBox are outdated. Please see updates for FY 2015 of the “Revenue,” “Net income,” and “Total assets” sections of the InfoBox below:

Revenue

$1.6 billion (FY 2014) $1.7 billion (FY 2015)

Net income

$37.0 million (FY 2014) $59.2 million (FY 2015)

Total Assets

$1.6 billion (FY 2014) $1.3 billion (FY 2015)

• The “Subsidiaries” section of InfoBox has two errors. See below for corrected version:

Subsidiaries

Liggett Group LLC

Liggett Vector Brands

New Valley LLC

Vector Tobacco

• The page’s introduction language does not accurately summarize what the company does. See below for suggested changes:

Vector Group Ltd. is an American publicly traded a diversified holding company with two major businesses: Liggett Group LLC (tobacco) and New Valley LLC (real estate), including Douglas Elliman. headquartered at 4400 Biscayne Boulevard in Miami, Florida.

It was Bennett S. LeBow founded Vector Group in 1986 by its . Since then, he has served as Chairman., financier. Bennett S. LeBow. Howard Lorber serves has served as the Company’s President and Chief Executive Officer since 1994.

In 2013, Forbes magazine named the Vector Group as one of "America's 100 Most Trustworthy Companies.

• The current “Holdings” section is outdated, uncited, and reads as a directory list. Since Wikipedia has policy against directories (WP:Wikipedia is not a directory), I’ve rewritten the sections as prose below and would suggest the following changes:

Subsidiaries

Please remove all bulleted content, and replace with:

Liggett Group LLC. Founded in 1873, Liggett Group LLC is the fourth-largest cigarette manufacturer in the U.S. Liggett operates in the discount cigarette market. As of June 30, 2016, Liggett’s family of brands represented a 12% share of the discount market. Its core brands include: Pyramid, Grand Prix, Liggett Select, Eve and Eagle 20’s. Vector Tobacco Inc. is engaged in the manufacture of conventional cigarettes, based in North Carolina.

New Valley LLC. New Valley LLC (formerly known as Western Union) is a diversified real estate company that acquires or invests in real estate properties or projects. It has invested in more than 20 real estate projects as of June 30, 3016.

New Valley owns over 70 percent of Douglas Elliman Realty, LLC, the largest residential real estate brokerage firm in the New York metropolitan area and fourth-largest residential brokerage firm in the U.S.

Investments and real estate holdings

Please change language of this section header to read: Other Investments and real estate holdings

Please remove all bulleted content under "Investments and real estate holdings" section header, (it looks like a directory list and none of the items are cited) and replace with:

Vector Group also owns a portion of Ladenburg Thalmann Financial Services Inc. and of Castle Brands Inc.

Former Investments

Please remove this section as it is a directory list, and none of the items are cited.

• ”Additional Offices” section header sounds a little strange and is not consistent with other company Wikipedia pages. Can it be updated to read “Office Locations”? Then, it can include both the headquarters info and the additional office address in the same section. See below for some suggested language changes:

Vector Group and New Valley’s headquarters are in Miami, Florida and they have an The company has additional offices at 712 5th Avenue in the Manhattan borough of New York City, New York.

Please feel free to reach out with any questions. Thanks again. BryantTheThird

References

BryantTheThird (talk) 13:58, 28 September 2016 (UTC)

BryantTheThird, I reviewed the proposed edits and they are factual and accurate. I will update the entry accordingly.--CharlesDeMint (talk) 00:27, 26 July 2017 (UTC)