Re-thinking My Cellaring Philosophy & a Surprise!

[mackeson]

I haven't posted for quite a while, but thought I'd share my recent "Hard lesson learned."

I was one of the people taken by surprise when McClelland announced their departure. Some of you may remember that I misinterpreted a post about GLP and thought he was done, so when the McClelland panic first started, I decided to heed the advice of my avatar and "Not panic." OOPS!

I have never really actively cellared, I just buy a handful of tins/bulk of blends I enjoy for a steady smoking supply, so I found myself in a position of not having enough of my favorite McC blends to last me more than a couple years. I'm now going to start buying more of my favorite blends to put away for the long haul. I don't want to be caught with my pants down again!

The pleasant surprise?...

I went through many boxes in my closet, linen closet, under bed, and storage pile, and found I did have many aged tins and bulk jars from various blenders including McClelland. So I have "Accidentally" cellared about 25lbs. of tobacco I didn't even know I had! The downside is I have a good supply of occasional smokes and little of my favorite staples.

Accidental cellaring turned out to be a pretty good surprise, but I think in the future, I'll cellar much deeper on my favorites.

Lesson learned. I should have listened to some of you that cellar deep much earlier.

 

[barepipe]

So I have "Accidentally" cellared about 25lbs.

Your accidental cellar is bigger than people’s deliberate cellar.

 

[mackeson]

Your accidental cellar is bigger than people’s deliberate cellar.

Yeah, but I've been at this a while and much of that is tobacco I don't often smoke anymore. I'll probably give some away and keep some just to see the aging effects. That's just an estimation from the crapload of tins and jars I found. It might be 20# or 35#. I never marked the weight on my jars

 

[barepipe]

The stuff you don’t like anymore would be good for trading

 

[mackeson]

I just weighed out my jars (I know, sacrilege opening the jars!) after barepipe made me curious, and it's actually a total of 18.3 lbs between my tins and bulk. I estimated high.

Now I'm more depressed.

 

[saltedplug]

You done good! although if I had 25 pounds of tobacco on hand, I believe I would know it!

 

[zerohunter]

This seems to be the philosophy of many, myself included, in the wake of McC's closure. As a relatively newer pipe smoker (less than five years), I debate whether I should spend my money on my established favorites to bulk up a future cellar or try newer blends on my ever-expanding list. I try to do a bit of both, but there's only so much money one can spend in a year on tobacco. The swiftness of McC's disappearance caught us all with our pants down. It's a weird time to be a pipe smoker.

 

[seanv]

I usually try to buy something new and something I enjoy at a 1/1 ratio when I am buying. Best of both worlds.

 

[mikethompson]

I have "Accidentally" cellared about 25lbs. of tobacco I didn't even know I had!

I can't tell if I hate you or am just jealous :wink:

Your accidental cellar is bigger than people’s deliberate cellar.

this!

 

[jaytex1969]

Whether you cellar deep or wide, you are still cellaring.

 

[curl]

I wish I bought more McC when the buying was good, but who knew the good times were fixing to end.

So at the end I was a little late to the party except I did get 2 lbs of 2010, 2 tins of Beagle and 3 tins of Grand Orientals.

Oh, and I bought another 18 pounds this month of mostly Va and VaPer blends.

I figured if I couldn’t smoke my new McC blends I would not smoke a bunch of other blends, too.

I just wish my other favorites weren’t in short supply...who knew we would run out of Bald Headed Teacher, too?

 

[pipesticks]

You opened the jars?????

I was going to type "weigh an empty jar then subtract from full jar weight" but then I figured Nah, Captain Obvious, Duh... :roll:

 

[balkisobrains]

Yeah, just tare the jars and you can also subtract a couple grams from the jarred tobacco weight in case the jars don't all weight exactly the same. ::

 

[sablebrush52]

Well, congratulations on the lucky find! Try some of these out to see if you like them better than before. I've experienced that with a few blends.
By now it should be evident that any blend can go Poof! Goodbye! without warning. This isn't something new, except to newer smokers, guys who have been pipes smokers for decades have seen this all before. Companies close. Blends go out of production. If you find something that you particularly like, put some tins away. At worst, you'll have some to age and some to smoke.