What the Cigar Needs Is A Good Five-Cent Machine

The era in which Vice President Thomas Marshall proclaimed a good five-cent cigar a national necessity brought the U.S. cigar industry its greatest success: the 8,500,000 stogies sold in 1920 still add up to a record. But good times are here again, thanks to the Surgeon General's report linking cigarette smoking and cancer. So far this year, cigar sales are running 30% above last year. Last week, while R. J. Reynolds, Liggett & Myers and American Tobacco all reported lower first-quarter sales, the report of Consolidated Cigar Corp. came out as rosy as the tip of a well-lit 75-center. Consolidated, the largest of the some 500 U.S. cigar makers (with 25% of all sales), showed an 18.7% hike in sales for the quarter and seems certain to surpass 1963's record $123 million.

Pitching to Women. Consolidated and eleven other major companies, which together ring up 75% of all cigar sales, make a range of cigars from diminutive cigarillos to big, blunt coronas. The sales gains are due almost entirely to the cigarillos, particularly those with plastic tips, that have been grabbed up by reformed cigarette smokers. In some cities, cigarillo sales are up as much as 400%, and wholesalers are rationing supplies. Many cigar makers just cannot keep up with demand; unlike high-speed automated cigarette lines, cigar making still involves slow hand operation.

The wholesale switch of cigarette smokers has jumped the cigar-smoking populace to 18 million. Among them are an estimated 100,000 women, including such well-pouted puffers as Greta Garbo and Edie Adams, who advertises Consolidated's Muriels. The heaviest pitch to women has been made by second-ranked General Cigar ("Should a gentleman offer a Tiparillo to a lady?"), but Consolidated has also acknowledged the market. It's "Have you noticed how many men are smoking cigars?" ads have been discreetly rephrased to "Have you noticed how many people are smoking cigars?" The cigar companies doubt that the feminine market will last, and predict that cigarette sales will increase again; but the industry hopes nonetheless to keep cigar sales on the high plateau they have reached. To do so, and to attract young men about to smoke for the first time, it has raised its annual advertising another 15% to $35 million this year.

No More Hands. The young men lured by soft-as-smoke ads ("With a cigar you will look smart") will be looking, surveys show, for roughly the same five-cent cigar that Thomas Marshall wanted. To provide it, and at the same time keep their earnings up, cigar makers are trying to eliminate costly hand operations. American Machine & Foundry has perfected machinery to roll any type of cigar, uses reconstituted wrappers in which tobacco leaves have been destemmed and ground. If it can produce popular, machine-made cigars, the industry will indeed have a glowing future.

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