Hoarding and Panic Buying

I ignore it all. I would like to sample some of those but life and leisure are more important when you get old. Competition is often for the young and foolish. Was there once but when you get to mid seventies. There are other pleasures. Wouldn't mind one ounce of stone haven to sample. Shel

I am OCD. One of the reasons I took up smoking a pipe is to try to overcome my nature. Being non-materialistic and non-selfish are not normal human behavior. We need to strive to overcome the ugly beast inside us.

I'm jealous that someone beat me to the penzance, after a few minutes I could care less. Life goes on for me. I have many things that I take pleasure in then worrying about the other guy who has more than me.

@sablebrush52- I think some of the hoarding and panic buying is driven by a couple of factors I have personally experienced. One is the unceasing, year-after-year tax increases making pipe smoking more and more expensive. As I noted in a different thread, I never used to cellar English or Scottish blends because they were readily available in tins at my two locals. Well, not anymore. One now charges astronomical prices, the other stopped carrying tins altogether because they would have to charge such prices. Now, I order them online, and I guess you could say I "hoard" them.
This "hoarding" is merely an effort to get as much of it as I can before the axe falls on internet tobacco sales, and we all know it will. That axe is part of the (two part) second reason: #1) in my opinion, no government has ever seen anything it did not want to regulate as tightly as possible. The internet has simply proven more difficult to reign in than we thought (thankfully). #2) in my opinion, the vast majority of people take a deep and perverse glee in forcing other people into doing (or in this case, not doing) what they want. Instead of saying, "I don't enjoy pipe smoking, so I won't do it", people seem to have a tendency to say, "I don't like pipe smoking; I need to make sure other people aren't allowed to do it". The ease with which someone will justify impinging on another person's freedoms is, in my opinion, truly astounding.
So, in sum, I want to stash away a good cellar before tobacco is priced out of my reach or legislated out of existence.

Just because your paranoid doesn't mean you're not being followed.
Seriously, in the early days I was buying in a panic. That said, I am glad I did as many of my fears that caused me to buy large quantities did occur. So if I had to do it all over again I would have changed very little.
I have a stash now so there is no need to buy anything out of panic and fear. That is liberating.

Tobacco ages well, prices will not go down and they may end internet sales. I find none of these to be dishonest or alarmist and all were things said that struck a chord in me. I smoked pipe for almost 20 years before applying the same rational to pipe tobacco that I already applied to cigars. Since starting a cellar, or dragon hoard if you must, my piping life is a better one. Not because I have tins that other scramble for but because I have choice at my finger tips. I do not drink much but keep a well and widely stocked bar. When I want a martini, I want to be able to fulfill the desire without serious expenditure or time or effort. Do I put away the big names? Yes, if they are blends I like but I am also putting away the unsung and inexpensive blends I like. Frankly I don't much care what people think of me buying tobacco just as I think little about why some folks buy stamps, wine or the thousands of other collectibles, odds and ends that litter people's abodes. Hoarding implies there are not million of tins comprising thousands of blends available for purchase at this very moment, which there are. Are there a few blends you must exert yourself to acquire? Yes but show me a single good or commodity this does not hold true for.

I find it odd the way they clamour for these blends when there are so many others so similar. I obtained 4oz of Penzance from a forum member, when I finally got around to trying it I couldn't see what the fuss was about. It was good, very smooth and I enjoyed it ( Gas Light's little brother ). My hoarding is strictly based on cost, I remember a pouch costing less than ten dollars suddenly costing close to thirty. I'm ordering 8oz at a time and paying $15+ for shipping and am thankful for being able to. The ridiculous taxes and stricter access to tobacco is coming to all of you south of the border, I wish it wasn't, but it will. So I will slowly build my hoard and hope I have enough to do me out.

While you've noticed a shift to hoarding behavior, I noticed an equal part backlash. I don't think anything has changed except for the Internet, how we communicate info has changed, but the info has remained the same. Why buy as much as your favorite or an anticipated favorite when it becomes available? Because it's not always available. Crow about it? Because it's a part of human nature, perhaps not in you, but look around. These threads, they are pretty equal parts "hoarding" and "hating hoarding". Those who fuss and those who fuss about all the fuss.

There will always be equal parts to all of these factors. It might seem it's changed, but it just seems. Communication has changed I believe. I believe that's all. The Internet, networking...

When I started smoking a pipe in 2006, someone told me that if I liked English blends like Nightcap I should try Penzance. I got a tin easily at an online vendor and tried it. Immediately it became my absolute favorite smoke. I forced myself to smoke 3-4 bowls of other tobacco between bowls of Penzance because I liked it so much I wanted it to be a special occasion in my rotation and still try other new tobaccos. It was the pinnacle of enjoyment to me.
After about a year, I quit smoking my pipe for various reasons. I always knew I'd come back to it someday, but I put it on the back burner and stored my pipes/tobacco away. When I came back to pipe smoking at the end of 2012, I immediately decided to buy some fresh Penzance to compare with the tiny bit I had left from 2007. Much to my surprise, I found out in the intervening years Penzance went from easily available to impossible to find. I didn't know if it was discontinued or what, but everyone talked about how impossible it was to find. I thought I might never be able to smoke my favorite blend again.
Since then I've come across Penzance a few times and always bought all of it that I could afford or was in stock. I certainly would never pay above retail price for it. It's a good smoke but there's other stuff that is very good too and not ridiculously priced. If I ran out and couldn't buy more I'd be bummed but it wouldn't be the end of the world. Maybe that makes me a hoarder or panic buyer, but I've heard too many people lamenting about discontinued blends to just assume the supply of my favorite tobaccos is never ending. I don't do it to gloat about it or out of some sense of competition because I want to have the most of it. I do it because it's my favorite blend and it's extremely hard to find so if I stumble across it, I buy it.
I guess I just assume that's why other people do it too...

There will never be a tobacco blend that I have to have. There's always something enjoyable available.

I think it is a new condition, that is due to historic changes in the pipe tobacco world. Even as late as the early '80s who would have thought that such pillars as Sobranie, John Cotton, Three Nuns, Sullivan Powell, etc. would be gone, and that Rattray and McConnell would be produced in Germany rather than their native Scotland?
Now add to that the turmoil of sourcing Syrian Latakia and the inability to procure specific Oriental tobaccos. Now, not only are certain brands in danger, whole types of mixtures are being changed due to the inability to get the proper ingredients.
Fast forward to the 2000's when we have settled into a new norm. New brands and blends, new favorites......then boom, one warehouse fire kills some of the highest regarded Pease blends. Add to that the disappearance of Dunhill from the American market, as well as other long time blends not leaving the continent and the period where it was very hard to get Sam Gawith due to flood.
Take all those together, and you have pipers who know that the unthinkable can happen. They are used to hearing about blends, hoary with old age going out of production and the "They're not as good as they used to be" saw and add a hostile legislative environment, and you have prime hoarding environment.

My feelings about it are more in line with what daimyo is saying. If all tobaccos were like milk and you could go to the local store and grab a gallon, would anybody even have a cellar? I don't cellar milk because when I want some I can get it.
Nobody in my town even carries Stonehaven or Penzance. I cellar or hoard both because its like a fart in the wind, gone before you have a chance to sniff it. When I do get a whiff I grab as much as I can as fast as I can, no matter the price. So yeah there is a bit of haste and panic but then at least I can reach for it when I want it. "But there are other tobaccos just as good or better than these two". Well then you go right ahead and smoke them because to me there isn't. If I want to relax and enjoy my hobby I certainly don't want to "settle" for something. If I want to enjoy a nice glass of wine I don't grab a jug of some corkless swill because someone told me its just as good as Caymus Vineyards Special Selection. I go to my cellar and open a bottle of Caymus.
Everything else is in my cellar so it can age but we are talking 3-12 tins of stuff you can get anytime you want with maybe a few exceptions. Nothing that is causing a stir in the market (hi peck).

People buy for whatever reason, however in my opinion the following is shitty behavior:
"Hey everyone, _________ is finally in stock at _________. I got by 6 bags if you call quickly you can get in on it."
While letting everyone in on the knowledge of the arrival of said coveted blend is very "noble", how about just buying 1 bag and let the rest of the earth have a go at some.
I see this quite a bit, and everytime it happens it rubs me the wrong way. I'm glad I have no interest in the rare stuff. However, I am looking to get some time of JA flake, but I'm not going to buy up the whole stock if I find some.

Greetings,
I've only been smoking a pipe for about 3 years so for me I know no other pipe culture than what I read these days on forums and see first hand in my local B&M. So my thoughts that follow are shaped with that perspective in mind.
Personally speaking, I've got the "collector gene" and have gone through periods where I collected sports cards and coins as a kid to bourbon, cigars, books, and stamps as an adult. Now I'm in the middle of a period where I collect pipe tobacco. For me I derive some of my enjoyment from the hunt of a rare and elusive blend and for the more popular and less rare blends I also enjoy building a deep cellar. It's fun for me. I don't get angry or frustrated when I miss out on grabbing a hard to find blend that is available online for 30 seconds before selling out. It doesn't phase me. Furthermore, I actually enjoy reading the cellaring/hoarding threads more than anything else on this forum. It's exciting and for just a second I can relate to how the happy hoarder must feel at that moment. Life goes on and so too does the hunt!
In addition to the "collector gene" that drives me, my cellaring/hoarding is also motivated by both availability and affordability. As both a new and relatively young piper (37 y/o) I fear a time in the not so distant future when my favorites might not be in production anymore. The more experienced pipers on this forum have no shortage of stories to share of their favorite blends going the way of the dodo. Then factor in the imminent price increases and I figure the time to strike wide and deep is now. If the Lord grants me long days ahead I don't want to be sitting around in 10, 20, 30, 40 years wishing I had stocked a deeper cellar and forking over double, triple, quadruple the price for something I can pickup now for a fraction of the price. And while I admire those willing to drop $100s on sealed tins of old legendary blends I'm not that guy. I'd rather pay it forward now and stock up while I am able on the cheap. If I meet a sudden demise well then my kids can be the ones selling off my stash to those in the future who have the money to spend.
I enjoy the cellaring/hoarding aspects of this hobby. For me it keeps things fun and exciting. Threads with either word in the title will just about guarantee I'll click on it.
Before I close, I've got ten tins of the limited edition Squadron Leader w/ perique that I'm willing to trade in exchange for a healthy liver. Just let me know!

So here's the difference, I bought 2 tins of the Squadron Leader with Perique. I could've bought more, but I figured limited run lets let someone else have a shot at some too.

I particularly don't care what others do regarding their tobacco purchasing, it's none of my business. As for me, I could subsist off OTCs like PA, CH or SWR, although I would be quite sad if C&D discontinued Pegasus. I buy a pound of that every month but I don't consider it hording. I just like it and smoke a great deal of it.

I have had 3 big "aha" moments concerning cellaring.
When I first started seriously smoking and got into the "fancy" stuff I looked at smokingpipes.com top 100 a lot and based my buying choices on that and the price (19 for 8oz) I bought H&H Anni. Kake and it became a main part of my rotation and almost my all day smoke. I have 4 kids and money is often tight, leaving little disposable income. Due to this I only had a few tins at a time with the 8oz tins of AK as the bulk of my shoe box cellar. Fast forward a year and I can't get the stuff if my life depended upon it. smokingpipes is ALWAYS out, they have the 2oz but too expensive, for me the price is a lot if what made AK so awesome. I play the notification game, but as with others I often have no cash when the stuff becomes available. It is available from P&C in bulk and 8oz, but they wont ship to WA and getting some is paramount to getting stuff from the UK. So the lesson learned...if you find something you like, buy lots of it when you can because there is a good chance you won't get it again so easily.
My next big moment was being gifted some 5yr FVF after only smoking the fresh previously...need I say more.
The latest was the price increase from MacBaren. A few months ago I bought 5 x 100g of ODF for $57, now it would cost $100. Seems like simple math to me.
So like many others I learned that I liked aged tobacco best, prices will keep getting higher and things that are easy to get now may not be next month. All this coupled with the OCD/Collecting fervor and reading posts titled "The Tobacco Apocalypse" it is no wonder people are cellaring deep.
On this forum I also found out that not everyone who has a deep cellar, hoards said tobacco. In fact as many have found out, this forum is full of very generous people who share their stash of goodies, to all them 3 cheers.

While we're here - don't panic, but Aylesbury Luxury Flake is available at Pipe & Leaf.

I don't believe any of this doomsday tobacco crap. Are things alittle tough? Sure! But things go in circles. As for hoarding....yea I have a bunch of stuff. Not for the end times though..I like getting good deal. It doesn' bother me at all that people have huge store rooms full of tobacco. Besides while everone is buying the Penzance, I'm grabbing the Capt.Black and HGL. (what can I say...simple tastes)