Clippa Sales is proud to be associated with the world's most iconic tobacco brands.
We import and distribute world class brands across the Southern African continent.
Cigar Aficionados
There was once a time when a man with a cigar in his mouth was held in high regard; a time when a young man toasted farewell to adolescence by igniting the end of a cigar that “just happened” to slip out of his father’s humidor. A time where the arrival of a man’s progeny was celebrated with cigars in the hospital’s waiting room. A time when one could find a guillotine right alongside a man’s trusty pocketknife.
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History of Tobacco
6,000 BC – Native Americans first start cultivating the tobacco plant.
Circa 1 BC – Indigenous American tribes start smoking tobacco in religious ceremonies and for medicinal purposes.
1492 – Christopher Columbus first encounters dried tobacco leaves. They were given to him as a gift by the American Indians.
1492 – Tobacco plant and smoking introduced to Europeans.
1531 – Europeans start cultivation of the tobacco plant in Central America.
1558 – First attempt at tobacco cultivation in Europe fail.
1571 – European doctors start publishing works on healthy properties of the tobacco plant, claiming it can cure a myriad of diseases, from toothache to lockjaw and cancer.
1600 – Tobacco used as cash-crop – a monetary standard that lasts twice as long as the gold standard.
1602 – King James I condemns tobacco in his treatise A Counterblast to Tobacco.
1614 – Tobacco shops open across Britain, selling the Virginia blend tobacco.
1624 – Popes ban use of tobacco in holy places, considering sneezing (snuff) too close to sexual pleasures.
1633 – Turkey introduces a death penalty for smoking but it doesn’t stay in effect for long and is lifted in 1647.
1650 – Tobacco arrives in Africa – European settlers grow it and use it as a currency.
1700 – African slaves are first forced to work on tobacco plantations, years before they become a workforce in the cotton fields.
1730 – First American tobacco companies open their doors in Virginia.
1753 – Tobacco genus named by a Swedish botanist Carolus Linnaeus – nicotiana rustica and nicotiana tabacum named for the first time.
1791 – British doctors find that snuff leads to increased risk of nose cancer.
1794 – First American tobacco tax.
1826 – Nicotine isolated for the first time.
1847 – Philip Morris opens their first shop in Great Britain, selling hand-rolled Turkish cigarettes.
1961 – First American cigarette factory produces 20 million cigarettes.
1880 – Bonsack develops the first cigarette-rolling machine
1890 – American Tobacco Company opens its doors.
1902 – Philip Morris starts selling cigarettes in the US – one of the brands offered is Marlboro.
1912 – First reported connection between smoking and lung cancer.
1918 – An entire generation of young men returns from war addicted to cigarettes.
1924 – Over 70 billion of cigarettes are sold in the US.
1925 – Philip Morris starts marketing to women, tripling the number of female smokers in just 10 years.
1947 – Lorillard chemist admits that there is enough evidence that smoking can cause cancer.
1950 – 50% of a cigarette now consists of the cigarette filter tip.
1967 – Surgeon General definitively links smoking to lung cancer and presents evidence that it is causing heart problems.
1970 – Tobacco manufacturers legally obliged to print a warning on the labels that smoking is a health hazard.
1970 – 1990 – Tobacco companies faced with a series of lawsuits. Courts limit their advertising and marketing.
1990 – 4 billion cigarettes are sold this year and manufacture is on the rise.
1992 – Nicotine patch is introduced – in the following years more cessation products will start being developed.
1996 – Researchers find conclusive evidence that tobacco damages a cancer-suppressor gene.
1997 – Liggett Tobacco Company issues a statement acknowledging that tobacco causes cancer and carries a considerable health risk.
1997 – Tobacco companies slammed with major lawsuits – ordered to spend billions of dollar on anti-smoking campaigns over the next 25 years predominantly focused on educating the young on dangers of smoking.
1997 – For the first time in history a tobacco company CEO admits on trial that cigarettes and related tobacco products cause cancer. His name was Bennett Lebow.
1990 – 2000 – Bans on public smoking come into effect in most states in America, as well as in other countries in the world.
"There's something about smoking a cigar that feels like a celebration. ...
