What gets to me even more are the few B&M owners who throw rare stuff up on eBay without even offering them up to customers first. So much of the cigar world is about journeys and experiences, some people don't get it I suppose.
Fun With Speculation??
- Thread starter Phaedron
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I can't believe anyone would ever, ever, ever, try to make money on selling cigars to another botl! that would be like me charging more than MSRP for my extra box of 2011 tat TAAs! I'm sure there is some deserving BOTL that would love to have a box of these. MSRP and no more.. Oh the indignity! I can't believe it! Tarred and feathered! Hung at the gallows!
and another thing...cigars are meant to be smoked not collected! Why would Pete or anyone else make a limited edition stick? Obviously they intend to have them all smoked! That is why they make them limited, so people smoke every single 1 and never hold on to them or make a dime of profit. they clearly don't hold on to any in order to donate them to charity that could create more money for the charity. that would be like admitting you made something in order to make it limited in order to create higher demand in a secondary market. that would be like admitting you made something Limited with the intent of it increasing in value over time for your own tax write off, but then acting surprised when anyone else tries to make a profit on the same cigars. I'm sure Pete would never do that!
How dare you sir!
How dare you sir!
bdc30
BoM May '11
Blues, your sarcasm is needless and unfunny. Nobody here has said people don't or can't sell cigars to make a profit. We all have acknowledged that it happens. What every poster has said is, this is a board for brotherhood, where we would rather help each other out as opposed to profiteering off our fellow enthusiast. There are certainly places on the interwebs where that takes place. This is not one of them.
Nobody here is posting an unopened box of 2011 TAA's at msrp (or, whatever they paid for it) at the moment either although, if someone did need to sell one here for whatever reason, I'd bet my bottom dollar that's what they'd post it for. That's why I am proud to be a member here.
Nobody here is posting an unopened box of 2011 TAA's at msrp (or, whatever they paid for it) at the moment either although, if someone did need to sell one here for whatever reason, I'd bet my bottom dollar that's what they'd post it for. That's why I am proud to be a member here.
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bdc30
BoM May '11
If i've misinterpreted I apologize.
Probably not a good topic and should die before it gets out of hand.
This is why I'm actually sort of glad the industry has gone into limited edition overload. Plenty of stuff to chase, less market for the One Golden Release for middlemen to cash in on.
Even when that gets old there's PILES of really great regular production smokes.
Enjoy the chase, but remember the smoke is the main event.
-Charles
Even when that gets old there's PILES of really great regular production smokes.
Enjoy the chase, but remember the smoke is the main event.
-Charles
Well said
What's starting to get pretty annoying for me is the latest trend (at least to a newer smoker like me seems to be a latest trend, but don't know the history) to have limited regular releases. They say its a regular release or will be a regular release, but only release a very small amount and make it very hard to get a hold of them, but its not limited, just hard to find and low supply.
of course I know sometimes it is necessary when they just don't have enough tobacco to maintain the quality for the larger demand. I'd rather wait for a great smoke then for them to release a half assed smoke. No one wants to get "garfunkled" these days
And that's why the only Liga Privadas I've smoked were Undercrowns. Call me crazy, but I'm not gonna go on a man hunt for a $15+ cigar.
Although... I've never had one, so I don't know what I'm missing.
StogieNinja
Derek | BoM June 2014
At the risk of getting flamed, I'd hesitate to call someone a scum bag simply for being a scalper. The entire free market operates on the idea that one guy will buy something and sell to someone else. Sometimes the middle man is simply a means of distribution. Sometimes he's a specialist in finding something rare. Whatever. Point is, there are already a lot of middle men in the industry. Scalpers just add one more layer. If someone feels like spending all their time hanging out at a B&M hoping to score, and then makes a couple bucks selling it on eBay or Wades, so be it. That's the profit they get for their efforts (though I'd think the profit would be relatively small given the effort - you see this all the time in the action figure collecting community too), but as long as there are willing buyers, it'll continue.
If you want to point the finger at scalpers, you need to take a step further and point the finger at the buyer as well. They're the ones enabling the behavior in the first place. And if you've ever paid a markup on the secondary market, you're as guilty as the scalper. You're rewarding the behavior. And you also have to point a finger at the B&M who's allowing the scalper to do what they do. But the B&M needs sales to survive, and who's going to say no to a guy who wants to purchase a few boxes? No many, unless they're a B&M who's more interested in a community, which is awesome.
Now, if they're breaking rules in order to scalp - IE, an account who turns and lists on eBay instead of selling at retail, thereby breaking the rules of having the account- yeah, that's a scumbag move. But it's a scumbag move because you're breaking the rules and are taking an unfair advantage to profiteer.
Now, don't get me wrong, I'm not a scalper. I stick to places like here and my other online cigar home, and "share the share" as it were. I'm a firm believer that you don't profit on your buddies, and I'd consider almost every member of BOTL or Puff a "buddy" in the sense that we're part of a small, tightly-knit community of people. Personally, if I get a good deal, I do a split at my cost. I've done a lot of them. But I won't hesitate to pay a bit more if I can afford it for something on the secondary market from a re-seller if I feel the price is worth paying. That guy is providing me a service for which I am willing to pay. If I'm unwilling to pay the markup, I simply go without the product, and life goes on.
Fortunately, there are communities like this one where people help each other out. In this case, we don't pay markup to each other, we pay each other in returned sharing and generosity, which of course is to be preferred, especially in small, close-knit communities.
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