Date: 02/09/2014
Author: Ray

CVS Discontinuing All Tobacco Sales

CVS has just announced that they will no longer be selling tobacco products in their stores. The news hit on Wednesday, when the company released a statement saying they would no longer be selling cigarettes, cigars, or other tobacco products. This is quite a startling decision in light of the fact that the pharmaceutical giant pulls in around $2 billion a year from tobacco related sales.

The majority of that money comes from cigarette sales, as opposed to cigar sales. CVS is really not a prime destination for cigar purchases for the simple reason that they do not have humidors on their premises. Some premium cigars which do not require humidors for storage could be sold in CVS stores however, as could machine-made brands. CVS sold a variety of cigar brands, including Dutch Masters, Macanudo, and Backwoods.

While CVS’s decision may inconvenience some cigar smokers, it will cause a much greater inconvenience for cigarette smokers. Premium cigar aficionados generally are better served shopping at local tobacconists with proper humidors to begin with. We can hope that this decision will actually be good for small businesses, since more casual cigar buyers who may no longer shop at CVS may turn to smaller companies for their needs. This may even lead them to discover the joys of premium hand-rolled cigars, which would be good not only for local stores, but for the premium cigar industry overall.

1 thought on “CVS Discontinuing All Tobacco Sales

  1. This shouldn’t even be an article on CigarInspector.com. CVS is in the business of selling prescription drugs (and too much else). The few cigars they sold (in addition to other tobacco products) doesn’t warrant any true cigar afficianado’s attention (unless that cigar afficianado owns stock in CVS). In short, who cares?

Leave a Reply