Mitchell Thomas Trading Co.

Mitchell Thomas Trading Co. is an American import and wholesale distribution company based in Memphis, Tennessee. It is recorded among the large-scale North American suppliers of pipes and tobacco accessories. The company runs both its own eponymous pipe line and, for a time, held the rights to several older brands that had otherwise left the market.

Founding and the Origin of the Name

The company's founder, Jeff Abel, entered the tobacco trade at fifteen at his family's retail shop in Memphis. At the end of 1992 he moved to Chicago to learn warehouse operations at a cigar distributor, and from 1994 he settled in Texas, working as an independent sales representative across a seven-state territory; among the firms he represented during this period was Savinelli. The lines he represented did not, however, cover inexpensive, everyday tobacco accessories; when no firm stepped in to fill that gap, Abel began sourcing such items himself. Within a few years, the range he had assembled reached a volume large enough to sustain a standalone business.

The company was formally established in 1998; its first and only employee was Abel's wife, Laurie. The business was run first from home, then from a small office, and eventually from a large warehouse in Memphis. The company's name was chosen in memory of two people: Jeff Abel's brother Mitchell Abel, who died in 1986, and Laurie Abel's father Thomas Jones, who passed away in 1987.

Brand Portfolio

Mitchell Thomas's business is not limited to distribution; the company imports and labels most of what it sells under its own brand. It also owns the rights to a few brands with a place in pipe history:

• Aldo Velani. This Italian-sounding name was actually invented as a trademark by Mastercraft in the 1970s; the pipes were made at the Cesare Barontini workshop in Livorno. Mitchell Thomas relaunched the name at the 2008 IPCPR trade show; records indicate production was returned to the Barontini workshop that originally made the line.

• Sasieni. The London-rooted classic English brand Sasieni entered the company's portfolio after a long history full of changes of ownership.

• Friend Holder. Mouthpiece and filter products designed to trap tar and nicotine; this product family counts as an example of the commercial side of pipe filters.

• Lil Cus. A small accessory line in the form of a portable spittoon.

Brands distributed by the company also include names such as GBD and Graco. Mitchell Thomas products reach retailers not only directly but also through other wholesalers such as Phillips & King and Music City.

Its Place in the Trade

Mitchell Thomas belongs to the world of accessible products that fill the everyday shelves of tobacco shops, not limited-production handmade pipes. For this reason the company's name appears less in collector literature than in records describing the workings of America's retail tobacco network. As with Aldo Velani, distributors of this kind play a large role in keeping the names of shuttered or forgotten brands alive: once a trademark changes hands, the old name returns to circulation under a new production arrangement.