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I first met Don Bores in 1998 in a hotel con-
ference room in Pennsylvania, where he had
summoned a handful of people to hear his vi-
sion for launching a tobacco magazine, trade
show and industry association. I’ll admit I
went into that meeting thinking he was nuts.
It was a time when smart people were pre-
dicting the imminent demise of print. It was
also a time when manufacturing and selling
tobacco products was about to become expo-
nentially more costly and complicated thanks
to the Masters Settlement Agreement inked
between Big Tobacco and state attorneys gen-
eral. Yet, Bores’s entire business model hinged
on convincing companies operating on ra-
zor-thin margins to invest a significant portion
of their meager time and resources into adver-
tising in a magazine, exhibiting at a trade show
and supporting a trade association.
Crazy, right? But Bores turned out to be the
sort of man who could inspire a handful of
people he had just met to follow him into a
venture that sounded pretty dubious. It wasn’t
that he had polish. In fact, meeting Bores in
person that first time, sporting his cowboy
boots and one of the many hats he was par-
tial to was not immediately reassuring. And it
wasn’t that he was a smooth talker—truth be
told, his default demeanor was a tad gruff. In
fact, I’m almost certain he pounded on the ta-
ble at least once that day.
However, he knew his stuff. He had a firm
grasp on the pressures, politics and players re-
shaping the tobacco market and, perhaps most
important, what the industry needed to do about
the changes taking place. He was passionate. He
was convincing. Those of us who walked into
that meeting feeling skeptical walked out com-
pletely on board with Bores’s vision.
And we were not alone. I’d already been in
publishing for some time at that point and I
knew how difficult it was to convince potential
advertisers to commit to buying space in a new
magazine—let alone pay for them up front. Yet,
Bores pulled that off, pre-selling pages in a mag-
azine,
Tobacco Outlet Business
(now
Tobacco Busi-
ness
), which had yet to exist. Later, when it was
time to launch an industry trade show, he would
do that again, convincing 21 tobacco compa-
nies to pre-purchase two years of booth space.
It helped that Bores saw his venture as being
about more than profit. As Bores told
TB
when
we interviewed him for a story several years ago:
“We were always profitable, but that isn’t what
it was all about. We wanted the industry and the
tobacco outlet retail channel to prevail.”
It also helped that he seemed to know every-
one. Whether it was for marketing, circulation,
sales, finance, trade show management, etc.,
Bores “knew a guy” he could call. (Or some-
times “a girl.” Bores was not the most political-
ly correct guy. Case in point, he referred to his
all-female email editorial team, not a one of us
under the age of 35, as “the girls,” meaning that
as a compliment—which is how we took it.)
Long after he sold the company, Bores con-
tinue to take an interest in our work and our
lives. We would spot him in his cowboy hat and
boots strolling the trade show floor at TPE or
enjoying a cigar on opening night and we’d go
over for a chat. He would ask about our fami-
lies and share his latest business idea (he always
had one), as well as his take on what was going
on in the industry, which was ever insightful.
I will miss seeing his wide smile bloom from
across the room as I headed over to say hello.
I know I’m far from alone in that. Don Bores
will be sorely missed. Personally, I like to think
that he’s up there somewhere, relaxing, enjoy-
ing a good cigar and happy with the knowledge
that he made a positive impact on the industry
that he loved and the lives of the people in it.
—Jennifer Gelfand, Editor,
Tobacco Business
NATO
Remembers
In 2000, Don was one of the owners of
Tobacco
Outlet Business
magazine (now
Tobacco Business
),
and his prior experience in the tobacco industry
gave him the foresight to dream of a national asso-
ciation for tobacco outlet stores.
Don’s vision became a reality in 2001 when the
National Association ofTobacco Outlets, now more
commonly referred to as NATO, was formed. For
the past 15 years, Don was a stalwart support-
er of NATO and often praised others for NATO’s
phenomenal growth and success. However, with-
out Don’s vision and foresight, NATO may never
have become a reality.
Through NATO, Don’s determination to protect
the right to sell and enjoy tobacco products was put
into action. In many ways, NATO is a legacy to Don’s
resolve to have the retail tobacco segment of the
industry become engaged in the fight to protect in-
dividual freedoms and liberties. NATO will continue
to participate in the fight in memory of Don.
—Tom Briant, Executive Director, NATO
TRIBUTES TO
DONALD JOHN BORES
Reflections on the founder of
Tobacco Business
and Tobacco Plus Expo
IN REMEMBERANCE
Donald John Bores, 1934-2016
Don with one of the
TB
"girls" at TPE.
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