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Two of the bigger cigar manufacturers,Tabacalera and General Cigar Holdings, are zeroing in on a particular trait of current smokers.Tabacalera identified male smokers between 25 and 40 years old as having a tendency to smoke their favorite one or two brands cheap tiffany necklace the time and seek variety with the other half in their cigar purchases. By contrast, older smokers will buy their favorite brands 80% of the time.

"We're trying to grow business by getting into that trial set," said Bo Young, vp-marketing. General sees smokers' love for cigars being akin to connoisseurs' search for the perfect bottle of fine wine or single-malt scotch,said Warren Pfaff,executive vp at McCaffery Ratner Gottlieb & Lane, N.Y, General's ad agency."There's a curious kind of interest in what's new; in what haven't I tried:'said Pfaff."Maybe, I'll find a better vineyard than I found last week and that is true of cigars. It never was true of cigarettes. We know lots of people like to try different cigars, where cigarette smokers are stuck in a brand and never get off."

The typical cigar marketing standby with generic-looking ads showing ashtrays, humidors and smoking cigars, increasingly is being bumped by executions that differentiate product by image or positioning. Consequently, there's more marketing portfolio management occurring beyond the usual cheap tiffany ring like ring gauge, taste and wrapper.This style is emerging partly because well-known brands are easier to find today, in contrast to a period of shortages a couple of years ago at the height of stogies' popularity.

Manufacturers did not see the fad coming and could not rush out more product, which can take more than three years to move from seed to shelf. Outsiders looking to cash in on the popularity struck contracts with any supplier they could cheap tiffany pendant to move stogies to market.The cigar rush was such that stores carrying a couple of hundred brands before the fad more than doubled their inventory. But the combo of oversupply and trendy smokers leaving, squeezed the Don Nobodies out of the business. Now that serious smokers are returning to names they recognize and searching unfamiliar cigars for that perfect smoke, marketers tout heritage, quality or create a mystique around established brands while building staying power into new names.

General Cigar was among the first to tackle that task three years ago with its Macanudo campaign.The top-selling premium cigar already had been positioned as the benchmark for quality, touting the craftsmanship of its firm,consistent crown shape, color, long ash and distinctive aroma. Tagline: "Why can't every cigar taste like a Macanudo? Because no other cigar is made like a Macanudo." Indeed, Macanudo ads once sported inserts scented with the Macanudo aroma.But when cheap tiffany cigar fad exploded, ad agency MRG&L had to address the conflict of new entrants in the market buying products that once were the domain of their fathers, grandfathers and uncles.

"There was a question with the person who had the cigarsmoking experience as well as with the person coming in,"said Bill McCaffery, president."The new guy was saying,'Do I really want what that guy smokes?' and the older guy was saying,'If these whipper snappers are smoking them, what is this about?' We really wanted to get across a strategy that we had true cigar taste combined with smoothness and consistency. True cigar taste would mean something to including the new entrant.We said, in fact, it's hard to disagree on true cigar taste"

One execution played up a generational comparison with a bridegroom and his new father-in-law smoking Macanudos. The younger is CDs, laptop and aces,while the elder is LPs, legal pads and birdies.The one thing they agree on is Macanudo. Other ad plays on the same theme cast an older employee and a younger boss and an up-and-coming woman attorney and a judge in "Objection, overruled, motion denied, recess Macanudo." Macanudo launched extensions like cheap tiffany bracelets in 1998 and, last fall, Maduro. Its tagline, "At last a richer yet smoother Macanudo" plays off the "Smooth Every Time" umbrella positioning,which broke last year for the flagship and extension brands, featuring subjects with believable personalities and characteristics enjoying their cigars in candid poses. "An image smokers can relate to:' said McCaffery