When I worked at a carryout, I noticed there were some people who specifically loved soft pack, or hard pack, but they hardly switched between the two. We asked a lady one time and she told us that they were most fresh in a soft pack, and that hard packs dried out the smokes and they tasted bad. I always bought Camel lights in a box and never once thought that.
I figure it’s mostly a tradition/habit thing (well, smoking would be a habit thing, but I guess the type of smokes is too)…
A friend of mine in college always bought soft packs. She’d tuck them into the back pocket of her tight hip hugger style jeans never broke a single one. Still never figured out how she did that.
OTOH, if I buy a soft pack (usually by accident), I’ll wind up breaking them even if I toss them in my car and only touch them to remove one. And if I don’t break one, I just end up with them spilling all over the place.
I smoked for many years. My understanding was always that the only thing that a soft pack had over the hard version was that soft packs had old school cool. So soft packs for pretentious gits, hard for those who think it’s more important that their cigarettes are not all bent up.
My mom smoked soft packs for years, and just in the last two switched to box.
Her reasoning was the soft packs were longer, she smoked and still smokes Marlboro Reds (shudder).
But the laughs we would get from her smoking a crooked cigarette because she’d had the pack stuffed in her jeans all day!
I’ve always preferred box, I hated the way the soft pack would lose cigarettes and dump out when turned slightly.
I still see people tear the hole at the top of the box, I suppose that would help with the crushing though.
Many years ago I was making a convenience store run and was tasked with buying some cigarettes for one of my friends. The clerk asked me “hard pack or soft pack?” and, not being a smoker, I had no idea what they were saying.
I ask for hard pack but will take soft pack as well. I use a cigarette case and although I like the hard pack better as my case is soft leather and the hard pack keeps it firmer I will accept soft pack if that is all they have.
The BF on the other hand must have soft pack. He will not accept hard pack and will go somewhere else. He insists that every hard pack of Winston ever made are stale.
Well, if you have a brother in county lockup you’re trying to sneak them to, I’m guessin’ your bunghole would find a softpack to require a whole lot less prying and shoving.
Soft Pack lends itself to handbagal areas that require a little flexibility. You can also fit them in the back pocket of tightish jeans with no problem.
Hard Pack doesn’t always squeeze into a case.
They’re catering to discriminating smokers like you. And ME!
My husband prefers soft pack because a hard pack is all pointy in your t-shirt pocket. Which is totally uncool.
Same thing with the front pocket of jeans. Nothing screams “something is in here” like a square box in a tight pocket.
You n’ me both. Even though quitting was easy. I just went cold turkey and that was the end of it. If I’m ever told I have a year or less to live or the world is coming to an an end or something the first thing I’m doing is buying a case (not a pack, not a carton, a CASE) of Camels!!!
I’d quit since 1992, started up again last year. In my defense, my wife never quit. Yeah, that’s it - it’s her fault. Or maybe I could blame Oregon - I live here several days per week and you can smoke here. Regardless, it’s certainly not my fault. ::puff::
Funny you should ask this, Morbo! I’ve been meaning to post this question hor a long time. Some major grocery chains like Giant Food here in Maryland only carry soft packs. I can’t for the life of me understand why people would ever ask for them over hard packs.
I always wondered why, also, until I knew a few who were mechanics, farmers or other laborers, like septic workers, who liked the option of being able to get the cig from the pack to the mouth without having to touch the filter with greasy/dirty hands. Some would open the pack from the bottom - so, while getting a fresh one from the pack, they weren’t touching the filter part, before putting it in their mouth.
I haven’t smoked in years, but it always seemed to me that the hard pack smokes were different from the soft pack ones. They just didn’t smoke or taste the same.
Add me to the list of people who think soft-pack smokes taste different from hard-pack cigarettes.
I was a Marlboro smoker. I almost always bought my cigarettes in the soft pack. I’d take a box if they didn’t have the soft-pack, but I preferred the soft pack.
They are (or were, back when I smoked) just a little bit longer than the hard-pack cigarettes, too. That’s not why I preferred them, but it was a bonus.
It’s been many, many years. But the soft pack goes in a shirt or coat pocket much better with out the corners and angles poking out. A hard pack did not protect the cigs from breaking in my experiences.
My brother likes the hard pack because he can fit a small bic lighter in with the cigs.
I just bought a soft pack or marlboro reds for the first time and they do taste different but I can’t tell if it’s better or worse. Also I bought a 16fl Oz can of Dr pepper, a strawberry lemonade calypso and pack of life saver Gummi especially and it came to a total of $7.03. Usually that’s the price of one hard pack of reds so in my area the soft packs r cheaper. Also I just emptied out my soft pack into my hard pack and the top barely doesn’t close all the way so the marlboro red soft pack cigs are a lil longer but for the safety of the cigs it’s a good idea to still keep that extra hard pack laying around… Even if the top doesn’t close all the way it’s still about 90% closed which is more than enough to keep em from falling out.
