Big Brother: Something on Cigars

I am one of the few people, in our current times, to work in a tobacco store. Or cigar store. Or smoke shop. Or Den of Sin. Call it what you will (just buy something!)

In particular, I work with pipe tobacco, a tiny and arcane area even in the context of a retail tobacconist. For, you see, the product that keeps smoke shops in business is not pipe tobacco. It’s cigars.

True, the image of the wizened, avuncular, corner-store tobacconist whittling away the days thinking up pipe blends is Romantic-capital-R. And it’s also true I am getting wizened and even avuncular (though my employer, Uhle Tobacco, is not on a corner). Alas, though, business does not care for things as they should be, but rather for things as they are, and the way things are regarding retail tobacconists is: MMMMmmmmoney. This means cigars. Cigarettes, too, but that’s for another time.

Blending pipe tobacco is not my only duty at Uhle’s. I also do the receiving of wholesale deliveries, which consist mostly of cigars. These deliveries are unpacked, boxes of cigars laid out on a table like huge dominos, and I then check the contents against a packing slip or invoice. If all is accounted for, I put the cigars in a walk-in humidor, take the paperwork to the office, and go back to pipe tobacco.

I can do that because of those cigars; I would not, frankly, have my job without them. I know this, and appreciate it (and enjoy smoking cigars). Still, there remains a bit of jealousy--the fact is, most customers come in to buy a product I have nothing, directly, to do with. Yes, I know that cigars are less complicated to smoke than pipes. Yes, I know very few people, by comparison with cigars, smoke a pipe. Yes, I know there is a built-in aura of…say, elegance and celebration with cigars.

All true. In the end, I am grateful that one part of the tobacco industry, cigars, can, in essence, support another part, pipe tobacco. Simply--at the retail level--no cigars means no pipe tobacco.

I enjoy and respect cigars, pipe tobacco’s big brother. Hell, there’s even pipe tobacco blends made from cigar leaves (notably by McClelland). A sign of respect--and sales. I hope all tobacco stores can have both, towards all of their products.

Twitter:  @thepipebit