Great review, but the problem with dealing with inconsistency between batches is that when I smoke mine, it may be something totally different.
I absolutely agree. It's analogous to wine, in my view. From harvest to harvest, even barrel to barrel, there can be enough variation to make an experience go from humdrum to fantastic.
I think tobacco blends, like blended spirits, can maintain a level of consistent flavor profile with excellent product management and keen attention to detail. However, no matter how well that management team does their job, there are simply too many variables to provide absolute consistency.
As I wax on this morning, I'm reminded of the well tempered clavier. You can't really make chromatic instruments play perfectly in tune, but you can make them functional by having them be out of tune in such slight intervals that it doesn't disturb the ear. In the same way, blenders can't really make blends exactly the same batch after batch, year after year, but they can make them close enough that the vast majority of folks won't realize a functional difference. There will always be super tasters (cough cough,
@JimInks ) just as there are folks with perfect pitch.
When there are ingredient changes, I imagine that it's tough on a product team to have to say something like "well, we can't source these ingredients, or, we can't do this process, so functionally this blend isn't X any more, should we re-name it and discontinue, or just keep the name and make the changes necessary to keep sales up?"
