Since I have already been to some cigar factories, I had some idea what to expect. What was so wonderful about the tour at the Don Lucas cigar factory was the close family atmosphere. While it is a small factory by some standards, they do not cut corners on quality or final product. They meet or exceed some quality control and aging standards that I have seen from other manufacturers. They don’t disclose what daily production rates are, but they vary. It all depends on what leaf they have in stock that day that is ready to be rolled. They do not base anything off production quotas, but only on quality standards. I greatly admire that practice, especially considering how rare it is becoming in the cigar industry.
Smoke Inn and Abe Dababneh are hosting a "Battle of the Bands" for cigars. Abe chose 6 of the biggest Cigar Media websites and asked each of them to make a sampler. The sampler selling the most at the end of the competition will be crowned the winner. Now through Monday use code LBRDAY and get 20% off you order at Smoke Inn including this sampler, bringing the price down to only $43. Click here to buy our sampler. Battle of the Bands ends midnight, Sunday October 4th and a LIVE virtual results show including all the competitors will be broadcast Monday, October 5th, 8PM EST.
2021 is the first year that Blind Man's Puff will be at the TPE (Tobacco Plus Expo) trade show. From today, May 12th through Friday May 14th, keep checking back here for more updates and follow our Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter accounts for live pictures and video interviews from the show floor. You can click the above links to follow our accounts on each platform or view them all together in the feed below.
At the end of August, just over two weeks ago, Smoker Friendly Hosted the 13th Annual Rocky Mountain Cigar Festival...
In my most recent trip to Nicaragua I was fortunate to attend Puro Sabor 2018. Puro Sabor is a celebration of the Nicaraguan cigar industry and the people who make it so wonderful. I had previously been to Nicaragua once before, in the fall of 2015, and I was so grateful to be able to go back again. Since there's so much to cover about this trip I'll break it into a series of different articles each covering different aspects of the trip itself. One theme that I hope you'll notice in all of these articles is the people. The people are the most important aspect of every piece of the cigar industry in Nicaragua. Nothing is more important to the industry than its people and it's the relationships that make the cigar industry in Nicaragua so beautiful and so wonderful.
Smoker Friendly Hosted the 14th Annual Rocky Mountain Cigar Festival at the end of August, just over two weeks ago. This also meant the fourth annual Blind Man's Puff Blind Cigar Tasting Event. In 2019 we did the first ever Blind Cigar Tasting Event for every attendee of the festival and we have done it every year since, except 2020 because of the COVID-19 pandemic. This year, we handed out more cigars and had more reviews submitted than any previous year.
This is the time of year that publications, websites and passionate cigar smokers start releasing their “Cigar of the Year” lists. Not all of these lists are created equally though, so we wanted to point out what some of the differences are, what you should be looking for and what to take into consideration when evaluating them or comparing them to other lists.
Operation Esteli is a joint effort between BOTL.org and MPI designed to provide education enrichment, food security, nutrition, as well as safe housing and shelter to disadvantaged children in Esteli, Nicaragua. This is the second year for Operation Esteli. In 2014, more than $12,000 was raised, which resulted in the provision of teacher training, school supplies and learning materials, and nutritious school lunches to support more than 700 students, as well providing the funding required to construct a new home for a family in need.
ear marked the 12th Annual Rocky Mountain Cigar Festival. Unfortunately last years event was not held in person so we were not able to do our Blind Tasting Event. In 2019 we did the first ever Blind Cigar Tasting Event for every attendee of the festival and it was a huge success. You can read about it here. This year, we went bigger and the event did not disappoint.
This year, Rocky Mountain Cigar Festival put on their 10th Annual event. Blind Man's Puff has been to almost all of them. We've seen it go from a festival with just a few booths from big manufacturers to one of the largest cigar events in the country with booths from all types of cigar companies.

