Hiram Walker Links Courvoisier XO, Cigars

Sigmund Freud said "sometimes a cigar is just a cigar," but try telling that to Generation Xers. Today's yuppies -- both male and female -- are lighting up upscale cigars like never before.According to Cigar Aficionado magazine, there was a 45 percent increase in premium cigar sales in the first six months of 1995.Hiram Walker & Sons Inc., Southfield, Mich., is trying to catch some of that marketing fire by offering high-quality cigars with its Courvoisier XO Imperial cognac. The company has created "Reward Your Senses," an upscale P-O-P promotion featuring 6,000 8-inch-by-13-inch mahogany humidor-style boxes imported from Honduras. Each box contains a cigar cutter and a humistat, a device that keeps cigars fresh."The promotion is specifically designed to build trial by the consumer and to create a high-quality image of Courvoisier XO," says Michael Remitz, marketing director for the Courvoisier brand. "We did 3,000 boxes for off-premise accounts and 3,000 for on-premise. They differ a little. The off-premise boxes are to help display the bottle in the retail store. When the box is purchased by the consumer, they take the bottle out and fill the space with cigars. The on-premise boxes are to hold cigars in restaurants and bars."The promotion began in November of 1995 and will run through spring. Sales promotion agency Ross Roy Communications Inc. of Bloomfield Hills, Mich., designed and produced all of the P-O-P related to the program."Some of our field people have incorporated a program, where legal, that offers the account a box of Arturo Fuente cigars if they agree to carry XO," Remitz notes. "The account will then use the cigars as a promotional tool for the consumer to try and to purchase Courvoisier XO." Hiram Walker has a tie-in with Dominican Republic-based Arturo Fuente through the cigar producer's Florida office."Off-premise," says Remitz, the P-O-P "is provided when retailers order bottles of XO, almost like a value-added item. On-premise, it depends on the legalities of the individual state. Because of the direct tie-in with orders, sales of XO have gone up considerably."

Hiram Walker Links Courvoisier XO, Cigars

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