Monday, April 02 2007
Like so many other locales, as a comprehensive smoking ban is being readied in England for July 1, cigar smokers and the restaurants who cater to them are planning ahead. Financial Times columnist Nicolas Lander took a look at the future with the ubiquitous Hunters & Frankau marketing director Simon Chase a couple of weeks ago; his findings are a worthwhile look into the future.
Chase is optimistic, having seen what the existing ban in Scotland has brought: "Overnight, we lost 60 per cent of our customers who could obviously either not comply with the legislation or who chose not to. But what has proved remarkable is that new customers have emerged who can." Lander wrote that "Overall, cigar sales have not fallen over the past year with sales to wine merchants and specialist outlets replacing the lost restaurant customers."
What is the impact on Hunters? Chase told Lander that sales of cigars over six inches in length are getting harder, given the paucity of places to smoke: "Instead, the focus is on the robusto range which are around 4 in. long and which take no more than 30 to 35 minutes to smoke." And he's telling the folks in Cuba that this will be the future everywhere: "What I have been preaching for several years in Havana is that the best way to combat the consequences of smoking bans is to invest, raise the quality threshold and improve our sales mix with better. More colorful tubes for individual cigars and small boxes. Cigar enthusiasts are smoking less but better. We are living in exciting times."
One of the popular "inventions" of the past 10-12 years has been the cigar bar. Headlined by the famed Club Macanudo in New York (founded in 1996), this concept takes the "bar" idea and places the focus on cigars and smoking rather than on spirits and drinking. Don't go if you're not interested in a cigar.
But not everyone has access to a cigar bar – or even a regular bar – when they want one. Enter Adam Nonas of Max Benjamin LLC and his Mini-Cigar Bar. "I love cigars, I love Scotch and I love fashion, but wherever I have traveled, I either find great cigars and lousy Scotch or good Scotch and no good cigars or both. So I decided you should be able to bring it with you."
The Mini Cigar Bar certainly offers the opportunity. The bag is made of soft, supple deerskin with a main, center compartment and three outside pockets. It comes with a cylindrical humidor that can carry ten 48-ring cigars, four acrylic bar glasses, a container that can keep ice cold for four hours and a torch-style lighter. The interior is segmented into three slots: one each for the ice tub and glasses, the humidor and the third for a full bottle of your favorite spirit. There you have it, in your choice of brown or black leather, all for a suggested retail price of $295.
- Rich Perelman in Los Angeles
Want more? Join Rich for daily coverage of cigars, accessories, people and issues at CigarCyclopedia.com.
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Reprinted by permission. Heard in the Humidor is a publication of Perelman, Pioneer & Company. Copyright 2007; All rights reserved.
