Stumbling across its website recently, I had one of those "Why wasn't I informed?" moments, and after several weeks of either not finding the time to go or forgetting to go when I had the time, I finally visited the store on Route 23 named the Tobacco Depot.
I wasn’t expecting a retailer the size of Home Depot or Office Depot, but I was surprised to find a 250-foot space, just one storefront amid several, that I actually had managed to miss on my first approach despite staring right at it.
I walk in and immediately see the display case containing about a dozen briars. This is good.
I take a few more steps inside and notice the stout (and kind of mannish) young woman behind the counter, visibly despairing the interruption of her solitude. “Hi. I’m interested in your pipe tobacco,” I said, just for the sake of acknowledging her presence. “What, for a wood pipe?” she replied. This is not good.
The sullen clerk steps out from behind the counter and meets me where all the pipe tobacco is displayed. “We have Captain Black. They’re ten dollars a pouch. And we have these. They’re three dollars an ounce,” she explained. Dumb, and now sullen myself, I regarded the paltry selection of generic aromatic blends arrayed in six or seven glass jars and the Captain Black. “Okay, thanks for your time,” I said to end the awkward silence. I left without bothering to look at those pipes or even check out whatever overpriced, dry cigars they may have been hawking. If this store specializes in anything, I think it is hookahs and hookah tobacco, which seemed to occupy the most shelf space.
So Tobacco Shack might be more apt, or Tobacco Shanty has a little more color, but in no way a depot.
Thus ends my foray into Thanksgiving weekend retail shopping.
I wasn’t expecting a retailer the size of Home Depot or Office Depot, but I was surprised to find a 250-foot space, just one storefront amid several, that I actually had managed to miss on my first approach despite staring right at it.
I walk in and immediately see the display case containing about a dozen briars. This is good.
I take a few more steps inside and notice the stout (and kind of mannish) young woman behind the counter, visibly despairing the interruption of her solitude. “Hi. I’m interested in your pipe tobacco,” I said, just for the sake of acknowledging her presence. “What, for a wood pipe?” she replied. This is not good.
The sullen clerk steps out from behind the counter and meets me where all the pipe tobacco is displayed. “We have Captain Black. They’re ten dollars a pouch. And we have these. They’re three dollars an ounce,” she explained. Dumb, and now sullen myself, I regarded the paltry selection of generic aromatic blends arrayed in six or seven glass jars and the Captain Black. “Okay, thanks for your time,” I said to end the awkward silence. I left without bothering to look at those pipes or even check out whatever overpriced, dry cigars they may have been hawking. If this store specializes in anything, I think it is hookahs and hookah tobacco, which seemed to occupy the most shelf space.
So Tobacco Shack might be more apt, or Tobacco Shanty has a little more color, but in no way a depot.
Thus ends my foray into Thanksgiving weekend retail shopping.
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Maybe they moved in after the pipe shop moved out.
