Big Impact for Newport Non-Menthol Cigarettes?

(CSP) As Lorillard Tobacco Co. prepares to launch Newport Non-Menthol cigarettes in early November, retailers seem ready for the new offering. ... Although this is not Lorillard's first attempt at a non-menthol version of Newport, recent U.S. Food & Drug Administration (IFDA) scrutiny of menthol could make this launch "more meaningful," according to the report. The previous efforts were test marketed about 10 years ago, but a broader national launch wasn't pursued, the report states. Continued

Political Cigar Boxes

(National Cigar History Museum) Since the 1860’s, elections have been special times for cigar makers, wholesalers, and retailers alike, all of whom quickly learned there was money to be made by covering boxes with labels picturing candidates and issues and offering them for sale wherever opinions ran hot. Saloons, pool halls, barber shops and men’s clubs were favorite spots. Continued

Photo: Boss Tweed Cigars (Library of Congress).

Whimsy touches tobacco shop

(newstimes.com) The Milford Tobacco Shop, at 2017 Bridgeport Ave., has all of the right touches, including the wooden cigar-store American Indian guarding the display cases.
But it's details beyond what you'd expect to find that makes Luzanne McCollough's year-old business fascinating, even for non-smokers. There is the Civil War memorabilia, including soldiers' letters home, the lead "minie balls" that were fired from their smooth-bore rifles and a replica of the small pistol that killed President Abraham Lincoln.
These items take up several glass cabinets in what might be called the 19th-century gallery of McCollough's personal museum, which also includes programs from Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show, photos of its star Annie Oakley and authentic stagecoach tickets for a line that operated in western Montana and Wyoming. Continued

Image: Library of Congress

Machine Made Cigar Renaissance?

Premium hand rolled cigars get most of the attention these days, but that may be changing. Machine made cigar sales appear to be on the rise, and at least one major online tobacco retailer has taken notice. "Machine Made: Ultra affordable cigars, precision-made for unrivaled consistency," reads a smart looking new graphic at Famous Smoke Shop. Not that Famous and other online tobacconists haven't sold machine made cigars in the past (though some haven't), it's that they weren't the most prominently displayed items on the homepage, often relegated to a subsection of the drop-down menu.
Forty-six years ago, premium cigars were something of a rarity in the U.S., says Theo Folz, of Altadis in a 2008 interview in Smoke Magazine, "There were tobacconists, but there weren't as many of them - there weren't that many premium cigars sold. ... The cigars that sold in those days were basically brands like Dutch Master, El Producto, Antonio & Cleopatra, White Owl, Phillies, King Edward - Swisher Sweet wasn't even a seller in '64, it was King Edward." But it was all downhill from there and the American cigar market seemed to be heading for extinction. That changed in the early '90's with the premium cigar boom, spearheaded by Cigar Aficionado Magazine.
However, even at the height of the swanky cigar revival, machine made cigars still constituted the largest portion of the American cigar market - they just didn't get any respect. They may still get no respect, but thanks largely to high cigarette taxes, America is once again in need of a good five cent cigar.
Call them what you will, stogies, cheapies, stinkers, prairie burners, dog rockets, whatever, tobacco consumers are looking to the machine made cigar industry for a little relief. This, I think, is good news for all cigar fans. A lot of premium cigar lovers started out smoking something with the word "sweet" or "filter" or "homogenized" somewhere on the package, and then graduated to more upscale brands as their tastes and earnings matured. It's also doubtful that machine made cigars are much threat to their upscale brethren, manufacturing differences ensure two very different products: different draw, different flavor, and yes, often, different quality. But, believe it or not, some of those stinkers are pretty good smokes, believe it or not. To quote a guy in the business, "a good machine-made cigar is better than a fair handmade cigar," a statement as true as it is modest.

Dissolvable tobacco: Camel vs. Stonewall

Star Scientific gave us Ariva and Stonewall dissolvable tobacco pellets years ago and now RJR has come to test market with Camel Orbs, Strips and Sticks. How do they compare?

Bold Room 101 Cigars Hit Retail Shelves

(Cigar Aficionado) Room 101 Conjura Edition, the amped-up version of Camacho's Room 101 brand, has hit retail shelves. The first installment of the Room 101 Limitado Series, the Room 101 Conjura Edition is made with a mix of Dominican and Nicaraguan filler tobacco, Honduran binder, and a rosado wrapper grown in Honduras. Continued

Photo: Alexander Graham Bell swimming with cigar (Library of Congress).

Tobacco firm Swedish Match Q3 boosted by cigar and snuff sales

(Reuters) Rising sales of cigars and snuff helped tobacco products group Swedish Match AB (SWMA.ST) achieve a 20 percent rise in third-quarter earnings, and it said it expects demand for smokeless products to rise.
The company said it expects both the snuff market in Scandinavia and the snuff market in the United States to continue to grow. Demand for smokeless products is rising as cigarette sales have fallen due to health fears. Continued

Finck cigar shop to open location in Helotes

(mysanantonio.com) Finck's Cigar Factory Outlet, which is known to have a retail location with the largest walk-in humidor in Texas, is moving into a new space in Helotes.
The San Antonio cigar retailer leased a 3,364-square-foot space at Helotes Plaza at 12940 Bandera Road, near FM 1516. The company has its factory on the West Side at 414 Vera Cruz Street. Continued

IRCPR Tobacconists Complete CRT Certification

Twenty-five tobacconists nationwide have earned the designation of Certified Retail Tobacconist from Tobacconist University, the official curriculum resource of the International Premium Cigar & Pipe Retailers Association.

The group includes the following:

Jorge Luis Valdez of Sabor Havana Cigars in Doral, Florida
Alex Diaz, Greg Hernke, Neal Thompson, K. Allen Byrd, Perry Lowe and Jeff Borysiewicz of Corona Cigar Company in Orlando, Florida
Douglas Fiore and Rose Ann Edmiston of Winston’s Humidor in Midlothian, Virginia
Phillip Ledbetter of Up Down Cigar in Chicago, Illinois
Alex B. Mayer of Wooden Indian Tobacco Shop in Havertown, Pennsylvania
Russell Salvatore of A Little Taste of Cuba in New Hope, Pennsylvania
Ronald Alred of Mojito Cigar Lounge in Cave Creek, Arizona
Michael McCarthy of MJM Fine Cigars & Tobacco in Palm Harbor, Florida
Luis Roberto Molina of Habana Port Cigar Merchants in Covington, Louisiana
Therina Himes of Custom Blends in Shrewsbury, Pennsylvania
David Kleehamer and Robert A. Roth of Nice Ash Cigars & Lounge in Depew, New York
Zack Photakis of Owl Shop Tobacconists in Worcester, Massachusetts
Cindy Pinkerton of Snow Mountain Smoke Shop in Las Vegas, Nevada
Robert E. Wood of the Las Vegas Paiute Smoke Shop in Las Vegas, Nevada
Jetmira Kaziu of Cigar Masters in Boston, Massachusetts
Wayne Young of Chesapeake Cigar Company in Edgewater, Maryland
Danny Ditkowich of Tobacco Plaza, Ltd. In Great Neck, New York and
Erich Orris of Tinder Box 420 in Rapid City, South Dakota

These tobacconists are among some 500 selected professional tobacconists nationwide who have been awarded CRT recognition after participating in an academic curriculum and testing process that enables them to achieve superior technical and marketing knowledge about premium cigars, pipes, premium tobacco and related accessories.

Photo: Therina Himes of Custom Blends in Shrewsbury, Pennsylvania. (Falmanac).

Davidoff’s New Maduro Cigar

(Cigar Aficionado) Davidoff has long shied away from maduro cigars. It was only 2008 when the Davidoff brand had its first maduro version. (And Dominican Davidoffs have been sold since 1991.) Now Davidoff has expanded its maduro line by introducing the Davidoff Maduro Toro. Continued

Artisan Tobacco Pipe Maker Joe Nelson Interview

(Pipesmagazine.com) Joe Nelson is the owner of Old Nellie Pipes and Nelson Guitars. He is an artisan pipe maker as well as a luthier and resides in Fond Du Lac County, WI. For those of you who might not know, a luthier is a stringed instrument builder/repairman. He has been making guitars for 14 years and pipes for 5 years.
While we were at the 2010 Richmond Pipe Show, we had the opportunity to talk with Joe and he took the time out of his busy day to have an interview us. Joe has just recently started using a new method in his pipe making. He is now oil curing his pipes. Continued

Dark tobacco stable as burley declines

(Louisville Courier-Journal) The smell of fire against the crisp fall air is distinct. In a metal-sided barn, rows of dark tobacco hang from the rafters and are cured by a fire underneath the smoke wafting through the leaves. While Kentucky's burley crop has declined since a federal buyout ended the tobacco price-support program, dark tobacco — used for snuff and grown primarily in Western Kentucky — has rebounded.
Kentucky is the largest U.S. supplier of burley and dark tobacco, while North Carolina leads in total tobacco production. Continued

Photo: Ten year old son of tobacco tenant tends the fire which is curing the tobacco in the barn, 1939. (Dorothea Lange)

Tobacco Art: John George Brown

(Wikipedia) John George Brown (November 11, 1831 – February 8, 1913), British and American painter, was born in Durham, England, on 11 November 1831. He studied at Newcastle-on-Tyne, in the Edinburgh Academy, and after moving to New York City in 1853, he studied with Thomas Seir Cummings at the schools of the National Academy of Design, of which he became a member in 1863. ... In 1866 he became one of the charter members of the Water-Color Society, of which he was president from 1887 to 1904. He generally confined himself to representations of street child life, bootblacks, newsboys, etc.; his Passing Show (Paris, Salon, 1877) and Street Boys at Play (Paris Exhibition, 1900) are good examples of his popular talent. Brown's art is best characterized as British genre paintings adapted to American subjects.

Cohibas and conversation: tobacco merchant loved customers as much as business

(Kitchener Record) Mike Koebel loved the Walper Tobacco Shop so much, he nurtured and pushed the business through fires, recessions, smoking crackdowns and endless downtown renewal projects for more than 40 years.
Over the years as neighbouring businesses came and went, cigar-lovers, pipe-puffers and magazine enthusiasts beat a path to his shop near the corner of King and Queen Streets.
“I can’t think of another retailer down there that’s been around even close to that long,” says local lawyer Brian Wagner, of the store that first began selling tobacco products in 1891. Continued

Hand-Rolled and Hand-Delivered: Sierra Madre's Cigar Factory

(Sierra Madre Patch) While it is doubtful that Emile Deutsch's Sierra Madre cigar factory had anything like a lector--the storyteller character in Nilo Cruz's play Anna in the Tropics who reads Tolstoy's Anna Karenina to employees while they work--it did enjoy the choice position of being located in Town Hall, the central business hub of Sierra Madre, where factory workers might have overheard any number of interesting conversations about city affairs. Continued

Photo: Emile Deutsch Cigar Factory-1885 (City of Sierra Madre, California).

Dusting Off the Stogie's Stodgy Image

(WSJ) With its bespoke wicker chairs, neatly trimmed herbaceous borders and cool breeze, the Garden Room at the Lanesborough Hotel in London is a welcome retreat from the hustle and bustle of nearby Knightsbridge. However, if you come here seeking a spot of botany, you will be disappointed. For this verdant subterranean hideaway is arguably London's most stylish and comfortable place in which to enjoy a cigar. Yet far from being exposed to the elements, by a quirk of engineering and careful reading of planning regulations, it is all but inside. The room is covered at the top; however, a gap at the edge of the ceiling, filled with slatted glass, as well as flower-filled open sides, allows smoking to take place legally. Continued

Shop brings a little tobacco revival to town

(KansasCity.com) ... Just as small-town people gathered around the radio to hear the latest news, people at Weston Tobacco gather around a wide-screen TV, watching CNN and ready to discuss the latest news.
All the while shop owner Corey Frisbee — eyes shaded by a cowboy hat — sits calmly cutting tobacco leaves. Then he skillfully shapes them into cigars and stacks them up, 100 to 120 a day. Continued

Image: Cigar store Indian, Denison, Iowa, 1936 by Russell Lee (FSA/Library of Congress).

Video: Making a Cigar

"After the tobacco has been grown, picked, cured, fermented, and aged, it is ready to be assembled into cigars. This video shows how the wrapper, binder and filler leaves are prepared and then put together into cigars. Different techniques for bunching and rolling the cigars are also demonstrated."

After tobacco: North Carolina builds on the legacy of the golden leaf

(The Economist) ... Tobacco’s legacy to Winston-Salem is far from being merely architectural. Because it has been such an important cash crop for so long, it is among the most studied plants in the world—Richard Reich, the assistant commissioner for agricultural services in North Carolina’s Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services, calls it “the laboratory white rat” of the plant world. Much of that study, of course, was done by tobacco companies, and Targacept, one of the bioscience companies in the Piedmont Triad Research Park, is among the fruits of that labour. Continued

Image: Library of Congress

Real tobacco cutters don’t cut cigars

(National Cigar Museum) Highly collectible, some quite valuable, but these are NOT cigar cutters. You’d destroy just about any cigar you tried to cut with one. Until the 1930’s these tools sat atop the counter wherever plug (chewing) tobacco was sold. Plug was shipped in 8, 12 and 16 ounce long strips, and merchants used these to cut off ounce and half ounce pieces to order. Continued

Altria's Profit Rises on Marlboro Prices, Snuff Demand

(Bloomberg) Altria Group Inc., the largest U.S. tobacco company, reported third-quarter profit that beat analysts’ estimates, helped by higher prices for Marlboro cigarettes and snuff sales.
Net income rose 28 percent to $1.13 billion, or 54 cents a share, from $882 million, or 42 cents, a year earlier, the Richmond, Virginia-based maker of Copenhagen snuff said today in a statement. Analysts surveyed by Bloomberg had projected 52 cents, the average of 11 estimates. Continued

Reprieve for Bartow cigar factory

(Polk County Democrat) Continued discussion of the cigar factory dominated most of the Bartow City Commissioners work session Monday, so much so that it would not be until nearly 7:30 p.m. — an entire hour beyond the designated 6:30 p.m. time slot — that the regular meeting would start. And in the end, commissioners voted to save Thompson Cigar Factory. Continued

Earning big from tobacco

(Daily Monitor) Jimmy Roy Jurua left Arua Tobacco Buying Centre smiling and Shs3.5m richer. Jurua had just received cash for his one and a half tonnes of tobacco he harvested this year.“Now I will be able to pay school fees for my children, stock up my shop and complete my third house,” he gladly said as he boarded a bus to his village- Ocoko located in Ajia Sub-county in Arua district. Jurua planted one and a half acres of the crop in February and harvested one and a half tonnes of tobacco in April. Continued

Select cigars in a secluded place

(Amarillo Globe News) Todd Dailey takes a draw on a cigar and jokingly says, "We're urban pioneers."
Well, maybe not so jokingly. Good Karma Cigar is the first of its kind downtown, but you better know where to look. It's a former small brick home that sits almost hidden at 110 S.E. 12th Ave. Continued

Tobacco Books: Confessions of a Pipeman 2nd Edition

(Pipesmagazine.com) The book Confessions of a Pipeman … an irreverent guide for today’s pipe-smoking man, has just been released in a second edition. There’s 50% more text and illustrations than the first, and it’s now all-color.
I’ve read the first edition of Confessions of a Pipeman and thoroughly enjoyed it. The author, Gary B. Schrier, is not afraid to cause a little controversy, debate, and certainly inspires thinking and even a little laughter with some of his profound, blunt assertions. Continued

Image by Walker Evans/FSA/Library of Congress

Gran Habano announces the release of the Gran Reserva #3 cigar

(PuffingCigars.com) Time has finally come for the limited production Gran Reserva #3 cigar by Gran Habano to be released into the public. Medium to full bodied in strength the Gran Reserva #3 was blended by George A. Rico using aged Nicaraguan and Columbian tobaccos from the Gran Habano farms.
Composition of the Gran Reserva #3 consists of an 8 year old wrapper and a 7 year old binder from our Nicaraguan farm “La Santa Cruz”. The filler is a mixture of 7 year old Nicaraguan from “La Santa Cruz” and 8 year old Columbian from our “La Joya del Valle” farm. The cigars were rolled in early 2008 and have been aging for the previous two years making the overall components about a decade old.
George A. Rico explains that “Being able to age the leaf and rolled cigars for such a long period of time has created a very rich, smooth, yet complex smoke.” Continued

e-cigarettes and new tobacco products could help save lives: researcher

(Herald Sun) ELECTRIC cigarettes and new tobacco products could help save the lives of Australian smokers, according to a leading researcher.
Queensland Universities Dr Coral Gartner will advocate for increased access to less harmful tobacco in Australia at a major drugs conference next week.
Dr Gartner has today said battery powered cigarettes that allow users to inhale nicotine without smoke or tobacco could help those who refuse to quit smoking altogether. Continued

Guillermo León Cigar Shipping

(Cigar Aficionado) La Aurora S.A.'s first cigar with a double binder—Guillermo León by La Aurora—is starting to ship. After a soft launch in the Miami area a few weeks ago the cigars are coming to New York next week, and company head Guillermo León is coming with them. ... Distributor Miami Cigar & Co. expects the line to be available nationwide around December 1. Continued

Image: Library of Congress

The Cigarette Book: The History and Culture of Smoking

(Spectator) I have seen the last of the things that are gone, brooded the poet Padraic Colum. But then so have we all. We have seen them clustered outside the plate-glass doors of offices or under the flapping canvas awnings ouside pubs, these last irreconcilables inhaling in the wind and rain. And the crazy thing is that they are acquiring a tattered dignity, which presumably was the last thing the authorities and the doctors thought would result when they got their ban on smoking in enclosed public spaces.
But what happens when their ranks thin, when eventually just one is left, as the last old Jacobite was left in some Paris café? Continued

Cooking With Tobacco

(chicagoist) Back in the spring, our own Kevin Robinson started a tobacco-growing project (parts 1, 2, 3, and 4). In his first post on the project, Kevin said that tobacco was "a fun and easy plant to grow, if cared for properly." Which I assume is why he and his wife gifted me with four planters of White Orinoco tobacco after an evening of tiki cocktails at Won Kow in Chinatown in late May. I found it to be a sincere gesture on Kevin's part, but ultimately a tits on a bull move: I'm a non smoker. 'Course, as soon as I returned to my apartment I was online furiously searching for historical examples of possible culinary uses for tobacco. Continued

Railway Conductors' Cigar

I found this ad in an issue of The Railway Conductor's Monthly from 1888. It reads as follows:

ORDER OF RAILWAY CONDUCTORS' CIGAR.
The Finest 10-Cent Cigar in the Market.
TRADE MARK REGISTERED.
TO THE: Order OF RAILWAY CONDUCTORS.
GENTLEMEN: In placing this cigar on the market, we feel confident that we are giving the Order the BEST TEN-CENT CIGAR that can be manufactured.
We will guarantee to keep the cigars up to their present standard, and by so doing hope to receive the liberal patronage of the Order they are named after, and also their recommendation to their many friends, who are in want of a good cigar. Respectfully,
BRAVO & KEYES,'
MANUFACTURED,
BINGHAMPTON, N. Y.
No cigars are genuine unless the words "Grand Chief" appear on each and every label.

Cigar Sales Light Up Tobacco Category

(Convenience Store News) After a 25-percent jump in sales last year, the cigar segment is coming on strong again in c-stores, thanks in part to manufacturer innovation and tax-weary cigarette smokers jumping to large filtered cigars. ... "We have to be careful when we look at sales figures to factor in all of those tax dollars," cautioned Ron Coppel, vice president business development, Eby-Brown Co. , who said some cigar manufacturers are seeing flat or slightly decreased sales. "There are pockets of unit growth in some subcategories, but they have been offset with unit losses in other subcategories." Continued

Growing demand for smokeless tobacco boosts Nashville plant

Nashville Business Journal (subscription) The smokeless tobacco plant on Harrison Street downtown may be one of the rare bright spots in Tennessee’s lagging manufacturing industry.
Nearly two years after Altria bought U.S. Smokeless Tobacco Co. and its facilities for $10.4 billion — including the Nashville operations — the plant’s future is promising, fueled by the growing popularity of cigarette alternatives.
U.S. Smokeless’ Nashville processing facility manufactures dry snuff products and moist smokeless tobacco, also known as dip, under the brand names Copenhagen, Skoal and others. Continued

Monte’s creates a trick-or-treat romp for cigar lovers

(New Mexico BizBlog) Albuquerque cigar shop owner Larry Monte Jr. has always said that businesses have to be aggressive in going after business and in treating customers with respect and gratitude.
“You can’t sit back and wait for business to come to you,” Monte says.
On Sept. 25, Monte showed just what that meant when his 5,000-square-foot Monte’s Pueblo Pipe Shop and Club La Gloria Cubana cigar club at 3636 San Mateo NE in Albuquerque hosted what could only be called a blowout event. Continued

Swag Cigars

(Cigar Cyclopedia) All-Dominican cigars have been all the rage since the Fuente Fuente Opus X line was introduced in 1996 and many of the follow-on Dominican puros have shared the Opus X tilt toward spicy and peppery flavors.
But it doesn't have to be that way. A new puro, the SWAG line from the Habana Cuba Cigar Co. - maker of Oliveros - showcases a different theme in a unique blend. Continued

Japanese tobacco firms hope changes keep smokers happy

(The Independent) Japanese tobacco companies are adding to their lines and making changes to their products as they anticipate the impact of the largest tax hike on tobacco in Japan.
Tax on cigarettes and other tobacco products leapt more than 30 percent on October 1, with retailers reporting "panic buying" in the weeks leading up to that date. Figures released by the government show that cigarette sales were up a remarkable 88 percent in September. Continued

Martini and cigar bar in Bay City extends hours after increase in business since smoking ban

(mlive) The Stables Martini and Cigar Bar in Bay City has extended its hours of operation to seven days a week.
Bay City Businessman Art Dore, owner of BARTS, 804 E. Midland, which the bar is located, said the extended hours are due to an increase in business, which has been up since Michigan's smoking ban took effect May 1. Continued

Image: Eugene Ysaÿe, half-length portrait, standing, facing right, with cigar in mouth (Library of Congress).

Cuban Tobacco Growers Take Storm in Stride

(MSNBC) ... In Pinar del Rio, where the premium tobacco for Cuba's world-famous cigars is grown, most residents took the storm in stride.
Growers had planned to begin planting Tuesday for next year's harvest, though many likely held off due to the storm.
"The rains have not been as intense as we had expected," Aliuska Banos, 28, told The Associated Press by telephone Thursday from the town of Sandino, along the extreme west of the island. Continued

Cornell & Diehl Releases New Tobacco Blends at Richmond Show

(Pipes Magazine) At the 2010 Richmond Pipe Show, Cornell & Diehl introduced four new blends. Two of the blends are under the Cornell & Diehl label, one of them is a new G.L. Pease blend, and the last is a new blend for the Hermit Tobaccos. Continued

Tobacco Art: Westward Ho! Tobacco

Westward Ho! Tobacco, circa 1868. Tobacco label showing westward movement by wagon train, wheelbarrow, and railroad. Lithograph by Louis Nelke & Co., Chicago. Copyright by James Geary. (Library of Congress).

Cigar factory legacy

(Polk County Democrat) Although its been more than 60 years since the last cigar was rolled at the historic cigar factory on Third Avenue, some Bartownians still remember and cherish the mechanized factory. More than 100,000 cigars a day were produced at the site. The building is now in disrepair and a group of concerned citizens led by Winter Haven and former Bartow resident Ken Atkins launched a campaign to renovate the factory and make it a draw for visitors. Continued

Also: Company seeks to renovate cigar factory

Photo by Ebyabe some rights reserved.

Prizery holds Nelson County's tobacco history

(Nelson County Times) A huge iron screw hangs above a tobacco hogshead, as though poised in suspended animation. The pause takes place perpetually in an outbuilding called the prizery at Elk Hill farm in Nellysford.
During the months after harvest 200 years ago or more, the prizery would have been abuzz with activity, and the screw would have been turning. It was used to press tobacco leaves layer by layer into a hogshead, the culmination of the process calling prizing, or pressing. Continued

Images: 1. Tobacco press, Upper Marlboro, Prince George's, MD 2. Sweeney Farm, Prizery, Appomattox, VA (Library of Congress).

Hurricane Paula Aims at Cuba Tobacco Fields

(AP) Hurricane Paula charged toward western Cuba and its lush tobacco fields today, threatening to inundate an area still recovering from three major hurricanes in 2008. Continued

Anatomy of a Cigar Factory

(cigarsoftampa.com) During the big days of the cigar industry in Tampa, a series of factory buildings were constructed in both sides of the Hillsborough River, to provided the proper environment for the hand made cigar manufacturing. Today those buildings are consider a thing of the past and are only part of the landscape in a new city, as silent witnesses of an era. What not many people know is that they were a good example of the building construction at the end of 1800's, and that they were engineering marvels... Continued

Image: Ybor Cigar Factory, 1916 North Fourteenth Street, Tampa (Library of Congress).

Puros Indios Cigars Return

(Cigar Aficionado) Reyes Family Cigars has changed its name. Again. The makers of Puros Indios and Cuba Aliados cigars, which originally did business under the name Cuba Aliados, then changed its name to Reyes Family Cigars in November 2007, has switched once again. The company, which is headquartered in Miami and makes cigars in Honduras, is now known by its two main brands: Puros Indios/Cuba Aliados. Continued

Photo: Cigar Store Indians (Carol Highsmith/Library of Congress)

Malawian Tobacco Sells For an Average 37% Below Government-Mandated Price

(Bloomberg) The average price of tobacco in Malawi fell 37 percent below the government-set price of $2 per kilogram (2.2 pounds) at a sale, Auction Holdings Ltd. said.
The leaves sold at an average $1.26 per kilogram in the week through Oct. 8, from $1.39 recorded two weeks ago, the Lilongwe-based manager of Malawi’s auction floors said in a statement published in the Daily Times newspaper today. During the week, 2.3 million kilograms of tobacco worth $2.9 million were sold, it said.
Malawi began setting minimum prices for the various grades of tobacco in 2007, after accusing merchants of putting growers out of business by offering them lower prices. Continued

Sales soar for loose tobacco as smokers cut costs

(Independent.ie) PEOPLE'S wages have gone up in smoke since the recession began -- and they're turning to cheaper loose tobacco to cut down on the cost of smoking.
But tax receipts from tobacco still rose to a record €1.2bn last year, with a total of 4,893 tonnes of tobacco smoked during the 12-month period.
Figures show the amount of loose tobacco being sold jumped by 60pc between 2008 and last year. Continued

Swedish Match Cigar Venture Makes Takeover Easier, Analyst Says

(Bloomberg) Swedish Match AB’s joint venture to create the world’s second-largest cigar maker makes the Scandinavian snuff maker an easier takeover target, according to Rolf Karp, an analyst at Ohman Equities.
Swedish Match transferred most of its cigar business to a joint venture with Skandinavisk Holding A/S in return for a 49 percent stake in the unit and 30 million euros ($41 million) in cash, the Stockholm-based snuff maker said on its website today.
“They will be able to focus on the smokeless business now,” Karp said. “It does make it a bit easier to take over, because you could just sell off the remaining stake in cigars.” Continued

Tobacco Board restricts crop size to 170 million kg in AP

(Business Standard) The Tobacco Board of India has decided to restrict the crop size in Andhra Pradesh to 170 million kg for the upcoming season.
Speaking at a press conference here on Friday, G Kamalvardhana Rao, who recently took over as chairman of the board, said there was a tobacco glut globally.
Farmers would end up getting lower returns if they were allowed to grow more tobacco, he said explaining the reasons for turning down Indian Tobacco Association’s appeal for an increase of 10 million kg. Continued

KT&G launches Esse Edge Menthol Cigarettes

(Korea Herald) KT&G launches its new Esse Edge Menthol, which contains premium natural menthol, menthe piperita, on Oct. 15, the company said on Tuesday. ... The country’s tobacco monopoly first introduced the Esse Edge cigarette, which adopts a slim figure of 8.4 millimeters and comes in a half-round-shaped package, last November. Continued

A Lesson in Cigar Lighting

(Cigar Aficionado) ... If you're lighting a cigar with any lighter (whether a Zippo or Dupont), it's important to remember to keep the cigar out of the flame. Hold the cigar about a quarter inch over the flame—not in direct contact. Rotate the cigar slowly. Start a burn around the perimeter. When it's thinly blackened around (but not charred), bring it to your lips and puff gently. The flame will jump to the center of the cigar. Continued

Illustration: Library of Congress

The Hobo Cigar Connection

Why would a hobo smoke cigars? It never made any sense to me, that a traveling migrant worker, which is what most of them were, would smoke something so ill-suited to such a hard lifestyle, but that's how they are always depicted. Finally, I think I found an answer in Patricia A. Cooper's book, "Once a Cigar Maker: Men, Women, and Work Culture in American Cigar Factories, 1900 - 1919."

"The cigar maker," wrote one lifelong observer of the CMIU, "is a wanderer." The description was simple but accurate. ... Travel also acted as a sort of rite of passage. This was especially true of hoboing. Most traveling was not hoboing, but everyone was expected to try it at least once. "I don't know why we did," remarked Ograin, but you had to take a hobo trip. If you didn't hobo - why they used to say, 'all right. You're through with your apprenticeship. Now go out and learn the trade.'"

The Cohiba Cigar Factory

(Havana Times) Situated within a stunning mansion located along 146st Street in Havana’s Cubanacan community is the factory of the coveted Cohiba cigar.
Issuing from the special plantations in the western Pinar del Rio Province, these cigars —possessing no rings to indicate their brand— were first produced for the exclusive use by members of the Council of State (to smoke or to hand out as gifts). It was in 1982 that Celia Sanchez Manduley christened them their present name, which is what our indigenous ancestors called rolled tobacco. Continued

Image: Making "pure Havanas," the world's most famous cigars, largest factory of Havana, Cuba, c1903 (Library of Congress).

Tobacco Pipes: From Habit to Art

(Malta Independent) Olof Gollcher (1889-1962) was a fascinating man of many interests – an artist, a scholar, a philanthropist, and a Bohemian at heart. Amongst his curious paraphernalia of collections, a number of pipes were found, 20 of which were probably his personal favourites used on a daily basis. Many of his portraits whether painted or photographed, show him typically holding a pipe cupped in his hands or actually smoking one. However there was more than simple smoking pleasure to be had for Gollcher where pipes were concerned. Continued

Image: Some guy smoking a pipe (Library of Congress)

The changing face of the once-dominant tobacco industry

(GoDanRiver) Robert W. Carter Jr. remembers going into Reidsville to shop during the 1940s, ’50s and ’60s, and being greeted by tobacco.
“You could smell that aroma,” Carter says. The city was home to American Tobacco Co., at one time one of the largest tobacco companies in the world and maker of the Lucky Strike cigarette, at one time the No. 1-selling brand. Continued

Photo: Tobacco auction in warehouse in Danville, Virginia where many Caswell County farmers sell their tobacco at auction, 1940. (Marion Post Wolcott/FSA/Library of Congress)

KT&G completes cigarette plant in Russia

(Korea Herald) KT&G Corp., Korea’s tobacco monopoly, has recently completed the construction of a plant in Russia to expand its presence in the world’s second-largest tobacco market. The company has invested $100 million in building the plant located on a 103,000 square-meter site near Moscow. Focusing on its flagship slim cigarettes, Esse, the plant will produce 4.6 billion cigarettes annually, KT&G said. It began operating Friday. Continued

Two young Piedmont growers stake their future on tobacco

(GoDanRiver) David Parsons drives a tractor as it inches down a row of tobacco rising sunward from the soil of Pittsylvania County. Migrant workers follow, capped heads bent in concentration as hands fly.
Snap, snap, snap. They break yellow-green leaves as long as their arms off shoulder-high stalks of tobacco. They pile the leaves on the tractor’s trailer, variously called a slide or sled, with practiced fluidity. Continued

Tobacco's roots run deep in the Piedmont

(GoDanRiver) Tobacco, for good and ill, shaped the history and culture of Piedmont Virginia and North Carolina.
Its reach extends back to colonial times. Tobacco was the first real cash crop. English colonists grew it and shipped it back home.
They planted it everywhere, even along the streets in Jamestown. Continued

Pictures: Top: Tobacco Warehouse, Danville, VA. Inset: "A tobacco drinker, 1623." (Library of Congress).

History of Cigar Making Tools

(National Cigar Museum) Man’s first murder weapon, first hunting tool and first cigar making tool were the same...a rock.
An early 1800’s chronicler of cigar manufacture wrote: “The outside of the cigar is made of one or two leaves, beaten flat by small smooth stones. They are filled with smaller pieces, rolled, and cemented on the edges with a pink paste.” Continued

Photo: Library of Congress

Company supplies tobacco compound for research

(Richmond Times Dispatch) Henrico County-based tobacco company Star Scientific Inc. said it is supplying a tobacco-derived compound to a research institute that is studying it for treatment of Alzheimer's disease.
Star Scientific, which makes smokeless tobacco products, said the compound was developed by its Rock Creek Pharmaceuticals subsidiary in Massachusetts.
The research is being conducted by the Roskamp Institute of Sarasota, Fla., a nonprofit organization that this week also disclosed a financial interest in Star Scientific through one of its trustees and a for-profit affiliate.
The Roskamp Institute, which studies neurodegenerative disorders, said it plans to conduct human clinical trials with the compound, called RCP-006. Continued