Are We Living in the Golden Age of Pipe Tobaccos?

brass · Apr 14, 2015

As I've noted elsewhere, there are so many well respected premium pipe tobaccos that I can't keep up. I've got around two dozen open tins and there are many more member recommended blends I'd like to try.
I'm wondering if we are living in the Golden Age of Pipe Tobaccos? I know there were legendary blends from years back that were discontinued for one reason or another. But I suspect many of Russ Oullettes or Greg Peases blends are as good as those classic blends.
I enjoyed trying different tobaccos back in the seventies and eighties but I think the selection was much smaller than today. I think most of us pipe smokers back then focused on our regular blend(s) rather than sampling many as many of us do now. I dabbled in creating my own blends but I didn't know another pipe smoker who went that far into the hobby. As a matter of fact, I suspect that few pipe smokers considered the activity as a hobby.
Pax

framitz · Apr 14, 2015

Back in the sixties when I started cigarettes were 23 cents pack. Pipe tobacco was many burley and aromatics in foil there were dunhill tobaccos in drugstore

And a reasonable number of tins downtown pipe stores were numberlous and they all had their own blends

It would seem that times were better and worse truly a tale of two times sixty years apart. Shel

mso489 · Apr 14, 2015

Yes, I think that the online market has expanded the market for many more blends than ever before. Distributing this kind of variety through the 20th Century tobacco shops, groceries, and drugstores simply wouldn't have worked. No one would have maintained the inventory. Blenders can offer many more blends in relatively small quantities and keep them moving out of their warehouses at a profit, in many cases. It's not a Golden Age of the old marketing system, it's a Golden Age of the new online market, with some participation by brick-and-mortar retailers as well.

jackswilling · Apr 14, 2015

freakiefrog · Apr 14, 2015

In short yes. but isn't it funny how with all the awesome blends out there we still gravitate to the old tried and true stuff like Penzance and BS

cosmicfolklore · Apr 14, 2015

I definitely see more men smoking pipes than I did for the last thirty years, but it still has a ways to go before it is the hey day it was back in the pre-80's.

jackswilling · Apr 14, 2015

Beer is a good analogy, there are so many domestic craft beers now. Back in the day St. Pauli Girl was exotic and there were few domestic craft beers. Same with pot. Same with tobacco. This is a golden age of tobacco, coffee, pot, beer, wine, food, etc, and I agree with mso489 to a degree, but most of these products are not widely sold on the internet, as opposed to B&M, the consumer/market has driven the Golden Age. We have demanded better and we got it.

tarak · Apr 14, 2015

For options? Accessibility? Between price, laws, and anti-smoking protections....arguable.
What I wouldn't give to have some places I could smoke inside.

beefeater33 · Apr 14, 2015

+1 jackswilling-

The choices in the local supermarket these days are staggering..........

Imagine what our (great?)grandparents would think visiting them today.

I agree, golden-age of everything.

neverbend · Apr 14, 2015

I'd say, Yes and No.
Yes, the Internet has allowed smokers to try blends from anywhere and by any blender. Blenders are breaking ground with new and different mixtures.
Tobacco acreage is diminished. Virginia is grown just about anywhere except Virginia. Blending to a specific taste whether with wine, cigars or pipe tobacco has always been a challenge but perhaps more now than ever.
The most variety I've ever seen is now. The best quality leaf is in the past. My opinion.

cmdrmcbragg · Apr 14, 2015

+1 @jackswilling
I personally believe we are living in the golden age of not only pipe tobacco, but also beer and casual dining. There are so many options in each of their respective universes. It blows my mind how many choices you can have of what to put in your pipe, buy at a brewery or liquor store, and places to go eat. Good times indeed as far as those things go. Really experimental period with tobacco, brews and foods to cook up.

matches · Apr 14, 2015

Golden age in terms of what's being produced. Crack down where I live on actually getting hold of tobacco - makes it a rather moot point.

lincolnsbark · Apr 14, 2015

The analogy of pipe tobacco and craft beer is spot on in my opinion. I know tobacco and wine are often compared but I think as far as the growth in popularity over the last few years of craft beer and pipe tobacco is the better. There is a re-appreciation of fine flavors and unique varietal flavors that transcends both craft beer and pipe tobacco.

shanelktown · Apr 14, 2015

I would say no and the reason being that many blends are being discontinued and very limited anymore. This being the case many people turn to hoarding blends in fear of them no longer being produced. So that's the reality and there is no golden age. Now if it's meant in the idea of abundance and variety that's a fair possibility, but having blends that are hard to find that's no golden age just simply a brown age.

lordofthepiperings · Apr 14, 2015

I think the uptick in younger pipers and the world of online pipe tobacco retailers have brought a "Golden Age" of pipe tobacco. Most of the old guard that I've spoken with at pipe shows or B&Ms have said the same.

settersbrace · Apr 15, 2015

In a word, yes.
Brian Levine on one of this years February Podcasts hit on a fact that today's modern pipe smoker differs from the ones that emerged post WW2 when one pipe and one OTC tobacco defined the man and his smoking. There were no afficianidos that sampled on a daily basis, an entire global tobacco supply. A Kaywoodie or a Linkman and a pouch of Grainger or Prince Albert where all the pipe man needed or wanted and he smoked that sucker from dawn till dusk.

Today's smoker is more of a dabbler, not always smoking on a daily basis, having a stable full of various pipes made oftentimes by the hand of an artisan. He may have one or two staple tobaccos but experiments and samples countless blends and often has many mixtures open and ready at one time. The Internet did not exist in 1955, the discussion on pipes and tobaccos took place in a tobacconists store or at a barber shop.

We have available today at our fingertips, access to any and all of the worlds pipe tobaccos to smoke as we please, we as a demographic have more disposable income, more leisure time than smokers had 60 years ago. If this isn't the Golden Age of pipe tobacco then we are in for a real treat when we do hit it!

briarfriar · Apr 15, 2015

I think we all have much to be thankful for today, but a golden age would not be characterized as a time of ever encroaching prohibitions and ever increasing taxes.
Tobacco taxes never will decrease; they only will increase. Strictures on purchasing, shipping, and smoking tobacco never will be liberalized; they only will be made more severe. In time, when our government will exercise true ownership of our bodies, and everything we think we might want to do will bear some social cost, there will be no smoking (except maybe marijuana), and we'll remember 2015 as the golden age.
Jay

cmdrmcbragg · Apr 15, 2015

The lifecycle of things is just that, a cycle. It was only a generation ago where the masses fought for less restrictions and society was more permissive. That began changing in the 1980s and now we are where we are today: encroaching on freedoms at the behest of this group or that group. It's only a matter of time before there is another pushback and the vast majority or people and those in power want to walk back that which was done today. Hopefully seeing that consumption of drugs, alcohol and tobacco are personal choices.

jackswilling · Apr 15, 2015

I live in one of the most regulated/taxed states and I just don't see the pipe tobacco oppression. Cigs get slammed here. I am free to buy what pipe tobacco I want when I want. I get that it may not always be so, but I am amazed at what is available and new options being added all the time. In fact reading this thread cheered me up. Very good thread Mr Brass. My last two orders:
McClelland Tudor Castle

HH Acadian Perique

Rattray's Old Gowrie

Hearth & Home Signature Anniversary Kake

Seattle Pipe Club Mississippi River

Seattle Pipe Club Plum Pudding

Seattle Pipe Club Deception Pass
Yes life blows. So few choices. Same old, same old.

Are We Living in the Golden Age of Pipe Tobaccos?

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