Alternate Outlets For Pipes and Blends?

[mso489]

Since pipe shops are few and far between, and those that exist are on thin ice, I keep wondering what other businesses might take on pipes and pipe blends as a sideline. The obvious possibility of cigar shops and lounges immediately raises the point that cigar sellers don't want people smoking pipes. We get twenty or more smokes out of a tin that costs the same as two or three cigars. They don't want us sitting around the cigar lounge puffing our thrifty blends and recruiting their cigar smokers. As we have observed on various threads, the drugstore chain Walgreens still sells Dr. Grabow and MM cobs and a Capt. Black, but on an almost under-the-counter basis. Who else is there? I remember not that many years ago the grocery chain Food Lion sold tubs of Prince Albert and Carter Hall at the customer service counter. Imagine that. About a century ago when I was a child, many newsstands in downtown Chicago had pipes and tobacco on offer, in a good selection too. That was another place and time.

 

[tobefrank]

I have wondered the same about cigar lounges and pipes. I visit one on a semi regular basis and often smoke my pipe, but it seems they have little interest in offering a selection of pipe tobacco next to their cigars. They are more or less competing businesses under the same roof.

 

[Seamaster]

Only the hipsters can save us now!

 

[Old School 3319]

I make a monthly trip to Missouri (next state over) to buy my wife here cigarettes and the stock some tubs and I usually grab a couple of tubs each trip. Since i mostly smoke the codger blends it works out well for me but the only pipes they have are MM cobs. I wonder with pot becoming legal in some states if they will take a chance. Or the increasingly popular vaping. I cant picture very many old codgers going in a vape store with a bunch off "hipsters" and kids with more metal in their face than a chevy V8

 

[mso489]

I agree that head shops and vape shops are not going to bring in pipe smokers, and if they did, it might run off their customer base. Pipe smoking has become an odd kind of boutique business for smokers who aren't boutique type people. Pipe shops seem to hang on at campuses and rarely in tourist towns or neighborhoods. Malls mostly don't allow smoking, though a mall kiosk might have made it as a pipe stand before malls themselves went into decline, or at least a deep transition. Malls are dormant, and some won't be opening back up. People are trying to figure out how to make them into condos. Right now, most of the pipe and blend sales are online.

 

[cosmicfolklore]

If you ask at a cigar lounge, AND if you make a substantial purchase, I don't see where they would have a problem. I rarely ever get told "no," and I ask all the time to smoke inside coffee shops, restaurants, and other places. Maybe I'm just so much more damned charming than the rest of you.

I would suggest NOT smoking an aromatic in a cigar lounge, as they even make me sick being around someone smoking that swill. And, as for the size of your purchase, I'd say a $30 purchase should warrant a positive reaction. If you don't like cigars, then just don't bother.

The one complaint I hear about pipesmokers in general at cigar shops is that they are usually just too damned frugal. If buying $30 in cigars sounds like too much, then just don't go. It's even embarrassing to see people make posts about being cheap asses on here. I know not everyone has the means... but, if that's the case, just keep it to yourself. You don't have to reveal all of your hard luck stories to us.

Tobacco shops... you know the ones that carry cigarettes and RYO stuff... they usually at least carry a few codger blends. Those guys are anxious to hustle a buck. But, if you ask them and then they carry it, BUT IT!!! Or, they'll just not bother carrying it any more.
And, maybe try a cheap bag of the pipecut RYO. I like it, and it gives you a chance to try an uncased pure tobacco occasionally.

 

[mso489]

Convenience stores at gas stations and free standing provide spotty sales of pipes and tobaccos, depending on the various chains and the region. Much depends on how quickly the pipe smokers find the points of sales, to keep the retail places re-ordering. If goods sit on the shelves, that product gets cancelled from inventory.

 

[mso489]

I think there's a cultural divide between pipe and cigar smokers, though there is also an overlap. Cigars are associated with tycoons, politicians, mobsters, and General Grant. Pipes are associated with professors, writers, psychiatrists, and craftsmen. College boys visiting the horse track all want to smoke a cigar and pretend they are Diamond Jim Brady. College boys smoke pipes when they wish to impersonate their professors or philosophers. On my one pilgrimage to Nat Sherman in Manhattan, the fellas and gals from Wall Street took over the conversation area and were all talking up a storm, while the pipe smokers sat in the rockers outside the humidor and around the shop and puffed in quiet meditation -- or so it seemed to me.

 

[cosmicfolklore]

Maybe ask the nearest chainsaw repair shop? And, you never know, maybe your local beauty supply outlet might be looking to diversify it's customer base. It doesn't hurt to ask.

 

[cosmicfolklore]

I think there's a cultural divide between pipe and cigar smokers, though there is also an overlap. Cigars are associated with tycoons, politicians, mobsters, and General Grant. Pipes are associated with professors, writers, psychiatrists, and craftsmen. College boys visiting the horse track all want to smoke a cigar and pretend they are Diamond Jim Brady. College boys smoke pipes when they wish to impersonate their professors or philosophers. On my one pilgrimage to Nat Sherman in Manhattan, the fellas and gals from Wall Street took over the conversation area and were all talking up a storm, while the pipe smokers sat in the rockers outside the humidor and around the shop and puffed in quiet meditation -- or so it seemed to me.

Most of us pipe hobbyist are willing to drop money freely on places that allow us to partake. But, as the hobby expands, we seem to have developed a subcategory of folks that only smoke cobs and complain about prices on most things. I can totally understand this for the fixed income and rocking chair folks, but...

 

[mso489]

Cosmic, I've always spoken up for pipe smoking on a budget, although I have lots of blends if not big quantities, and a few up-market pipes along with my much admired (by me) cobs and lower-end factory pipes. When I got to Forums in 2013, the high-end collector/smokers indulged us with endless photos of beautiful high-end artisanal and rare historical pipes. Between fish'n'banjo, peck, and foggymountain, sable', and others, it was a virtual pipe museum. Now Forums is more balanced, and maybe deficient in the splendid artisan pipes of yore. I like both ranges of the spectrum, and hope we keep both cohorts.

 

[gerryp]

Only the hipsters can save us now!

I never thought I'd say "Thank God for hipsters", but now I realize that in spite of their Quaker Oatmeal guy hats, skinny jeans, and suspenders, they have made a positive contribution to society.

 

[Seamaster]

As the hobby expands, we seem to have developed a subcategory of folks that only smoke cobs and complain about prices on most things. I can totally understand this for the fixed income and rocking chair folks, but...

If you think the way to “expand the hobby” is to insist every newcomer starts by dropping a hundred quid on a Savinelli, I‘ll have a bowlful of what you’re smoking.

 

[cosmicfolklore]

If you think the way to “expand the hobby” is to insist every newcomer starts by dropping a hundred quid on a Savinelli, I‘ll have a bowlful of what you’re smoking.

I have absolutely no interest in expanding the hobby. There's already enough competition buying up the goods.

 

[gerryp]

The best local shop in New Orleans has an ok selection of pipes and tobacco, but sometimes the employees are a little rude. I'm not asking them for advice or anything, but a polite response to "How ya doin'?" might make me more willing to pay almost $30 (tax incl.) for a tin of Nightcap. I only go there occasionally, and only then to support b&m tobacco shops.

The same chain has a location in Metairie. Same prices, but better staff plus they host the NOLA Pipe Club meetings, which I swear I'm going to attend one day. I run into Pappymac just about every time I go there, and I feel like a jerk for failing to appear at any of them.

Btw, have you guys noticed that hardly any b&m stores sell pipe cleaners these days? The crappy ones in the craft dept. of Walmart don't count.

 

[cosmicfolklore]

Btw, have you guys noticed that hardly any b&m stores sell pipe cleaners these days? The crappy ones in the craft dept. of Walmart don't count.

For Father's day my oldest daughter brought me a big bag of BJ Longs. She said that she got them from a head shop. So, apparently paraphernalia of some sort must require pipecleaners.

 

[BROBS]

Only the hipsters can save us now!

I’m trying dude

 

[BROBS]

I have absolutely no interest in expanding the hobby. There's already enough competition buying up the goods.

I agree. Get out of here

 

[BROBS]

The best local shop in New Orleans has an ok selection of pipes and tobacco, but sometimes the employees are a little rude. I'm not asking them for advice or anything, but a polite response to "How ya doin'?" might make me more willing to pay almost $30 (tax incl.) for a tin of Nightcap. I only go there occasionally, and only then to support b&m tobacco shops.

The same chain has a location in Metairie. Same prices, but better staff plus they host the NOLA Pipe Club meetings, which I swear I'm going to attend one day. I run into Pappymac just about every time I go there, and I feel like a jerk for failing to appear at any of them.

Btw, have you guys noticed that hardly any b&m stores sell pipe cleaners these days? The crappy ones in the craft dept. of Walmart don't count.

Actually we have tobacco shops called “tobacco outlet” and they carry Pipecleaner and OTC pouches/tubs and that shitty ass cheap Sutliff aro series called something other than Sutliff I can’t remember. Also the vape shops have codger blends in pouches but not much.

 

[BROBS]

So I guess if all B&Ms and Internet sales went away I’d be smoking SWRA