End of Dunhill Tobaccos

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gnarlybriar

Might Stick Around
Jun 11, 2009
66
24
74
Chesterfield, VA
Does anyone have any idea of when the last will be produced/available in the US?
What a damn shame that BAT would think of killing off a world-wide seller, for generations of pipe smokers. They have enough revenue to have a small section that doesn't make extreme profits quickly.

 
According to the distributor that I talked to at The Briary's Pipe Event, "Dunhill" is not even a company anymore. There are no family left, and the name is owned by a conglomerate. Dunhill pipes is no longer. For the last few years, they have been produced by a company renamed Alfred Dunhill's White Spot. And, the tobacco is owned by the producers of that tobacco. The name is just leased out to different companies, like colognes, luggage, etc... the company that leases the name could care less about what these folks do with the name. I can only speculate, but exactly why the tobacco producers want to get out of the game, but I suspect that, yeh, they could care less.

BTW, the new pipes are now labeled as "Alfred Dunhills White Spot."

 

stickframer

Part of the Furniture Now
Apr 11, 2015
875
8
I've heard the tobacco will be available for about 18 more months.
Edit: there was a thread not too long ago that went into more detail.

 

jpmcwjr

Moderator
Staff member
May 12, 2015
24,568
27,070
Carmel Valley, CA
Please, no feckin' politics, or swearing, for that matter.
There are a ton of US blends that are as good as, or better, than the fading Dunhill marque.

 

fnord

Lifer
Dec 28, 2011
2,746
8
Topeka, KS
I'm still a disbeliever at this point.
Dunhill, sadly, is one of the grandest merchandising whores in the business. (The silly shit I've seen down through the years sporting the Dunhill marque is mind boggling.) Their tartan (The Dunhill plaid is a tartan, right?) is universally recognized and the name alone resonates. It makes no business sense whatsoever that longstanding brand names will be shelved or binned.
Cigarettes, pipe tobacco or cigars, it doesn't matter. No company's exit strategy would merely walk away from such a name brand revenue stream.
For the record, I'm most certainly not a member of the Flat Earth Society.
Fnord

 

jvnshr

Moderator
Staff member
Sep 4, 2015
4,616
3,868
Baku, Azerbaijan
There are a ton of US blends that are as good as, or better, than the fading Dunhill marque.
Sure there is, but sometimes you just want to drink Corona instead of a boutique beer. I've always thought that Dunhill will not disappear from the market, so never thought about cellaring it.

 

kiel

Starting to Get Obsessed
May 27, 2016
208
2
Whether is stays or goes I will probably still cellar a few. I recently tried a five year old 965 and it wasn't bad at all, much better than my first time trying it (fresh). Standard Mixture was a win for me so that will be added. There are so many virginia flakes out there to choose from, but cellaring Light and Dark Flake is probably in store too because why the hell not.

 

seagullplayer

Part of the Furniture Now
Jan 30, 2014
500
129
Indiana
Should they go then five years from now everyone will carry on about how great the blends where.
And in ten years they will have been the stuff of dragons and unicorns...
And if someone picks up the name, people will talk about how they are just not as good as the original...
Cause that's just what we do. :)

 

jvnshr

Moderator
Staff member
Sep 4, 2015
4,616
3,868
Baku, Azerbaijan
Should they go then five years from now everyone will carry on about how great the blends where.
And in ten years they will have been the stuff of dragons and unicorns...
And if someone picks up the name, people will talk about how they are just not as good as the original...
Cause that's just what we do. :)
:D

 

mawnansmiff

Lifer
Oct 14, 2015
7,385
7,295
Sunny Cornwall, UK.
I suspect the unscrupulous entrepreneurial hoarders will be stocking up on all their blends now hoping to make a killing further down the line when the stuff becomes as rare as rocking horse droppings :roll:
Regards,
Jay.

 

iamn8

Lifer
Sep 8, 2014
4,248
14
Moody, AL
The day it's all gone will be a profoundly sad day. The implications of the biggest of the big being pulled are vast, far reaching. I don't think it's hit us yet just how major this is for us all, and not just for those of us who love Dunhill tobacco. I think we're kidding ourselves.

We can argue the analogy, but this is as though BMW or Mercedes suddenly announced they're getting out of the car business, insomuch as it doesn't exactly instill confidence in the future of the marketplace.

 
Well, with the way the FDA is handling the deeming date and existing brands, seeing the Dunhill name go down probably has some companies with deep pockets looking to add Dunhill to its tobacco line-up. Of course this is just wishful thinking, but it's a brand with a following, it's already on the market, and it has great branding. The only catch I could see is that when Dunhill pulled out of the US back in 2007-9(not sure of exact date) it may not be considered a brand that meets the FDA deeming date qualifications.

This is why we have so many blends that are replacements. The whole Brigham tobacco line was made to replace the Dunhill blends that were no longer available in the US, plus a whole bunch of other companies made lookalikes as well.

 

mso489

Lifer
Feb 21, 2013
41,210
60,433
I'm a wild-eyed optimist, but I think the Dunhill pipe tobacco brand will get sold to one of the relatively larger blenders with enough cash to make it worthwhile for the current corporate owners of the name (used in relation to the blends). Maybe Sutliff will buy it just to goad the anti-Sutliff folks. Branding is so much of marketing. The blends would have to remain as they are for sales and perhaps for FDA hassle, but that would be part of the sale. Not being a student of the tobacco business, I may not grasp the situation that would liquidate the brand for all time. You can't buy a new Studebaker these days, though they were first in the market with good and popular electric cars about one hundred years ago (remember them?). Tesla's a boring johnny-come-lately. My great aunts were tooling around a Chicago suburb in their Studebaker electric in 1922.

 

sablebrush52

The Bard Of Barlings
Jun 15, 2013
19,623
44,833
Southern Oregon
jrs457.wixsite.com
Clearly BAT didn't think that sales of Dunhill tobaccos were worth continuing. Someone might buy name rights, but as the blends were off the US market after Feb 15th 2007, they're a dead duck anyways. It's curious how the timeline for ending US distribution coincides closely with the date that the FDA final ruling would have forced BAT to either put up, or shut up.
Buy 'em while you can. As has been noted, they will become the stuff of legend and you can gouge the hell out of your fellow pipers.

 

michaelmirza

Part of the Furniture Now
Oct 21, 2015
638
0
Chicago, IL
I'm visiting the forums for the first time in a while, and the search function remains nearly impossible to use. Can someone please link to the original thread about this? I had not heard this news. :cry:

 
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