Part Two: Las Vegas Big Smoke Saturday Seminars

Lunch with the Experts

Jack Bettridge
Posted: November 8, 2006

Lunch at the Big Smoke Las Vegas Weekend on the day of the Saturday seminars always comes as a welcome chance to replenish the stomach, but the cigar manufacturers who host the tables also look forward to it as a way to get valuable feedback from their customers.

"Anytime you get a chance to sit face-to-face with the end user of your product, it's great," Jorge Padrón, president of Padrón Cigars Inc., said about the noontime luncheon, where dozens of tables were each headed by a cigar executive or a Cigar Aficionado editor. The menu included petit beef filet, a salad of baby spring mix with roast duck and whole grain vinaigrette, a tiramisu dessert and Geyser Peak Cabernet Sauvignon Alexander Valley 2004. The table host shares smokes, as well as answers questions on an intimate level.

"I find you get a well-informed customer at that event, someone who is familiar with your product and cigars in general. It's also a wonderful opportunity for the consumer to voice their concerns," said Padrón, who has hosted tables at the event for several years. He added that he also enjoys the camaraderie. "I always run into a lot of people we know from past lunches. We don't forget them and they don't forget us."

Sherwin Selzter of General Cigar speaks to a guest at lunch.

Wayne Suarez, an executive at Tabacalera A. Fuente y Cia., said two of his guests had sat at his table at previous Big Smokes. "That was great to see those guys again and meet some new guys," he said. Suarez distributed gifts of two cigars, one of which was a Fuente Fuente OpusX, and a DVD on the Fuente family. "They were tickled pink!" he said.

Jon Huber, marketing director for C.A.O. International Inc., hosted a table for the first time, and said the relaxed format even has advantages over the kind of one-on-one customer contact he has during in-store events. "It's good because they find out that you aren't just a marketing guy trying to sell cigars," he said. "They see that you are someone who likes cigars as much as they do."

Coming, as it does, after the cigar seminars, in which manufacturers answer questions from the audience, the luncheon serves almost as a continuation of the earlier events -- but with a twist, said Huber. "It's rare that you get to sit down with 10 guys who are that passionate about cigars. It's a real finger-on-the-pulse kind of thing."

Jorge Padrón with a Big Smoker at his table.

Jose Oliva, vice president of Oliva Cigar Co., agreed that the sequence of going from the more broad-based format of the seminars to the intimate lunch "makes it invaluable. This is a much more focused group of guys."

Oliva said that he had already received a handful of e-mails from customers who attended. "It's a great relationship when you have customers who feel they can now e-mail us with their questions and concerns."

Huber noted that the kind of questions he fielded had a different slant than those put to Tim Ozgener, president of the company, who hosted a separate table. "They'd ask Tim, 'What goes into that blend' or 'Why can't I get the Mx2?' They'd ask me, 'Do you guys have as much fun as we think you do?'"

Oliva, who also hosted a table for the first time, said that before the event he was concerned that the time slot (three hours) was too long for lunch. "But it flew by. I just enjoyed the fact that we could have lunch and smoke cigars at the same time," he said, echoing the sentiments of the attendees. "Superb!"

Photos by Camilla Sjodin

CLICK HERE TO READ ABOUT THE EVENING FESTIVITIES

CLICK HERE TO READ ABOUT THE SUNDAY SEMINARS

CLICK HERE TO READ ABOUT THE SATURDAY SEMINARS:
ANNIVERSARY CIGAR TASTING
RISING CIGAR STARS
NEW CUBAN CIGARS
UNUSUAL TOBACCO LEAVES
LUNCH WITH THE EXPERTS

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