Spring is, for pipe smokers of refined taste (just my opinion, mind you), prime season for breaking out the Virginia tobaccos we’ve kept aging in the vault all through the long, dark days of cold weather. For this pipe smoker, spring is the best season to be alive—a time when almost every day amounts to a celebration of living—and not only for the lemony delights that my well-aged Virginias and VapPers promise. The whole back yard smells like a perfumery. I can open some windows and give the heating and A/C a break, so the electric bill gives me a break. Everything just seems to come easier during the spring.
Being such a big fan of spring, I was heartened to learn that PCA was moving its trade show to March, simply on the theory that people’s mood would be in seasonally peak form. And I am hearing praiseworthy reports along those lines. PCA The Magazine account manager David Wilson says his first trade show was in Houston “many moons ago,” and like most of us he has taken note that the number of pipe exhibitors on the showroom floor is reduced nowadays. “This decrease, as you can imagine,” says Wilson, “led folks including me to reflect that the pipe industry might be disappearing. But that’s really not the case at all.” Wilson points out, “What we have is a smaller footprint of the pipe companies on the show floor, but they are doing great business. Retailer folks descend en masse upon our pipe exhibitors and place large orders on opening day. And it goes on all day!”
Fewer companies doing bang-up business sounds like action that is becoming concentrated into pockets that deserve particular attention.
Wilson says businesses that make an effort to boost their market visibility realize benefits in sales. “There is a lack of marketing and advertising among most of the pipe exhibitors. Being invisible to your audience, well, makes you invisible,” he points out.
“But both F & K and Arango consistently promote themselves, and it works. I saw it firsthand. On day 2 of the show I had a chance to talk about the health of the pipe business with Josh Weiser, VP of sales at Arango, and he reassured me it is still strong.”
Another positive report comes to us from another springtime show—the Chicago Pipe Show—about which show director Ron Pecorini is nothing short of ebullient. “This was the greatest Chicago pipe show ever,” he reports. “Pipe smoking has had its ups and downs,” he allows, “but the exciting part is to see how many new and young smokers there are. A large group of 28- to 58-year-olds have really gotten into the hobby. This makes the future look bright indeed.”
A pattern continues to emerge, one of a new kind of pipe-smoking custom: Rather than disappearing from the culture, the pipe hobby is merely concentrating itself into hot spots. Decades ago one could see pipe smokers in the wild almost every time we left the house. These days, not so much. And yet … go to a show, or attend a club meeting, or visit a lounge in a well-appointed pipe shop where smoking is permitted, and there they are—pipe people, in surprising numbers.
This fracturing and concentration within the pipe world again reinforces the notion that pipe businesses can profit by focusing on the pipe hobby in those times and places where pipe smoking naturally thrives. It again suggests that any tobacconist wishing to boost its pipe business can succeed (returning to a theme) if it can make itself a “pipe nexus”—a place where, in a world of segregated and compartmentalized smoking action, pipe smokers know their needs will be met. Any cultural phenomenon that fragments into pockets of action invites the wise business person to target those pockets with concentrated attention.
True, springtime is for lovers, but the entire calendar belongs to businesses that can evolve with the conditions of their chosen trade.
– Image by Arielle Lewis Photography. Story by William C. Nelson.
This story first appeared in PCA The Magazine, Volume 2, 2024. To receive a copy of this magazine you must be a current member of PCA. Join or renew today at premiumcigars.org/membership.