Giving cigars as gifts has a very long history. I will not even pretend to be knowledgeable in this area – I am no historian. But more than the cigars themselves, cigar boxes can make excellent gifts, especially this Christmas. Did you know that cigar boxes were made especially for the holidays? I read a feature article on cigar boxes and my eyes popped out as I saw the old cigar boxes that they made.
The National Cigar Museum has this write up:
Each year, from 1880 to 1920, the eight week holiday season saw more than 25,000,000 boxes of cigars sold. By early November shelves were stocked with attractive holiday packaging in all price ranges, from two for a nickel cigars to those selling for a buck each (the typical turn-of-the-century domestic cigar sold for 5¢ to 2/25¢).
Cigars were popular gifts because they could be given cross-gender, cross-age
and cross social class. Cigars were an appropriate present from a robber baron to his chauffeur, a maiden aunt to her nephew, or an unmarried woman to her paramour. Sons could give them to their father, women to their tradesmen, parishioners to their priest, drunks to their bartender and students to their mentors.
Today, you can still give cigars to anyone. I just don’t know if you can find cigar boxes of this kind anymore. Why don’t you go take a look at them for yourself?