The Half Ashed Cigar Forum

I was listening to this show today, which talked a lot about the IPCPR convention that had occured the week prior in 2014. A couple of things struck me now that I missed back then, but still might apply.

One of these was the hand-wringng about what would happen to the trade show if cigar samples were no longer legal (as may still happen). It struck me that we are possibly being too America-centric with our thoughts about this. It's the INTERNATIONAL Pipe and blah blah show. Why not hold the convention in the Bahamas, the DR, Puerto Rico, or Mexico? It seems those locations aren't particularly much further than the coasts, esp via air travel. Just a thought.

Also, there was the tales of some stolen cigars. Specifically, two companies that lost the single boxes of two samples they had. Kip mentioned that one of these companies spent a good chunk of time handing out flyers asking "have you seen this cigar," supposedly to recover said box. Seems to me that that is a GREAT way to get people talking about your product. "Oh, my. The Gran Habano was..." "Did you hear about the stolen Gran Habano...?" "Hey. Did they find the missing Gran Habano...?" Genius marketing ploy, if you ask me.

Ideas about these?

I think in a more recent episode (perhaps in the 120 range) I discussed what you're mentioning about the cigars being available to a different market without the FDA regs. That's kind of along the same line and could essentially be the way we get product into the states if and when regs go into effect.

Regarding your second thought, genius! I had never considered that. With multiple companies claiming this it seems more legitimate than if just one, but nevertheless, you're spot on. It becomes that one box "that got away". Stigma follows it forever.