CAO

CAO is a brand named after the initials of its founder, Cano A. Ozgener, first known in the United States for its meerschaum pipes and later grown in the cigar field. The company's starting point was not a factory but an engineer reworking pipes arriving from Türkiye in his spare time; in this respect CAO is counted among the typical examples that tell the story of the meerschaum trade's bridge between Türkiye and North America.

The Founder's Path

Cano Aret Ozgener, who gave the brand its name, was born on 19 January 1937 in Istanbul, to an Armenian family. He continued his education first at a French school, then at Robert College, earning a mechanical engineering degree in 1960. The interest in pipes he developed as a student in Istanbul, particularly his fascination with meerschaum, formed the core of his later business life. He moved to New York for graduate study and, after his education at Columbia University, began working as an engineer at DuPont's facility in North Carolina. The family he built with Esen Sever, whom he met and married during his New York years, stayed at the centre of the company as it developed further. Ozgener died at his home in Nashville on 9 June 2018, after a long illness.