Standardization - friend or enemy?

[gatorlope]

It used to be that you didn't get quality tobacco out of a can...
You could visit the tobacconist with your “taster” pipe and sample the different types of tobacco as well as a variety of ready made blends that he had to offer, then pick and choose according to your own tastes, either finding one of his blends that suited you or customizing a blend according to your own recipe that you could tweak however you liked when you visited him again.
Pipe smokers had a certain freedom of choice and canned tobaccos were hardly any better than the picking out a ready made brand like you would with cigarettes or cigars.
That was the reason I became a pipe smoker in the first place, unlike many of my contemporaries who became addicted to their “cancer sticks” or “coughin’ nails”.

 

[bassbug]

It used to be that you didn't get quality tobacco out of a can

But now you do. Enough said.

 

[Chasing Embers]

It used to be that you didn't get quality tobacco out of a can...

Dunhill, Murray's, the Old Balkan Sobranie, Erinmore, McClelland, Mac Baren, and many more came in cans going back decades.

 

[bnichols23]

Thanks, Duane -- exactly what I was gonna say. You could get good tin stuff BITD, you just had to go to a dedicated B&M to do it. Drugstores/grocery? Forget it -- Prince Albert, SWR, Carter Hall if you were lucky, & if you were REALLY lucky Captain Black. But the quality stuff was always available, if an actual tobacco store was.
Bill

 

[cosmicfolklore]

It used to be that you didn't get quality tobacco out of a can...

When was this? Like the Napoleonic Wars?

 

[rfernand]

Prehispanic America. You had to climb a pyramid to order your mixture. And you had to be a priest.

 

[ophiuchus]

It used to be that you didn't get quality tobacco out of a can...

Interesting. This may the first time I've ever heard this particular generalization.

 

[jpmcwjr]

That was the reason I became a pipe smoker in the first place, unlike many of my contemporaries who became addicted to their “cancer sticks” or “coughin’ nails”.

Generally thought of as "coffin nails".

 

[cosmicfolklore]

IDK, I have always thought of the phrase as coughing nails... but verbally verses written... it loses some of the ironic homography when spelled, "coffin."

 

[warren]

quality tobacco

Your definition of the above obviously differs from mine. So, I'd disagree with your observation. No one can argue with your observation though, as it seems to be based entirely on your personal likes and observations.

 

[gatorlope]

Exactly...
Being slightly younger than “TuffTony”, I do remember an earlier age when you didn’t have the erudite input from your peers such as the internet has given us. Even now, as is obvious in these posts, there is always a difference of opinion regarding any particular product.
The tobacconist that you met in the shop was the one person that you knew who could talk intelligently on the subject and his unblended tobaccos (as well as his blends) were where you could learn your own preferences while you had some guidance from someone who actually knew what he was talking about, bypassing the canned goods entirely.
It was like going to the produce section for your fresh vegetables instead of getting the canned varieties that never seemed to measure up in quality or flavor.

 

[dcon]

I managed a tobacco shop (actually a couple) a long time ago. I think we might be a bit quick on poo-pooing gatorlope’s post. While quality canned pipe tobacco has existed for a very long time, it did not account for anywhere near the volume of sales of a tobacco shop’s “private blends”. Obviously, the SWR, PA, and CHs of the world sold in great volume at grocers, drugstores, and practically anywhere. These were not considered “quality” tobacco (no insult intended to their adherents). To go to a Tinder Box or local B&M was about picking up one of their blends or actually, more often YOUR blend. All of the stores that I managed or frequented kept Rolladex (for you youngsters, that is a paper search engine) with clients’ blends created from a mix of the tobacconist’s available components or blends. Balkan Sobranie, Bengal Slices, Dunhill Blends, McClelland Virginias and Orientals, and several other long forgotten tins decorated the shelves but, seldom left in customers bags. That is not to say that they did not sell, just not in the volume of the bulk.
It would be interesting to hear what some of the online retailers’ sales ratios of bulk/tin would be today. Quality definitely abounds in both.

 

[cosmicfolklore]

I just don't fully comprehend the question. Do I think that standardization of tobacco in a tin is bad? Compared to having someone mix up something for me? ...at a Tinderbox?
I just cannot fathom the difference. By the late 70's, 80's Tinderboxes were a place where goobs went in the mall... at least this was my observation. Since not very many men went to the malls, all I saw were lines of longhaired boys buying clove cigarettes and looking at the neat chess sets, desk lamps, and knives for sale in the displays. I don't remember ever seeing a humidor, but I do remember those jars of nasty aromatic tobaccos on the counter. If those were what you were smoking out of, then have at it.
What years were they keeping a roladex? 40's, 50's? Where was this leaf sourced?
So, you felt that War Horse, Capstan, Three Nuns, and Balkan Sobranie were "inferior" to the stuff mixed up at the Tinderbox?

 

[dcon]

Cosmic, I was definitely not commenting on the quality of the tin tobacco vs the proprietor’s sampling’s. My recollection is that by the late 70’s to early 80’s practically everyone went to malls. Tinderboxes were already becoming bits of relics by then. Every Tinderbox I ever went to (many) had humidors and Tinderbox had private label cigars as well as brand name. A lot of B&Ms did more than just rebrand Lane and not every jar was full of aros.
I can recount that I used a Rolodex in the early 80’s. This was prior to PCs being used in such settings and was very common in a lot of businesses.
The shops that I managed bought bulk components and blends from Lane, Stokkebye (which may have been distributed through Lane back then), and McClelland. Several Dunhill blends were available as bulk and sold through Lane and a lot of shops renamed even 965. I think that gatorlope’s post perhaps highlights the perception of quality then vs now.
BTW I had long hair back then and do once again...(and cloves were more of a 90s thing in the biz)

 

[cosmicfolklore]

I remember that a buddy of mine always wanted Ginseng cigarettes, so we would wait in line at the mall tinderbox. I don't think I ever tried one, because I still have no notion of what a clove or ginseng cigarette would taste like.

I was definitely not commenting on the quality of the tin tobacco vs the proprietor’s sampling’s.

I was going on the OP's question.
Yeh, PC's weren't very practical for anything until mid 90's. I was thinking in terms of keeping up with individual customer's recipes. And, I misspoke. The young guys at The Briary were making fun of Skip's roladex one day, tossing out cards, "he's dead," "he's dead," "he's dead," "he's dead," "he's dead."

 

[dcon]

:rofl: that dead list would be extensive

 

[gatorlope]

dcon gets it.
Back in the days when a working wage was a dollar an hour, we didn’t have the money to be experimenting with a bunch of exotic tinned tobaccos that we might or might not like.
Nor were we inclined to sound off like a bunch of wine snobs, discussing aftertaste, aroma, “undercurrent tastes etc.
But it was a luxury we could afford when we could smell and even sample various blends or even try their component parts separately before we made our purchases. You couldn’t sample or even smell the tinned tobaccos beforehand unless someone you knew happened to buy one. It was a pig in a poke and if you didn’t like it, that was too bad, because you couldn’t return opened tins!

 

[crashthegrey]

Ginseng cigarette? What?! Some days I am too young. How did I miss this? I love ginseng, I love the occasional clove cigarette, or kretek, but ginseng?!

 

[dcon]

I have gone there on the Ginseng. Not likely to repeat it. It tasted just like burning ginseng. If you like that, you may enjoy it. Cloves can be interesting . Kretek used to have a wide variety. I found that straight clove was occasionally enjoyable but, any that combined with tobacco were not to my liking. A lot of clove bidis used to be available as well. They directly compare to floor scrapings IMO.
All in all, I find no valid use for ginseng and clove is best left for ham and toothaches.

 

[dcon]

gatorlope, I like to think that my uncle was a typical pipe smoker of his day. His daily go to was either SWR or SWRA which you could buy by the pouch anywhere. He was an occasional cigarette smoker but, the pipe was usually hanging from his mouth at work or in conversation. He lived just over an hour from the closest metropolitan area. There he would go to a Tinderbox or a B&M in a fancy shopping district and return with several 2 ounce bags of maybe a cherry, an aro, and an English. He kept a pipe rack with a jar. He actually had several nice pipes a Dunhill, a couple of Saseini, several Grabows, and some regular old basket pipes. All were billiards. The “big city” tobaccos were a treat. That was pretty common.