An Update on Forum Blending
Alex Svenson
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Great News. I talked to the bean counters over here we are going to be able to turn this forum blending concept into a full time, ongoing activity. This first one was a great experiment. Here is how it is going to work. Bear with me as we probably wont get started on the next blend until January but after that we should be able to do about 4 a year.
We are going to band and box the first blend in a size of your choosing. However, the goal for the forum blending project will be to do several every year. I need input from the group though on how you want it to be set up since this is being made just for you guys.
Here is what I was thinking to get us started:
A. Fist order of business decide on a name. While printing bands did not make sense when we did not know if this would be an ongoing thing, printing them up now makes sense since I can just print a bunch and we can use them on all of the blends going into the future. That said, to differentiate each blend we will order these in boxes only and have the main logo done in Cliche on the lid and have the generation number but on it in screen print. For example, if we call the brand Catadores, the first one we make in January will have the Catadores band and be in a box of 20 that has the logo on the lid. Below the logo it would say "First Edition" or "First Generation". The second blend we do in the spring would have the same exact band and same box but say "Second Generation". We will bring in a set number of boxes for each generation and add them to the brands page. When they sell out, they are gone forever. Most likely I will only bring in 100 boxes of each generation until it grows and justifies more buying. Also, the cigars will only be purchasable in boxes as I need to keep them in tact since it will be hard for my warehouse crew to tell them apart once I open boxes since the bands are all the same. That said, boxes will relatively cheap at $89.95 ($4.50 per cigar) for a box of 20. If guys want to do splits etc, that is up to you.
B. For the next round, I will create a special sub section of the forum dedicated to discussing the blend and will create a special part of cigar.com dedicated to the project. Here there will be a a copy of the thread on the current blend (similar to the thread on the daily cigar deal site), an area to vote on the poll for that week: IE: wrapper, body, size, filler, binder, etc. It will also show results from the prior weeks votes so everyone can follow along. The polls and voting areas will be set up much more professionally with check lists etc and I will have my IT team dedicate some time to getting it set up.
C. We will need to limit each blend to just one size.
With that lets discuss what you guys think. Do these terms sound good? Did I miss anything? What about factory? Do you want to stay with just one factory or do we want to move it around each time to different factories? Perhaps that is the first poll each time we start a blend, which factory. Lets start discussing. In the mean time, we really need to finalize the name for this thing and I need an answer of size for the first generation blend so I can get them ordered and in house by Jan 1 which is when I hope we can start working on the Second Generation blend and have the site set up.
We are going to band and box the first blend in a size of your choosing. However, the goal for the forum blending project will be to do several every year. I need input from the group though on how you want it to be set up since this is being made just for you guys.
Here is what I was thinking to get us started:
A. Fist order of business decide on a name. While printing bands did not make sense when we did not know if this would be an ongoing thing, printing them up now makes sense since I can just print a bunch and we can use them on all of the blends going into the future. That said, to differentiate each blend we will order these in boxes only and have the main logo done in Cliche on the lid and have the generation number but on it in screen print. For example, if we call the brand Catadores, the first one we make in January will have the Catadores band and be in a box of 20 that has the logo on the lid. Below the logo it would say "First Edition" or "First Generation". The second blend we do in the spring would have the same exact band and same box but say "Second Generation". We will bring in a set number of boxes for each generation and add them to the brands page. When they sell out, they are gone forever. Most likely I will only bring in 100 boxes of each generation until it grows and justifies more buying. Also, the cigars will only be purchasable in boxes as I need to keep them in tact since it will be hard for my warehouse crew to tell them apart once I open boxes since the bands are all the same. That said, boxes will relatively cheap at $89.95 ($4.50 per cigar) for a box of 20. If guys want to do splits etc, that is up to you.
B. For the next round, I will create a special sub section of the forum dedicated to discussing the blend and will create a special part of cigar.com dedicated to the project. Here there will be a a copy of the thread on the current blend (similar to the thread on the daily cigar deal site), an area to vote on the poll for that week: IE: wrapper, body, size, filler, binder, etc. It will also show results from the prior weeks votes so everyone can follow along. The polls and voting areas will be set up much more professionally with check lists etc and I will have my IT team dedicate some time to getting it set up.
C. We will need to limit each blend to just one size.
With that lets discuss what you guys think. Do these terms sound good? Did I miss anything? What about factory? Do you want to stay with just one factory or do we want to move it around each time to different factories? Perhaps that is the first poll each time we start a blend, which factory. Lets start discussing. In the mean time, we really need to finalize the name for this thing and I need an answer of size for the first generation blend so I can get them ordered and in house by Jan 1 which is when I hope we can start working on the Second Generation blend and have the site set up.
Comments
This is a great forum!
I think the cap of 100 boxes would still keep it special. I'm fairly new here, but I think this is a great idea and I'm looking forward to it.
How about a secondary foot band saying 1st / 2nd generation/ edition or whatever, If it didn’t add too much to the cost. That way it would be possible to sell non boxed after a few edition. This way more people would be able to buy every edition, as I would imagine most won’t be able to get a box every time but would still like to keep up with things and try them all. Maybe as a 3 or 5 pack, a 3 would be good as you could smoke one age one for a year or two and keep the last one forever sort of thing.
I've cast my vote for size and and name for this original blend on Renaissance Man's thread. As for the new process I'd be up for trying a new factory each time and putting that in the mix as well. We could change the size up each time, too, all up for voting. I like sol's idea of a second band that doesn't have to be production quality to so people can get these in quantities less than 20. 4 boxes a year might be hard for some. Looking forward to the next step.
Now this is an even better idea. AWESOME!
Or just two different blends with one wrapper choice for each, which would be 2 new creations in a year?
I really enjoyed the knowledge gained just from changing the wrappers of what was the same core.
BTW I got my Forum Blends in today and enjoyed the Maduro this morning and just finished with the ECSU an hour or so ago.
I LOVE them both and would pre-order either again if the opportunity comes around again. These things are REALLY GOOD !!!!!
one wrapper, one binder, one filler per blend.
this could also keep the number of samplers up. demand up. and maybe prices down a bit.
two blends per year - yes
I also like the idea of keeping the factory for a period of time but moving it later, like 1 factory per year
Like making a cake, some of the ingriedients must remain the same even when making two different cakes. If we automatically elliminate certain eliments of the stick we were working on because it may have already been used in another blend we may end up creating a lot of "different" sticks instead of a lot of TASTY sticks.
While I am all for new things, I think we may need to re-use certain elements even when creating new blends.
The other thing that occurred to me was that if we limit things too much, you may end up with a blend that only appeals to a relitively small portion of the forum members (and that's OK) that would translate into poor sales for C.COM, and afterall it is a business decision for them.