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The Next Big Thing in Cigars, Pepin
Garcia with his son Jaime.
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It's cliché to describe the members of a family company as closely knit, but the Garcias take it to an extreme: father, son, daughter, spouses and children all live together in one house in Miami, as they did in Cuba. "It's not usual in the U.S., but in Cuba, we lived all together," says Janny with a smile and a wave of her hand. "It's impossible for my father to live without us, and it's impossible for us to live without him."
Being together virtually all the time, at work and at home, makes it easy to focus on the one subject that matters: tobacco. "In my home, we only speak tobacco," says Jaime, a powerfully built, soft-spoken man with sleepy eyes and a tremendous pride in his cigars. "When we talk, it's only cigars. Every day, every time, every week, only cigars."
The family recently took a short vacation—together—to the Dominican Republic, but it quickly evolved into a working trip. "We smoked 60 cigars in three days," says Janny. Pepin acquiesced to leisure but once. He wanted to leave the beaches of Puerto Plata and take a trip to the cigar factories in Santiago, but his children convinced him to stay and get some modicum of relaxation.
The Garcias expanded El Rey de los Habanos in May 2006, essentially doubling its space, but one could hardly tell. They added a small area, about the same size as the rolling room, where cigars are banded and packed, and a shop in the front that sells various cigars made by the company, including the Don Pepin lines and Tatuajes. In back of the rolling room is a tobacco preparation area, where piles of tobacco sit in plastic bins. Jaime takes out leaf after leaf, and offers a visitor a sniff of the tobacco's rich aroma. "Secret," he says when asked from what part of Nicaragua the tobacco comes. Then he beams with his contagious smile.
In the equally tiny aging room, which is nothing more than a few shelves in a humidified cooler, cigars sit half wrapped in newspaper (for protection) on a rolling cart. There are perhaps 20 bundles, gorgeous chocolate-brown pyramids, proud and long "A" sizes and diminutive coronas. It is half the entire factory's daily production.
At the same time as the expansion in Miami, the Garcias embarked on their most ambitious project to date, opening a much larger cigar factory in Estelí, Nicaragua. Tabacalera Cubana, which is also a partnership with Fernandez, has enabled the Garcias to substantially increase the number of cigars they can roll. The cigars in Nicaragua are made in the same style as those in Miami, with two binders and mounted heads, but in the new plant production is divided between bunchers and rollers. "Teaching the people was hard," admits Pepin. "In Cuba, one roller makes everything. In Nicaragua and Honduras, they work in pairs."
Nicaragua has brought the Garcias their most high-profile client to date: Ashton Cigars. The Philadelphia company recently signed a deal to have a new brand—San Cristobal—made by the Garcias in Nicaragua. The signing of such a prestigious customer has humbled the Garcias. "It's like a dream to do a cigar for Ashton," says Janny.
The large factory has given the company more room to work: all fermentation and tobacco sorting is done in Nicaragua, and the finishing steps are done in Miami.
Some were concerned about the Garcias' ability to maintain quality standards when the Nicaraguan factory opened, but so far the results are impressive. Nicaraguan cigars are responsible for some of the family's highest ratings, including the 93 points recently awarded to the Tatuaje Havana VI. The new factory's first full year in operation, 2007, should bring the Garcias' total production to nearly 5 million cigars, up from 2 million in 2006. The family's long-term goal is to get to about 7 million cigars.
Despite the recent success, it's a tough life, and it's uncertain how long the Garcias will stay in their current, cramped Miami location. "We're probably going to move," says Janny, who spends a total of two hours each day commuting in Miami-area traffic to and from work, starting at the factory at 7 a.m. and leaving at 6 at night. "We're looking for something closer to the house."
Pepin is happy with his ratings, and the industry accolades. "I feel like a millionaire when people come to me and say you're making good cigars: it makes me feel proud," he says.
Late one evening after a meal in a local restaurant, Pepin and his family are sitting outdoors puffing away on more cigars, discussing Cigar Aficionado ratings. Pepin wants to know the highest rating ever given a cigar in a blind taste test. "Ninety-nine points, for the Hoyo Double Corona," he is told. "Long ago."
He takes another puff of his cigar, and thinks to the future. "Once Cuba opens, the Cubans are going to take leaf from Central America. They have more rollers than the leaf that they have," he says. He is asked if he would keep making cigars in Nicaragua if the embargo is dropped. He says he would. Then he is asked to blend the perfect cigar in his head.
He smiles broadly at the question, and says without hesitation that it would be a combination of Cuban-seed tobaccos grown in Nicaragua and Cuba. The wrapper would be from Cuba. The binder leaves would be from Nicaragua. For the ligero tobacco in the filler, he would use two types, one from Estelí and the other from Jalapa in Nicaragua. The other filler components, seco and viso, would come from Cuba, the former from Villa Clara, the latter from Pinar del Río.
"That cigar," he says with pride, "would score 100 points."
Photos by Amy Eckert
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