176 Weasel fest wrap up and a special Cigar Coop bonus show

Episode Summary

Episode 176 of A Cigar Hustler's Podcast is a two-part show. The first half is a full wrap-up of Weasel Fest 2021 in Austin, Texas — the RoMa Craft Tobac consumer event hosted by Mike Rosales and his family — told by the hosts alongside shop staffer Chet, who made his first trip to the event. The crew walks through the whole weekend: the travel chaos (Clear and TSA at Orlando vs. Austin, a free-upgrade rental Lincoln Nautilus, and the ritual "douching" of a cigar-smoked rental car), the hotel saga where Chet was talked into sleeping on the pull-out couch, and the goodie bag of Weasel Fest swag, Garrison Brothers cups, a Black Irish bottle and a coveted diving-board ashtray brought home as gifts.

The heart of the recap is the people. The guys praise the generosity of the Rosales family and the sheer logistics of pulling the event off — the fire department reportedly cleared the permit the morning of the event — and single out Skip Martin, Michael Rosales, "Frenchy" John D'Oliveira, Sean, and Charlie Minato for long, late-night conversations that ran until 4:30 a.m. The Scarface concert (the rapper's first show back after serious COVID-related health problems) is described as an intimate, zero-stress highlight, along with the late-night HQ hang with retailers including Ben Roland, Vince Hildebrandt of Sons Cigars, Brett Frye of Tobacology, Chris of Scallywags, and Sam and Rosie of Fine Ash Cigars. The practical takeaway for 2022 attendees: pay up for the VIP pass — better concert seating, HQ access, and unlimited food and drink make it a completely different experience, and next year will almost certainly sell out.

The bonus second half features Erik Espinosa Jr. — "Cigar Coop" — who missed the show the prior week due to a date mix-up that nearly triggered an elaborate on-air prank. Coop covers his read on TPE (a mixed bag, slightly heavier on premium cigars, with Drew Estate absent and Altadis and others expanding booths), his expanded PCA coverage team including Aaron Nielsen and Dave Burke, and his expectations for the PCA trade show: a smaller footprint, the Big Four still absent, and lowered expectations after a lost year. He notes most PCA exclusives announced so far are line extensions rather than genuinely new blends, and that the big open question is whether Fuente and Padrón will show anything from their announced collaboration. The two also gripe about brands giving exclusives to Cigar Aficionado first and the trend of undisclosed blend components, before closing with talk about the Cigar Media Compound at PCA and shop business back home.

In This Episode

1. 01
   Weasel Fest travel and hotel war stories
   Chet recounts flying to Austin, the couch-vs-king-bed negotiation, and the crew's airport and rental car routine.
2. 02
   Swag haul from the event
   A bag of Weasel Fest goodies including a box, Garrison Brothers cups, a Black Irish bottle, and a diving-board ashtray.
3. 03
   Meeting the RoMa Craft crew and the industry crowd
   Praise for the Rosales family, Skip Martin, Frenchy John D'Oliveira and the team's current efficiency at RoMa Craft.
4. 04
   The Scarface concert and late-night HQ hang
   An intimate, stress-free concert followed by small-group conversations with retailers and Charlie Minato until 4:30 a.m.
5. 05
   Why you should buy the VIP pass in 2022
   Better seating, HQ access, unlimited food and drink, and a warning that next year's event will likely sell out.
6. 06
   Cigar Coop on TPE 2021
   Erik Espinosa Jr. reports a mixed-bag show with Drew Estate absent, some booths expanding, and releases held back for PCA.
7. 07
   PCA trade show expectations
   A smaller footprint, the Big Four missing, expanded Cigar Coop coverage, and whether Fuente and Padrón will reveal their collaboration.
8. 08
   Media access, exclusives, and undisclosed blends
   Frustration with brands routing exclusives to Cigar Aficionado first and the growing trend of undisclosed wrappers and fillers.

Brands & Cigars Discussed

Linked items are in our shop. Mentions without a link aren’t currently stocked or couldn’t be matched with confidence.

Transcript

Welcome to episode 176, Cigar Hustler Podcast, the Weasel Fest Edition. Diesel Fest, still, number one show, you know I was exhausted, and I didn't even go, I don't know how you work a double thing on a weekend like Cheetos, Saturday, I was dead, it's tough, it's not for the light hearted, not for the light hearted, all right, hold on, this music is almost done, today's show brought to you by the Octador by Case Elegance, the team at Case Elegance has spent years meticulously crafting the Schumador to be their The largest and best yet, fitting up to a hundred cigars, this deluxe humidor features a striking octagon, so the wet, posh black piano finish, glass top, front digital hydrometer, accessories, storage door, and now he just walks out when I did it, keep going, Spanish cedar, magnetic enclosure, and the patent-pending hydro system, Case Elegance has undergone extensive research, testing and customer feedback to solve every shortcoming commonly experienced with other humidors, cleverly recessed into the bases included patent-pending hydro system. An accurate and low-maintenance cigar humildication system that makes dialing in, welcome back to the show, Michael, and maintaining your humidor easy. Case Elegance has integrated a front-facing digital hydrometer, offering your peace of mind that your stakes are kept to your desired humidity.

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A striking shape, beautiful finish, and thoughtful engineering makes this a must-have for any aficionado. com for more information and purchasing. Chet, watch out. Boom.

There it goes. Alright, we have Chet today. His name is Chet. But we have a new intro.

We have a new intro. And he's going to replace me. All right, ladies and gentlemen, coming to the main stage, BDP, put your dollars and hands together, and inside be the king. Oh, wow, Adam the King.

Welcome to episode 176 of the new and improved Cigar Hustler Podcast. I just wanted to know that had I known that that BDP would have taken on a life of its own and would have never said it to you. That's Rosales. I regret every second.

You should know by now, anything you bring across this guy, it's going skyrocket. I'm going to grab it and just run. Wow. I'm going to get a new tattoo that says BDP right here on my wrist.

Oh my God. Oh, I forgot the hat. It was so busy Friday night, I forgot to put the hat on. Hmm.

Yes. Well, you know what? I just forgot. I have a little present for you.

Uncle Skip was here! So we didn't... I thought you wanted a red hat. He said you wanted a blue hat.

No, red hat. It's a red hat. I told you it was red. Red hat.

Motherfucker. Remember Bo had one? And I said, hey, Bo, look, hey, look, Jed, there's Bo's red hat. I told you you wanted a red one.

So either way. Appreciate being on the show. Thanks a lot, Jed. You gotta take care of BDP.

One thing BDP has for it was a red hat. I took care of BDP. I got BDP. So either way, it didn't matter.

The red hat and the blue hat, they didn't have your size, they only had smalls. And I actually tested out a size and there's no fucking way that you're going to be heading that. So you go ahead and you guys talk amongst yourselves. Oh, okay, this is the king, this is where he's got, see, he got mad.

I did get a present for you, so. This is where we take over the show, Mike. He got mad because I didn't give him an intro like that, so now he's all upset. I'm just gonna leave.

So I told you while I was there that I would, in my appreciation of letting me go. You got me a half-smoked cigar, you sent me a picture. Well, that too, that's in here all. Oh, the half-smoked, oh, here it is, here it is, the half-smoked cigar.

There you go. Oh, a bag! Just a little bag full of goodies that I just kind of picked up along the way, you know. It's a small hat box, Michael.

Things that are, you know. We have, we have, oh, I don't have that one, that's nice. Okay, all right. Lovely, I love it.

I was kind of going with the blue theme, for some reason. The blue theme, yeah, you're going with the blue theme. But we have a garrison, it was one reason back in my car, I couldn't figure out where I came from. So we were literally walking out late Saturday night, it was like 4:30 in the morning, and I'm like, oh fuck.

4:30 in the morning? Yeah. And I'm like, oh shit, we gotta get some. So I was going to skip on the door for me, and I'm like, hey, I need that.

And sanitizers from the United Airlines. You guys want to follow the United? Everything's safe, man. Earl Grey tea, is this from the hotel?

That's from the hotel. Nice. I love the hotel. English breakfast.

Is there a toilet paper in there? What's even better is the garrison, half-used garrison cups that I drank out of. I was about to say, are these, because they are sticky. They are a little sticky.

They're slightly used. Oh, I see. This one's very sticky. Weasel Fest cups?

I can't believe that those are disposable. Right? Is this a black Irish? Yes, it is.

Oh, I don't have one of them. I was only allowed to get two, I tried to get a box, but they only allowed me to buy two, so if I have two, you have none, we both have one, you know, tacos, so it's delicious too, it's so good, oh, all right, all right, but I smoked mine the night at the Habano House, Habana House, Habana House, Habana House, Habana House, Habana, Habana House, and because you didn't get a package, you know, I had to make sure you got a Weasel Fuzz box, I got my Weasel Fuzz box, I'm going to add to my collection. So we both have one, so when I run out, I'm gonna scound up yours. Oh, and there's two sets of them too, so we found that out when we opened yours.

We did. Boom. Yeah. Um...

Yeah. Nice. Oh, butt. The king came through.

So here's a piece of the... The pizza? Oh, pizza? The piece de resistance.

Oh, whatever the fuck it's called. You brought me barbecue. " And it's a badass thing. This is for Uncle Skip.

Another computer, another laptop, I could use two laptops. Yeah, so we were rattling through, like we were going through the whole thing, you know. His office? No, he has like a whole merchandise section.

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. So we're going through the drawers and he had no large blue or red hats. Oh, that's fine. So, I'm sure that they'll get some more in and when they do, we'll make sure that it's-- And the hassle he went through at the airport for this-- I did go through it.

Makes it even better. It was a problem at the airport? Oh, yeah. Yeah.

Drum roll. It's not a bomb, is it? It's not a bomb? Don't you have an effect over there?

I've only seen this one other time from one other person has it. It's a steal. It does. You stole it?

Yeah, it means take. Steal me, yeah. Not S-T-E-L. Your own official diving board ashtray.

My own diving board ashtray. Look at that. Get this thing out. It's yours.

Get that out of here. That's yours. Just out of the way. There you go.

I'll take that one. Actually, this thing is complete shit. Hand me the... Hand me the...

Does Greg know? You go ahead and use that for... Does Greg know? No, I don't know if Greg knows or not.

He'll be so jealous. Well, he has one. That's what I mean. Yeah.

I'm gonna have to mark it. I'll put BDP on the bottom. He'll most likely get rid of his. Yeah.

I can't have this now. He's talking about getting a Mohawk. I said, you let me know what you do. Oh!

You let me know what you do, because I am shaving my head back to my normal spiky hair. Thank you. Between the painting and the hairdo. Ugh.

You gotta change your whole deal. This is my life. This is my life. The painting?

Well, he has a Joker painting in his house. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. The guy fucking doesn't like Joker? No.

No, but hey. Is that the Starry Night thing? Yeah. That was the first thing he wanted to paint on the wall downstairs.

I'm like, no. He goes, it looks good. I go, it's at your house. We didn't want that.

Yeah, no. Who are you? We don't know who you are. I will tell you this.

There were numerous people that approached Chet and said, oh, so you're Mike's brother. Over and over and over and over again. Oh, that's better than Rosella was calling you votes. Well, it's probably because I'm, you know, so fit.

That's it. You know, and it was... Oh, yeah, relatively the same size. Yeah, very good.

But I did. So many people were like, yeah, it's so nice to meet you, man. You're Greg, huh? You're Greg?

" You just go with it, Greg. You always just go with it. " He pretty much stayed in the same place the whole time. You know, he mingled with Jeff Matei.

He showed up in the background of Rosales' live feed several times, and yeah, he was sitting in the chair. Just doing his normal thing. Like, you know, unfortunately, you know, I got to hang out with a little bit of everybody, you know, and that was kind of the hard part. I can't even mention everybody's names, so, you know.

I literally made a list, because I knew I wouldn't remember half the people that I met, other than my boy, Ben Roland. That's my boy. We clicked it off. He's a good guy.

He's cool, man. Apparently, him and his wife have been to the shop numerous times. Oh, really? And they told me that they've never seen me here.

Must be nicer weekends, Ben, when you come, right? Nights and weekends. " I got a couple of those, too. I have to give Now we are the owner I promised that I was going to make one statement about one crazy bitch And there was one crazy bitch that was there She was out of control, I'm not going to say her name Her husband was very nice though And I'm just leaving it at that That's all I'm saying Can I guess?

I won't I was going to say that eventually we'll get her shirts Oh, she was sending me photos Of Tyler She was one of the people that sent me photos of Tyler She was infiltrated I made one comment Somebody went to send me a phone They're all coming in I'm like too many There's seven of them getting his hair done That whole thing became The thing to do at Weasel Fest People were snapping pictures of that poor guy I was having a ball It made me feel like I was part of the thing You were there In spirit Tyler was a good sport He was so horny on Instagram We're going to screw it up But it was Lake County Cigars or Lake Country Cigars. Lake County, Lake County, Lake County, I don't know, it doesn't matter, it doesn't matter. Yeah, but he's a good guy. He is, he's a good sport.

And yeah, he was, yeah, he's been a, he's been a whipping post for a little over a week now at the Aroma Craft Factory. Yeah, Chet said he skips Keanu. He skips Keanu, 100 percent. Everybody needs a Keanu.

Everybody needs one. You know, everybody needs one. Everybody needs something to, you know, to abuse. It was awesome, man.

It started straight from the time we, well, when I got to Mike's, it started. Waiting on. Mike's? Yeah, when I got to your house.

Oh, yeah. He wasn't ready. He wasn't ready. He wasn't ready?

Yeah. Well, he was. I was ready. We were waiting.

Oh. Somebody else was late every single time. Oh, wow. Every single time.

Go figure. No, you know, it's like you live and you learn. And I think that moving forward, what will just happen is, hey, you know, you can Uber to, well, I can't wait. I just can't wait.

I'm not trying to be disrespectful by any means necessary. It's here's the deadline. You know, here's where you got to be at specific times. If you can't, if you can't do it, it's cool.

It's fine. We'll meet you there. Yeah. Just meet you over there.

I was ready. Even if it's 15 minutes, you know, it makes a difference. Right. It all adds up really quickly.

You know, he's a, he's a cuddler at night too, isn't he? When you sleep? Yeah. He's a spooner.

Yeah. After I hammer him. Well, yeah, after the sex. Yeah, right.

But I mean, can I, can I tell you, I mean, so we, we land and of course, besides Austin, and tent city and all that hoopla the excitement of seeing that but we finally get to the hotel and i'm so excited i got this big fancy king bed that i get to lay in and everything and and uh you know the king plops his stuff down and he's like looking and he points over to this little cold hard couch oh you got the couch yeah i got the couch yeah got the couch you know i traveled with him and I got the couch. I knew you were going to sandbag me. The old guy gets the couch. Yep, same with me.

Same with me in Arizona. I was going to open up the bed and everything. He's like, "No, no. It takes up too much room.

" You'll be fine. Just on it. Did you get a pillow? I did get...

I think it was a pillow. I got a towel. I think it was blankets mushed into the pillow. Oh, you got blankets?

Yeah, no. Into the pillowcase. I got a towel for a blanket and then a washcloth and a hand towel to make a pillow out of. I fucking knew you were going to do this, too.

And I don't know why I said okay. How could you give up the bag? What are you thinking? Well, because I wanted to switch it to Two Queens.

And I'm like, no big deal, because for whatever reason, I couldn't switch it. Oh, when he said, you know, when he said King, I thought, ooh, they had a big room with Two Kings in it. No, because that's what I was going into, but it was that. And then the blanket had like a hole in it, so my big toe kept popping out through it.

Oh, fancy hotel, fancy hotel. So I just want, so let me, so stop right now before I, before I kill you both. So I want to go upgrade for two Queens and you know, right now the service industry, as far as hotels are concerned, they just don't give a fuck about you. It's COVID and we're at capacity, whatever the fuck that means.

Like get, get back to work already. Enough is enough. You know, this is Texas for God's sake. Nobody fucking cleaned our hotel.

Yeah. You know what? We had that problem in Tampa that we, we complained to the housekeeping. They go, Oh, with COVID, we only come at the end.

We only come at the end. We don't give you towels, we don't give you shit. We got towels. Adrian scooped up the dirty ones, walked across the hall, threw them in the laundry, and then took clean ones.

It's just so stupid. It's the fucking dumbest shit on the planet. The hotel industry needs to get their shit together, and like yesterday. " Like, doesn't care.

Just fucking, you know, fuck you. And I think we saw four people the entire time we were there. Yeah, he's like, oh, you know, there's a wedding, there's things. I'm like, okay.

So, we go upstairs, and I say, hey, listen, you can take the bed and I'll take the pull-out couch. No, no, no, no, no, no. Chet, absolutely not. I couldn't let that go, man.

I needed that. This plays off better for me if I sleep on the bed. I needed it. I would have slept on the floor if it took the story to go down.

Absolutely, I will not sleep on the bed. I have a bad back. That bed's too soft. It's gonna hurt me.

You're trying to hurt me. He's the same lines in Arizona. I mean, he laid it on thick, you're gonna hurt me more than you're trying to help me. Yeah.

And I'm like, son of a bitch. I'm like, okay. So then I'm like, next time, bathtub. I'm like, okay, well, let's set up your bed for you, you know, we'll set up the couch.

Oh, no. Oh, no, that's worse. No way, I'm not sleeping on that. You feel that bar and that mattress, it's like this thick?

He doesn't even talk that down. He talks up the couch. This couch is perfect. This couch.

This is a posturepedic couch, I believe. This is amazing. This couch is going to be great for my back. I am going to sleep like a fucking baby on this couch.

This is the shit that he's telling me. And then I wake up and the cushions are like separating, so my ass is like in between the cushion, the one's down. One slide down. Even the next night, the second night there, I say, listen, would you like the bed?

You can take the bed at this point, you know, if you, Well, you should take the bed. No, no, I told you I slept great on the couch. I did. I want to do the couch again.

The couch is where I need to be. The couch is the place. The couch was my spot. And I'm like, I think it was more, I'm the king, the king does not sleep on the couch.

No, I kind of did that. Okay. No way. Bullshit.

You flew me to Weasel Fest. I fucking take care of my people, motherfucker. Spoiled me like crazy. He did tell me that.

It was my honor to take the couch. That you took care of it. And in all honesty, it was comfortable. Come and check on him.

Are you okay? Are you okaying? The entire trip, man. Apparently, you beat three guys up to get them up to Scarface on the stage or something.

Yeah, that's the truth, man. Of Cressley Pursuit. Well, I was in line. I was kind of waiting for my moment.

Yeah, waiting on the right moment. Yeah, I waited, and there was kind of a hog. You know, he sat next to me, just going over life stories, and I'm like, "All right, man, come on. " And he did.

He just went right through them. " Oh, get out of here! I got out of here! Come on over!

It's like Mike Anderson said I have to meet somebody else, so please! Coolest guy I ever met, man. It's years of experience at the gym, and it's like, you know, you gotta, when you gotta get, when you gotta get that machine. Get the machine, right.

I'm sorry, how many resets do you have? I have eight. I'm like, alright, cool, sit down and stare at you. And you just wait.

And they're like, what? Are you done? Oh, you're not gonna go anywhere. No, I'm not.

I need that machine. So you either A, speed it up, or B, get the fuck out. Let's go. Messing up my reps, boy.

So we're going to meet this Scarface because Chet needs to get a video for Palmer. I needed it. And that is going to be that. I'm sorry, War Hero.

That was very nice, by the way. Thanks for your service, whatever. I don't know. I don't know.

I woke up my wife, I go, look, Scarface, you can say my name, watch it, watch it. I told my wife, I was like, I said, I'm getting ready to get in line to meet Scarface. She's like, who? I said, the Ghetto Boys.

Who? Do me a favor, go on YouTube and look up Ghetto. Come on. We're moving on now.

yeah ridiculous i get it it's fine but the event was yeah uh so this is the first thing back from his uh scarface's first like oh yeah so yeah no he's got a plug in his kidney he's got a problem with his heart he's got the whole the guy i mean code fucked this guy up man he really fucked that guy up man he really fucked that up man he really but he came through man he's going like man fuck that guy no no wrong one this is my producer he's you guys fuck that up man you guys fuck that up so so uh yeah so he's gotta be the coolest man in the world where's alice is i mean he just he's just walking around oh he's super chill yeah i mean the problem was i mean i could tell you that jerry and dion and mike williams like that crew were giving him a hard time about his white belt his white belt you gotta wear you gotta wear the white sandals with the white belt they said Like, you can't, it has to be uniform. Oh, well, those bougie Hawaiian Zeris don't come in white. Very angry about, I'm sure they do, very, the Alakai's, yes, they have them in white. Do they?

Mm-hmm. Very angry about this, you know, I'm like, well, where to slap your guy down. Right. I'm like, you know, I gotta be honest.

You know what, guys? I mean, you guys, fuck that up. You want me back next year? Fuck that up.

Just so you know. You're out of here. So, yeah, you know. Block their emails.

Jamie, block the emails for those three guys in front of my belt. I don't think that's gonna happen. They're pretty solid dudes, and they're hecklers, but they're, um, yeah, who gives a fuck? Like, I didn't put any thought into it.

They pointed out, though, man, that thing stuck out. It was crazy. If I wanted to find him, I'd just look for the white glowing belt. Search for the white belt.

There he goes. He's over there. There he is. Search for the white belt.

But he was kind, man. Him and Skip were like, they were just the kindest dudes ever. And, you know, you tried to set me up with the whole hug thing? Yeah.

So, you know, of course, I'm like, I'm not doing it. First time I meet him, he hugs me. Oh, I was like, boom! Uncle Skip, he's a lover.

He's such a good dude, man. They were so, they were, they were, they were amazing. The biggest problem, you gotta go to work. Did nobody said Skip's thing through the...

Intrinsic apathy? Yeah. I definitely said it to him a couple times, he didn't pick up on it though. I was like, you know, I really think this is more along the lines of intrinsic apathy.

Then he just kept going. Okay. That was two, two and a half years ago. Oh, well, he's, he, no, no, he's picked up on it on Facebook.

He has made some comments to me and stuff about it. Yeah, I gotcha. And then he broke down atrophy, or whatever the fuck it is, and it's like, yeah, aka intrinsic apathy. Yeah.

Very nice. So, yeah, no, he understands it, but. So, I'm gonna ask both of you, but what was your favorite part? Uh, man, the whole thing, just the, yeah, I guess the generosity of like the whole, like the whole Rosales family.

Right. Jamie is amazing, the kids are amazing, the stuff that they were doing-- Her daughter was just like her. Oh, there's no doubt who that kid is, absolutely, and she's the sweetest little girl ever. She really is.

Like, watching her, like, when you know somebody, like when she saw Mike, just ran to him, like, bear hug. I was like, that's it, man. Yeah, that's super cool. But the whole family, and you figure the time, the effort, the headache of putting this event on, And then Jamie still busting out regular home life.

- Oh, she's all class, man. - Like, nonstop. - She's the best. - That was, to me, that was kind of the most memorable thing.

- Super impressive. - The concert itself was just amazing. - Yeah. - Music, the sound, the cigars, the people, man.

I love meeting everybody. It was phenomenal. But there were times where I'd kind of walk by real quick and look at their name tag, the VIP thing, and then I'd walk past them on purpose. " Yeah, so that was my secret.

" I mean, I had an idea of who I wanted to meet, just from doing online orders and stuff, and those particular people, I made a note and I wanted to hunt them down. " Because I don't see their face, I just see the name or I talk to them on the phone. So, you know, that was my kind of way to kind of tag it together. Yeah.

So it was phenomenal. It went too fast, man. Yeah. It went way too fast.

It was like that, just over. It was amazing. And then it ended and you're like, man, you know, I could use another 48 hours of this. It could have easily been another day or two days.

Yeah. Right. I'd have been happy with it. Yeah.

Now, staying up till three, four o'clock, talking to Skip, nah, you know. It's, you know, it's awesome. By then I was beat. It was cool.

It was interesting to see the rookies, the rookies hang out with the group. Right, try to hang with Skip. You know, you're gonna roll with the big dogs, you can't be peeing like a puppy brother. You tried to warn me this, I'm like, hey, listen, you know, you ain't gonna sleep.

I was gonna say, so did you sleep at all? You're gonna get three or four hours. If you're up till four, back to the hotel, what, five in bed, back up at seven? I mean, I don't know what time you guys started.

But like, the hard part is the conversion. So the conversion is, Rosales calls it a night, like a two. Okay. Right?

'Cause he knows that he's gotta get up and roll through. Now, Skip doesn't necessarily have to roll through. Right. But you got to fucking, you want to hang out with both.

Right. So you hang out with Skip. Right. It took a wee hours.

And you hope that he surrenders when you're ready to go. And he did. 30 and he was like, okay. He finally started yawning.

You know, like, normally, like, but normally if you say, hey, all right, I'm going to go. He's like, what the fuck? Yeah. You know, like, I had that.

See, he is back now. Yeah, serious? But no, he was like, okay. Because it was the whole day of the concert and stuff.

Right. And then, you know, you get up and you try and get ready for breakfast and stuff like that. And then you, you know, you hang out with Rosales and stuff and kind of get things. So that's funny.

What time did breakfast start the next day? Yeah. Well, for us, it was like 11:00. Oh, okay.

So that's not too bad. No, I mean... Not like you're back at 5:00, up at 8:00. And I think brunch was like on Sunday, 12:00.

Yeah, so like by the time you get to bed, you're like, you're in bed by 6:00 and you're probably up by like 9:00, 9:30. I still woke up. I was up by 8:00, 8:30. Yeah, it's hard.

It's very hard to wake up later than that. You know, if that's what you're used to. And once I get going, man, once I'm going, that's why it's so hard when I leave here at night, I'm amped up, so when I go home, I'm already amped, so that's how I was at the, at the fest, I just wanted to keep going, and going, and going, and going. How were we doing on time?

I didn't get seven minutes, I didn't get to bed till two Friday night, or Saturday morning, whatever it was, it's probably half the reason I was tired. You know, I know that you asked what the favorite part was, and for me, there were, there's a lot of great, great things that happened, for sure, you know, it was awesome to really, You can't catch up with as many people as possible. Right, people you don't normally get to see. Yeah, and that is a big deal for me.

Right. Unfortunately, like, I had to keep moving. Right. So like, you sit and you talk your bullshit and like, all right, cool, man, hey, I gotta go walk around.

Yeah, I'm sorry, I have a great time, but I gotta go talk to somebody else. There are plenty of times where I checked in with Art and hung out with Art, but like, I can't. Right. I can't just sit with Art, you know, as much as I want to.

It's like, all right, dude, you know, but he's, you know, he handles himself very well. He mingles and gets along with everybody without question, you know. So, talking with everybody was a huge deal for me, and I was really appreciative and grateful that I got that opportunity. The other thing that was absolutely for me incredible was the fact that we had like this real kind of intimate concert with fucking Scarface.

I'm like, how fucking cool is this? There was no, like the one thing that I hate about concerts is the other people that are around me. You know, it's super tight, you're sweating, you're thirsty, like none of that shit was going on. And then, all of that shit was going on, it's like, I'm gonna go to the bathroom.

I go and walk in the HQ and I'm fucking gonna go to the bathroom. It's like, oh, you need something to drink? You go get something? Like, there was no, none of it was stress.

There was no stress. Gotcha. There was zero stress, which was amazing, especially when you add the aspect of a concert into the whole thing, you know? So, and then like, you start hanging out with people and then as the wee hours kind of progressed, the people start to kind of break down.

You start to have a smaller number of people. and then you get to kind of you've known some of these people for so long but when you have like a small group of five or six guys just kind of hanging out you know you don't want to that really opens up and hits you with some shit and drop some knowledge and like god damn i did not know that about you this is awesome so having that was absolutely incredible you know the end of the concert man when we all went into the hq yeah that's when it got that's when it started it was like and it was cool because you know i'm i can i can talk a you know a cat off a fish truck so it was kind of cool to you know at one point it was and greg was like you know are you okay i'm like okay bro i'm good i got my people you're here so it was like me ben vince hill who another oh my god i love that guy so it was like me him vince hill and a couple other guys so i can't think of the name at the moment but we were just talking about shop stuff like going over like Oh, Chris from Scaltywags. What about this customer? Oh, the customer that crushes the cigar.

Sam and Rosie from Fine Ash. Yeah. And it was just, we were just popping off, and everybody had their own little stories, and we were cracking up, and it was funny because we all kind of had the same issues. Right.

Brett Frye from Tobacology. Yeah, that was the one that I wasn't sure who he was. Okay. I drove him to get Whataburger and took him to his hotel.

Oh. Yeah, it was good. Sex was alright. Just okay.

You weren't spent after the two nights with him already? No, no, I was, you know, I knew what I was getting into. He was a beast, man. He had his power milk.

He was good. He was good. Muscle milk. You ready to go?

I don't need any of that stuff. I don't need any of that stuff. Ridiculous. It was awesome.

And Charlie Monado, man. You were right. Yeah. That dude is just a genius.

A plethora of knowledge. Oh my God. I'm sitting there listening to this guy and I'm looking at Greg, I was like, how is this guy, how does he know all this stuff? I don't know if that's running anywhere.

It may have turned off. We're at 27. So yeah. Well, here's a great thing.

Here's a little before we check that, whether it's a curtains curtain. Here's what's great about Charlie is when you sit down and you have like a one on one with them, it's fucking awesome. You know, like you really, you have an awesome conversation. You learn a lot.

You have a good back and forth. The problem is when he gets too comfortable with you, he just starts hammering you. I'm like, dude, it's, it's fucking been, it's been less than 24 hours and you're already, we're already at this point. I mean, what the fuck, Charlie?

I'm like, you know, give me a break. I will invent you. We're gonna cherish you in front of all these people, you know, so that happens, that definitely happens with Charlie, but man, yeah, I mean, he's, you know, that guy gets shit on so much in this industry, and he's so fucking smart, so fucking smart, so it's incredible, it's real, and I really always look forward to like the end of the evening when you get Charlie and Skip together, I'm like, this is- Oh yeah, 'cause he was slaying it eloquently to Skip too, man. 'Cause the debates continue, 'cause they both, they have their own opinions, and they have their own views, and they don't always line up.

And it's fucking highly intelligent. I feel like the poodle in Coming to America was like, he's not the king, he's the king. And the dog's like whipping back and forth, like whoosh, whoosh, whoosh. Like that's the fun part.

And then like every once in a while you can drop a bomb on them and throw it and they're like, well, what about this? What do you think about this? You know, I really... How's that going to work?

Tell me about the, what do you think really, how do you feel about the guys at the PCA? Boom, and just kind of back up. Like, here we go. You know, and it's amazing.

So I think somebody was pissed off at Elon Musk. Somebody said that, well, he doesn't have Sovereign Nation money. Oh yeah, they got into that. Then they got into the infused cigar thing.

Yeah. And that was awesome. Cause you have two very different opinions on that. And, you know, but they're still kind of the same, which is amazing.

You're like, it's, it's so unique. It's one goes left, one goes right, but they still ended up the same spot. Yeah. And none of it is like unintelligent.

Just, this is how I feel about it. You know what I mean? Like you don't get that shit, which is awesome. It's like, here's the data, here's the research, and here's why I think this, you know, it's not like, well, I just saw this fucking YouTube clip, and that guy had a lab coat on, so he must know what he's talking about.

Right, he must be a scientist. Right, so, you know, it was, like, that stuff is fucking amazing, for sure, hands out. I hope we do it on time. We're at 29 and a half, so it's probably off.

Hey, just one thing, if we're going to wrap this up, it's up to you. If you guys have more, we can keep going, but we do have the other gentlemen out there, too, so it's up to you guys. We can do a whole hour of this if we want. I mean, this would be easy to do.

Yeah, it would. And then he can go on another show, too. All right, well, let's take a break. We'll roll into it, and then we'll get him afterwards.

We'll keep going. Oh, sure. All right. We'll either be right back, or we've already been right back, one way or the other.

Hey, it's Mike, too. Want to be part of the show? com/cigarhustlerspodcast. We have tiers starting just $5 a month.

For $10 a month, you get a special show swag, and then you're eligible for the weekly secret show. Secret shows cover in-depth cigar reviews, behind-the-scenes information, and sometimes we just talk shit about people. Choose which tier works best with your budget and become an official show hustler. Thanks for the support.

All right, and we're back. Maybe episode 177. It is 177. Maybe the bonus episode of 177.

So, Jet made it back from the break. I made it through the break. Normally, the guests don't make it back from the break. So, welcome.

Welcome back. Thank you. Thank you for having me again. Should we?

You know, why? Oh, that's right. I was going to play the BDP game. You have no buttons correct today.

No, no. I'm just enjoying the story. I didn't have it. Just see the shit show.

We're going to play all these sounds, Jet, tonight. So, we're going to start on screen one. We'll just go ahead and tell you this now, we're given our 11 month notice, so in 11 months we're quitting, so that we can both go next year, and then if you want to take us back afterwards, that's fine. So Mike, I should start calling him Roe, because it's Roe, Mike, and then Palmer.

Yeah, it's too confusing, he goes by Michael. So the Roe, we were saying bye at the gun range, and he was like, I'm going to see you next year, and I was like, well, I don't know, you know, because I came this year in Palmer, and he goes, you know what, quit. Quit just before it. " So yeah, we're giving our notice.

" Trust me, I know. " Well, I think when they crawl back to his chat, we'll let them back in. Well, yeah, we'll at least contemplate their offers, even as they had to say, so one way or the other. When they're left with Keanu and New Steve, because Danielle would have already moved on by then because she's too good to just stay here the rest of her life.

Is this the episode where I witnessed the implosion of you and you just slaughtering Palmer with his new ashtray? I just stabbed his eye on my neck. So how do you think that diving board is going to look in your forehead? Well, the TSA lady, she was kind of wondering...

Oh yeah, what is this? Is there a metal object inside of your backpack? And I was like, yes. A solid piece of lead, possibly.

Well, what exactly is it? I'm like, it's an ashtray. And then all of a sudden, like the demeanor changed. Oh, it's an ashtray?

I gotta tell you though, MCO, Orlando, TSA, with the clear, like I'm a fucking surgeon now when it comes to traveling. We are, I am not messing around. And you know, normally it was just me and you, like we, we flow. Right.

We have no, but when you have four, it's like herding cats. Right? So, Chet's cool. He flows with me.

with me but when you had add more to that and i'm not bashing anybody else but you know but when you have more people things get a little more discouraging right people try and chime in and say well what about that i'm like just shut the fuck up like this i do this i do this is what i do right just you know this is where you just be a soldier and you just come along right so we go to mco clear and we're fucking studs right we sign them up we sign them up in less than three minutes or four minutes boom okay now you're officially clear you go come with us boom oh Oh yeah, they walk up and they go, excuse me. Oh yeah, there were people in line showing their passport and they were like, excuse us. Yeah, they hate clear people. It's like, we're express passers.

Oh yeah. And then there was no shoes off because, you know, they weren't messing. Clear, you don't have to take your shoes off. Well, you do if you're not TSA PreCheck, but we were good there.

They didn't care. No shoes off. You go through this one. Here you go.

Don't take your laptops out. We're burning through. All right, Mike's fucking sweet. So you're in and out through TSA in less than 10 minutes, right?

Except for who got popped. pop except for except for when they're you know instead of when you get interrogated for you know greg got popped for cigars which cigars in his bag cigars in my bag we were loaded greg is suspect stop that man he looks shifty so it's just looking sus right now stop that man so those are really tight to ask him more questions over there but at this point i know we're good like we got plenty of time everything's comfortable you know we even gave ourselves a little more kush because of covid we didn't know how it was going to be more of the weekend so we were we were in good shape coming back through austin it's a shit show you know we clear it we hit the clear button you cut the line but there's still shoes off everything out of your bag i'm gonna need to do the cavity search you know like the whole gamut of things and i'm just like listen you know what what the fuck are we doing here man like just move it along i know i guess it's because it's a smaller airport because they're not used to them i don't know well i don't know what it is but it definitely It definitely was more stressful, you know. At one point, I thought they swabbed my nose. I thought they were like, uh, uh, what is going on, man?

We were pimps at- COVID-check, we're COVID-checking you right here. At Orlando, like, right this way. Right. Austin, they're like, who the fuck are you guys?

Yeah. Can you call Orlando and ask them who we are? Yeah, like, MCO is way better. They take care of us.

You're right, though. It's a bigger airport. They're used to people. They're used to the tourists, the tourist weekends and all that stuff.

But, you know. Yeah, Austin's like, there's seven people in line. Call extra help. Call somebody else.

Now, when we get to our car rental, you know, like normally you have, as through National, you have the one row to pick from. Right, yeah. But you know, because they were low on cars, they're like, you can take whatever you want. Oh, right?

I was like, whatever I want. Whatever. And I was like, even over there. Sorry, Greg, we gotta go over there, we're out of here.

So there's a premiere section. I'm like, even over there? And she goes, yeah, even over there. Yes, even over there.

So, we grabbed, like, there. like there. We grabbed a pretty gangster Lincoln, like a mid-sized SUV. Brand new Lincoln Nautilus.

It was a Nautilus, man. It was nice. We were looking at the F-150. We wanted to blend in with the Dixons.

Didn't have bullhorns, so couldn't take it. Darn it. I was like, what if it was a Raptor? I would have taken it.

I did learn how to douche a vehicle. Oh, yeah. That was my first experience. If you ever rent a vehicle They're pulling you out, and you're a partake.

The baby wipes. You gotta do the baby wipes. The douching of the vehicles, man. There is no evidence of cigar smoke in that thing.

None. Nobody knows. Nope. Nobody knows.

Nobody knows. Nobody knows. I don't know what we're talking about. Nobody's gonna know.

I didn't say where I learned it from. I'm just saying I learned it. I just want to know that we all, so we all cleaned together, you know, and Chet did a great job. And I looked at my brother and said, if you kill somebody, they're gonna find you.

You're gonna have, there's gonna be evidence left over. This is not how it's done. It's not the way you do this. Step out of the vehicle, please.

Let me make sure that this is okay. You know. Alex was on point, too. But Alex did great.

Alex did a great job cleaning. I was for sure. She can kill him. Totally.

I don't know where he is. So our three sides were like spotless. And then there's Greg. Like, get out of your seat.

We got it, though. Get out of your seat. Did he not even get out to clean? He just cleaned it around himself.

I don't want to get out. Turn the air up, please. That's good. But yes, it is.

It's interesting. Yeah. That's interesting. Yeah.

That's interesting. And then the whole, the whole, so I know we've kind of been all over the place, but when we landed, me and Craig were tweaking. We needed a cigar, and we need a liqueur. Oh.

And this guy, he's just driving and driving and driving. Oh, you landed out there. Oh, yeah, out in Austin. Right.

And he just kept passing store after store. We're like, there's a gas station right there, we can get a lighter. Oh, yeah, you had no way to light them, that's right. No lighters, no cutters.

No cutters. Nobody tried to shove something into the power board on the car? No. You guys can't.

Because this man has a plan. That's it. And his plans get to point B. I'm not fucking around.

You know? You know, what's really kind of funny is the roles flip. Like, if I roll with Rosales, it's the other way around. I'm the soldier.

Where are we going? Boom. Okay. But like, also, things that the co-pilot needs to learn.

When it comes to cigar, I shouldn't be touching my shit. I've taught him that when we travel. I shouldn't be touching my shit. Co-pilot lights a cigar.

You fucking set my shit up so we keep rolling. I always lit your cigar when you drive, you didn't remember? I'm not monkey-fucking anything on the way through. Yeah, he's like, what are you doing?

I'm lighting your cigar, this is what I do, I'm not driving. Right? That's the team thing, right? Yeah, but with COVID, you know, I didn't want to touch it and all that.

No, I failed. You're kidding me, it's practically the same spoon here inside this building, so. It's okay. It's all COVID in this building?

These are things that we learned. You know what, 2022, Weasel, I'll be on point. It's okay, it's cool. Me and Palmer will be on point.

It's like, you know, and the other thing. He will have his arm around you holding it, I'll be on this side lighting it. Perfect. Cutting it in line, there'll be forehand in front of you.

You take a puff, he pulls it off, ashes it, puts it back in. Excellent. Now we're talking, that's the way to go. Team, team, team.

The other major thing, too, is like, if you get coffee, you get two coffees. You know, like, don't fuck around. Did you not get that? That never happened.

I don't drink coffee. Well, if you get a whiskey, you get two whiskeys. I offered, I don't really drink, I offered, but he's on point. I thought you were going to tie one on, you didn't drink at all?

No. Oh. He was on point, man. I don't like to drink at those places.

Right, but you had said that you might, though. I was probably just full of shit. Oh. So you told me, I never had any intention.

I asked you if you wanted to drink, and you said, no, you'd like to be... I like to be sharp. You know, you want to be a hundred percent, so I kind of actually took that. So I just kind of slowed down sipping, 'cause I didn't want to be, you know, blissfully drunk.

I'm taking your shirt off, swinging it around. Is that you, Skippy? Yeah, yeah, up on stage, like... This is Scarface, baby!

Scarface! " You know, like, the reality is that I'm really blunt to the point already. You know what I mean? Right, yeah.

Having you drunk is not... Let's enhance that. I guarantee you I have no friends. No one will talk to me.

I'll be like, this fucking guy. You'll be sitting there by yourself. You'll be sitting there by yourself drinking. I'm not drinking.

Mikey Angry. Fuck you, come on. Mikey Angry. Let me tell you where you're fucking at.

Here's the fucking thing. Let me tell you. Skip, I don't have enough goddamn cigars. Let me break this down for you real quick.

I said 25,000. They'd be like, somebody get him away. I mean, 50. Put him down.

Put him away. So, no, it's... " Exactly. You'll never sell another cigar.

You'll never sell another cigar. Yeah, exactly. I mean, you guys fucked that up. You fucked that up.

You fucked that up. We're gonna have shirts for next year. Man, you really fucked that up. That was awesome.

Absolutely. I gave the old Garrison whiskey booth a run for their money, though. I was like, old-fashioned. Old-fashioned.

You want another old-fashioned? There was one point where I got up from the tents along the one wall just to go to the bathroom. And I passed them and the lady literally saw me, started mixing and drinking. I was like, no, no, no.

I'm going to the bathroom. She's like, oh, I have it ready for you when you come back. I'll be back. I was like, all right.

I got, I went to Style & Switch to get, to eat, right? Because they had Style & Switch there, barbecue. And I'm like, I'll take brisket. And they're like, do you want anything else?

I said, no, I'll just take brisket. He's like, okay, I'll get you a small plate of some brisket. I said, how about you get a bigger plate and put on some more brisket? And he's like, okay.

So then he gets, he goes, VIP. And he makes the plate and he's like, how's that? And I go, I could really use that. I could go for some more brisket on that plate if you want to give me some more.

I could use a cow. Save me another trip if you put a little more on there. Just bulk all that up, and I'll devour the whole thing. " I don't need a fork, no fork.

Yeah, that's fine, I'll just... This is delicious. I got the everything plate, but I did tell them to hold the bread. Way too many carbs.

Way too many carbs. As we hit McDonald's on the way back. Okay. I'll take 40 nuggets, five burgers.

I mean, what do you guys want? Literally. So I'm judging him like a mofo. I think I know what you're doing.

He's like, what are you doing? I'm like, I'm fucking, this is it. This is the cheat day, baby. We ain't fucking wrong.

Oh, it's Sunday. We're going for it. I'm judging him. He looks at me, he goes, the McChicken is for Brit.

Yeah, the one, the one $1 meal thing. The one $1 thing. On the way home from the airport. What about those 40 nuggets?

It was 20 nuggets and somebody stole 10. I lost 10. I was really upset. Yeah.

I just got two little cheeseburgers. That's all I needed. And a big old cola. I needed sugar.

After two days of solid smoking, man. I needed the sugar. You got to feed the beast. The body needs nourishment.

You got to check out every once in a while and say, "Hey, here you go. " I felt bad because I don't eat breakfast. I'm not a big breakfast guy. And here, the Rosales family is just laying out these spreads, which I did learn that when Ro asks you to do something, do it.

Do it quickly and correctly, because he knows how to put out orders. Yeah, you got to move the tables. Yeah, he runs the show, man, for sure. So I was slicing up a quiche and nuking it.

There you go. He explained it tip for tip on how to handle it, so I couldn't fuck it up. I mean, you can't fuck that up. Man, I couldn't have fucked that up.

So, but yeah, you know, it was a big spread, but I just don't need it. So if I could give a piece of advice to anybody that's looking to go to Weezer, weasel fest next year i would honestly say spend the extra couple bucks and get the fucking vip without question absolutely it is a way i feel like it's a huge difference of an experience right you have better seating for the concerts you have access to hq you have more booze if you want to get more booze unlimited you have more food if you want to get more food the whole thing is like no all holds barred on whatever no holds barred no questions asked but that's fucking awesome so i would tell you to get the vip also you know um shout out to fucking frenchy john d oliver he was fucking he was amazing you know um i can't give that guy enough credit for all the shit that he does he works super hard in the office you know he handles my sales orders which i have always been reluctant to give up working with solely rosales you know especially with my past experiences but that other guy but john has always gone out of his way and made sure that you know quite the It's a long voyage of an experience. This shit is done to a T. So, definitely shout out to Frenchy.

And Sean, man. Meeting him. I know I'm saying I've met all these people, but meeting Sean was like... Like meeting Elvis.

Dude, it was just the coolest cat I've ever met. You know, what's really truly remarkable is the success of the company, and this is with any company, it really is a validation of the whole team. Yeah. You know, and that echoes here, right, without question.

See, he'll take his back. Because, no, once you cross that line, once you cross that picket line, like that makes a big difference, you know. And that's on the couch in the hotel. Like I could tell you right now that I haven't seen Roma Crafts hum the way that they're humming right now.

Yeah, it seems like that from the outside in. The team is the most efficient that they've ever been, you know. And I'm not bad-mouthing anybody from the past. I'm just saying that as of right now, all parts are perfect, you know, As far as where they need to be, and how they're operating, everybody gets their role, and they all put in the work, you know.

Yeah. So, and we have a lot of that here. We really do. We have a lot of that here with the parts that are in this establishment, so.

On a little smaller scale, but for the most part, we're there, man. It's the same thing when it comes to team and efficiency. Like, we all execute. You know, you guys all do what needs to be done, and like, there isn't, there's seldom bullshit.

You know, it's like, hey, okay, we get it. We're all on the same page, for the most part. You know, I'm really grateful for that, to be honest, you know, except for maybe Keanu. Just Keanu.

He's alright. He's okay. He's better than his predecessor. He's a good dude.

He's gonna develop a drinking problem now that he's 21. Yeah. He's a fucking shit face all the time. I'm not coming in.

I called him Saturday. His birthday was Sunday. So when I got out of here, it was late because the one guy was here. But anyway, I called him at 12:30.

Wish him happy birthday. And he goes, "I said two angry orchards. " I'm like, oh, good, good. I think I just depressed myself.

Such a heavy drinker. Yeah. So. We were gonna take him out for his birthday, too, but I don't think that'll last that long.

Yeah, well, it'll be a short trip. I think 30 minutes with us, he'll be out. I think you grab him for happy hour and you drop him off at 2:30. And then you guys go out.

And then we go do our thing. Right. Yeah. We gotta take him and let Jimmy take him out.

Yeah, yeah. Jimmy and Terramar. Yeah. A little Celery City action in downtown Sanford.

I like it. Oh, yeah. All right, so we'll wrap this up and then we'll get Eric in here from Black Star Line Cigars. And he's got like 15 minutes to talk and then, okay, thank you, thank you very much.

We'll get him for a good 30. Yeah, yeah. And we'll go from there. All right, man.

Thank you. Chet, thank you. Honestly, I know I thanked you when we got back to your house, but seriously, I can't thank you guys enough. It was epic.

Well, hey, you know, I mean, thanks for sleeping on the couch, Chet. But before you hear the other show, he's going to PCA, and I'm going, you don't get to go. Yeah, that's okay. I'm good with that.

Just letting you know. I'm good with that. Letting you know. That's fine.

But we're in generosity, only goes so far. Weasel Fest would be our thing. I'm sure Weasel Fest was probably bigger than PCA. That'll be our thing.

PCA will be a quick tour. We're only there for two days. Oh, that's a better, it's an easier sell at home. Yeah.

So. But I can tell you, if you were at Weasel Fest, we, we could have did some damage. Me and you together. That's a lot of people asked for you.

Me and you together. We quit in 11 months. Listen, you know how many people brought up Palmer? Palmer.

Palmer. The podcast. The podcast. BDP.

I heard BDP so many times. The owner of Cigar Hustler. I mean, people were asking for it. It really is kind of remarkable how many people know about us from the podcast.

The podcast. Yeah. It's insane. You guys are a big deal, man.

Yeah. Well, you said Skip wanted some middle-aged man knowledge. Yeah, well, I wasn't going to bring it up. It's only four episodes.

That was literally the first thing he said to me. to me. He goes, so you think you could discuss with me middle-aged men in small business? I was like, I think you got it under control, Skip.

And he started rolling. He was like, it's funny. And he turned around and walked away. I was like, he likes us.

He likes us. He's probably happy to have a new podcast. That consumes a lot of data, man. Well, you're not sleeping.

You gotta have something to do in the middle of the night. You blast through it. It's all intrinsic apathy is what it is. Exactly.

I can't even spell that. You guys fucked that up. Man, you fucked that up, you hit the wrong button. No, that was the moment I looked at it.

Yeah, I was going for it. Bam, you gotta go to work. Bam, you gotta go to work. A Cigar Hustlers podcast, its owners, and its sponsors take no responsibility for the opinions or statements made by the talk show host or their guest.

Statements or show topics are not necessarily the beliefs of Mike and Mike Productions or the podcast providers, and opinions between talk show hosts may differ. It is not our intention to libel, incite, or hurt anyone's feelings. We invite you to write the show's host, Mike Szczepankiewicz, with any feedback or suggestions that you have for their shows. These broadcasts are presented and made public as entertainment in the hope that they will be entertaining to the audience.

And we're back. Welcome to episode, back from episode 176 of A Cigar Hustler Podcast. Joining us today He's the legend himself, I was wanting you to say his name. Am I going to say it?

I was trying to bring you in. That was your cue. We worked this out, Michael. Coop!

Oh, wow. What's going on, brother? Sorry. Sorry about that intro, Coop.

I know. I'm terrible. I'm a horrible person. Mike and Mike.

What a pleasure. Finally be back here. Yes. Three more, you get a jacket like Taranio.

Exactly. Exactly. I know. But it's been two years.

I mean, that's the thing. So, let's see. Every two years it comes on. So, another 18 years it gets a jacket.

They'll be fine. Exactly. I mean, I thought I'd be down here a lot more regularly, and obviously pandemic had a lot of... Oh, yeah, that's right.

The whole pandemic. Pre-pandemic. Yeah. So I got a funny story to tell you before we kind of get into things.

All right. Palmer almost killed you. Oh, I was going to tell the story. Because of me.

I was going to apologize and tell the story. Because of me, you almost died. Not much. More metaphorically than...

You know, this is... Our video looks kind of like... It looks like Evil Batman-esque. It's got kind of an angle on this one.

Yes, that's what I told you. That's okay. All right. Michael told me you were coming on last week.

Yes. I thought you were coming in. " Right. And I didn't pay attention to the edge of that email that actually had the date in numbers.

Right. June 1st. So I'm like, so I'm rallying the troops. I'm like, "Hey, listen, Coop's coming in.

" Last Tuesday, we're getting all set up. We're all ready. Right. We're gonna have him come in.

" He's supposed to be here in 10 minutes. I'll be here in 10 minutes. No, no, he's at Abe's there, sitting uncomfy, sitting there talking. Yeah, so he was like, oh, he blew us off.

He blew us off. And then one of them asked you where you were going. You said, I don't know, some shop I don't know the name of, and then maybe go by and see Jeff. They're like, that son of a bitch.

He wouldn't even say her name. This is fucking war. I'm Switzerland here, buddy. No, I mean, I did say, I thought I said the name.

You did. It's totally not on you. It was 100% on me. I mean, I wouldn't risk the ridicule I would get from any of you guys on this.

Oh, the not ready for primetime hustler players had a whole skit we were doing for this week's show. Oh, there was. It was a beautiful skit. Yeah, it was beautiful.

I was just talking to Hector. " I said, "I'm just wrapping up a call, Hector. " You don't want to die. So, the Tuesday after, he texted me and circled the date.

I think it was he meant next Tuesday. Yeah. Oh, my. " Yeah, I was still in the South Florida part of that trip.

But you're going around, you're making your way around the state at this point. You're almost like a sales rep, which is incredible. No, actually, I extended the trip so I can come in to see you guys, because I knew you guys were at Weasel Fest. In the safe play, apparently so.

So we'll leave in the mock, tomorrow's the last day, and I head back tomorrow, yep. No kidding. I mean, at this point, I've seen you more than I've seen Alfredo. And he said he's still our rep, the new guy, he doesn't come before.

No, I mean, I felt bad, I mentioned, hey, it can come in Friday, he said, I'm at Weasel Fest, I'm like, and why I'm not at Weasel Fest, why it wasn't, was because of his trip. Right, that's understandable, you know, that was, I think that was the hard part about Weasel Fest, is that it was kind of like, all right, you know, because you don't know when you're a go, and then you sit, they greenlit it, and you're finally, okay, let's do this. I mean, legit, the fire department, I believe, showed up that morning to clear the permit so that the event could go on. Oh, wow.

Yeah. So it was really to the wire. So, you know, and when you have to operate that way because of COVID, you didn't get enough time to prepare. Exactly.

I think a lot of people that really wanted to go didn't get an opportunity to go, but it was fantastic. Everything I've heard, I was just talking to Chet about it beforehand. Yeah. It was absolutely phenomenal.

Now, I know that you did some light coverage on TPE. Right. And you said that it looked like things were okay. I mean, you know, I don't know.

You didn't go though, did you? I did not go. Okay. I did not go.

I just, you know what, I feel like I fucked up by not going because I don't, you know... I asked you 12 times. I don't have a real answer as to how it really went, you know? You know, there's some people that will tell you it went great.

Yeah. But there's other people who have told me quietly, eh, it really wasn't the sales levels that we thought we were gonna get. Right, right. But there were some companies that said, hey, we did really, really well.

Right. I mean, and I believe the companies that told me that, so... Okay. I think it was a mixed bag on it overall.

Right. Was it more like CBD, marijuana stuff? Was that still the vast majority? Or, you know, did you see more cigar?

Do you think that more cigar companies popped up this time around? That's hard to tell, obviously, because I wasn't there. But it seemed like it was slightly bigger on the premium cigar end. Right.

Because Drew Estate had a big booth before. Right. And then they didn't go this year at all. Right.

Yeah. But then there were some companies in the pavilion that upgraded to full-size booths. Right. So, you know, that was another thing.

There's probably some type of incentive, I would imagine, because they don't want those big spaces sitting empty. Right. Right. And then, you know, Altidus had a bigger booth this year as well.

Socker increased the size of his booths, from what I heard. Right. So, I mean, there were some booth sizes that got bigger. Are they going to put a cap on booth sizes?

Because I heard that wasn't possibly a thing. That I haven't heard. I just don't see like, I don't know, it just doesn't seem, I don't know, as advantageous, right? Like, you get some of these big guys, it'd be nice to kind of level the playing field and make them only get to a specific size and then that's it, you know, I mean, fuck, the Drew Estate Lounge, you could have put a bowling alley in a TPE, you know?

So, you know, it'd be cool if they were, I just, they just, it just seemed overkill, you know? Um, what, so, all right, so we didn't, you didn't go to TPE. Obviously, you know, So you have been hunkered down, you have been in the bunker for a year and a half, like real talk, really, you know, with a long beard and long, long hair. Now, did you get vaccinated or no?

I'm vaccinated. Okay. What did you get? Johnson, Johnson, Pfizer?

Uh, Pfizer. Pfizer. Did it knock you down? That second shot?

Same thing. Yeah, my second shot was rough, but then it kind of, you know, it kind of cleared itself up. But the funny thing is, I thought I was getting like the blood infection, like I had, I was feeling all those same symptoms, and then when I called the doctor, the doctor says, you can't get a blood infection from this, you're just feeling sick, just chill out, and then 24 hours later, I was fine. I'm pretty sure I've got a doctor, I'm pretty sick.

Call the attorney. Yeah, exactly. Get it all wrapped up. Okay, so that's good.

Are you going to go to the PCA? That's what I was leading into. You're definitely covering that. Definitely at PCA, we're going to be expanding the team.

Aaron Nielsen's going to be on the ground with us this year as well. Yeah, he's a good dude. So, yeah, we have... I've still been in communication with him.

Oh, yeah. You know? He's the guy... His dad was Cheap Trick or something like that?

Yep. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, okay. But, like, that's obviously not that important. I mean, the fact of the matter is the guy knows a ton about the cigar industry.

Right. That's why I'm bringing him. Like, if he wasn't like that, you know, I met him because of the connection, obviously, to his dad. Right.

But I saw something that, hey, he could really cover the show like we need to cover it at Coop, so... Right, it'd be a different perspective. Yeah, so... Right.

We're going to allow Bear, who's going to be covering it for Coop, he's going to focus more on video this year, and Aaron can kind of help me out with the fat gathering and the stuff we need to do with the boost, so. It's like you're building a team, bro. We're building it slowly. We've got Dave Burke in Australia, but he couldn't come.

Yeah, Dave's, that's right. You know, we've got to get him to a PCA. I offered. I said, if you want to come to PCA, I'll get you at the PCA.

I'll finance the ticket, I told him. It's a little bit, he couldn't get out this year anyway, but I know he's also got some stuff going on. on he's going for his phd and stuff like that so he's that's kind of a big deal yeah yeah dr burke dr burke dr burke yeah all right so kind of coverage on tbe i mean we can talk weasel fest i just don't want to spill the whole beans just yet right because we uh we haven't we had a chance to discuss it um and then you're gonna definitely do pca with with like a full full team yeah you know are you gonna so you're gonna cover the all four days or all four days i'm thinking i'm gonna You gotta go just kind of in and out two days and be done. Well, I'm hearing that from a lot of retailers who are going to go there because what I hear, and you could probably tell me better, is after day two, your budget's kind of shot.

I mean, not necessarily. It depends. You know, it depends upon how you, what you kind of structure out. To be honest, I haven't gone as a retailer in five years.

You know, I've gone as a wholesaler and then I've made a couple of orders on there. There, do you need a light? You all right? I got one in here.

Okay. So this is the first time that we're not really showcasing, not really displaying. And I'm like, okay, well, if we're doing that, then I can get in and out. I know that I got to play some order with Fuente.

I know there's specific companies that you want to cover by purchasing at PCA to get specific stuff, right? Yep. So, I think we're going to do it. Well, you could use a lot.

Don't forget, you have media. You're media as well. Oh, we are media. That is true.

You have an invite to the Cigar Media Compound. Yes? Yes. It's official.

It's official. We have the house booked and everything. What day is that? Every day.

I'll let you know specifically what nights we're not going to be there, but I think... So that's the night we want to go. Yeah. But we upgraded the compound this year.

Really? Yeah, we upgraded the compound. Okay. Loomis really kind of came through with a really good house.

Really? Yeah. Okay. All right, so you want to go, Mike?

Yes, I'm in. I mean, I passed on Weasel, so I figured I'll go to that one. I did pass on Weasel. Yeah, Chad does not get to go to PCA.

I'm sorry. I'm very sorry, Chad. I hope you enjoy Weasel. Look, I missed Weasel Fest too.

I was really bummed. It was this vacation weekend, but... It was pretty epic, dude. I have never seen anything like it.

Never seen anything like that in the industry. It was incredible. I mean, it was the most amazing thing I've ever seen. I don't mean to...

I don't want to play it down. Oh, yeah. But it was absolutely... No one underplay the whole thing, no.

Save it for the other show. We haven't had a chance to do it on the radio show. Yeah, we're shooting this out of order. We're doing this backwards.

So, we had to get Coop when he's available. Very busy man. Yes. I appreciate it.

Very busy man. So, is there anything at PCA that you're excited about? Any more sagas or something? You know, I think the story of PCA is obviously going to be the show itself this year, because it's...

Everyone's looking at PCA. Word is it's going to be a smaller show footprint this year. Right. It's coming back after a year lost.

Big Four not there. The mess at Cigar Con two years ago. So I think everyone's really looking at PCA. Can this show perform?

They're going to get a little bit of a pass, I think, because of COVID. Right. Expectations will be a little bit lower. Yeah.

So as long as they're 80 percent of what they probably should be doing, everybody, you know, it's a thing. I mean, release-wise, the big question is, is Fuente and Padrón going to show anything off what they're doing with that collaboration? It's sounding like no. But in fairness, they never committed to doing anything at the trade show either.

They announced it, and I think everyone, all of us just assumed it was going to be the trade show. Right. And they didn't. So that's, I think, but that's going to be the highlight, I think, if they show something or if they're together at the trade show.

Yeah, I mean, I guess so. I can't, I don't really think of anything that's really kind of popped for me that I'm like, I got to see this. Yeah, it's down to, what, 30 days now. So the announcements should be out, you know, I think that you missed a whole year of production for the most part for getting something new and innovative or whatever the case may be.

Or everybody worked on something that nobody ever heard about because, you know, what tobacco we got left? Throw that together, see how it turns out. What happened at TPE was the companies were going to both. They held back their releases for PCA.

They didn't want to sacrifice what they were doing at PCA, so they kind of want to support the PCA. So they're doing that. And then there's a lot of companies that are having back orders too, so it didn't do any good to show it early. So, you know, I know there's companies who are at TPE that are going to PCA that have stuff coming out.

Right. Any of them excite you? Nothing yet. I mean, the PCA exclusives have not excited me yet.

I mean, there's nothing wrong with a line extension, but as a PCA exclusive, I'm kind of expecting something more. Right. And that's what it seems like it is so far. Like the TAA stuff.

stuff right right so that part i do notice some companies that do have some special lines coming out right um but they probably made deals with scar aficionado to give it to them first bullshit that's not you oh that's bullshit that stuff kills us right now i mean yeah it kills us because like if they give it to us the same day it's okay but after that if they just don't even we can't get the information that's when it's a problem right yeah yeah that sounds uh So I'm using the card, hey, what about supporting the industry and stuff? Like, come on. Right. I'm curious what companies those are, but I don't want to put Coop completely on blast.

No, go ahead. Nobody listens. You can figure it out. I'm sure I could.

If you see it in Cigar Ficionado and it's not on a half-wheel Coop, then you know what it is. I didn't even realize that existed because I never look at Cigar Ficionado. Right, exactly. Now look, there's some companies like Puente and Padron.

they were so used to dealing with cigar fish now and sending faxes you're not going to change they're still sending faxes that's how it's going to be that's how it's going to be now but if I call Carlito and ask him a question he will respond on it he'll elaborate on it to as much as he will elaborate he likes keeping it over a mystery so that's okay I'm okay with that too I don't know if I'm going to say anything about blends moving forward like what's in it I don't fucking know No, just leave me alone. Oh, yeah. That seems to be the thing. Nobody's saying what to do.

Undisclosed. Yeah. It's an undisclosed wrapper filler binder. Magic blend.

Yeah. Yes. It blows up in the middle. Yep.

Exactly. You know. I mean, it's, um, but like, like I smoked a cigar this weekend, or actually yesterday. I was holding out for it.

And, um, the wrapper is supposedly something that I've never had in an, in an external wrapper. So I was curious to how it would taste and if it actually was possible. So, I don't know if it is or not. I'm still curious.

Is it one of Rosales' special blends that he... No, it was a friend. It was from... I don't want to give out too much information.

It's undisclosed information. Oh, undisclosed. It was from a good dude at Weaselfest. It was from a good dude at Weaselfest.

I mean, I heard there were some company owners out there, too. Other company owners were out there. I know Ace Prime was out there. Were they?

I don't know. Luciano was out there, because I talked to him. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Luciano was definitely out there.

We talked to him from there, that's why. He was, he hung out inside HQ a lot where it was cool. Yeah. Air conditioning.

Yeah. Right. He was definitely there a ton. Yeah.

But I don't think there was anybody else really, you know, I mean, as far as there were other retailers, there were consumers, you know, and trying to talk to everybody is definitely difficult. Oh, sure. I tried. I tried.

I tried. That number of people. Yeah. Maybe the best round I could possible, you know.

I ran into Mitch, he was, he was, I didn't know who he was. I didn't know who he was at first. I'm like, man, I know his face, but he had a Cigar Hustler decal on his travel humidor. Right.

So I just gave him a War Bear. I said, here you go. Like, he had a table full of people. I was like, nice sticker.

Boom. And I walked away. Chet said if he saw one, he would go on Facebook and go, okay. Okay.

And then he walked back over and go, hey, aren't you? Yeah. It's hard to figure that out sometimes. It's like, hey, you know, I'm used to seeing you in this round circle.

Right, yeah. And you look a lot taller than I thought. Right. Or you're a lot shorter than I thought you were.

How old is that photo? I feel like that happens a lot with me. " You know? No, no, I doubt anybody says bigger when they see you in person.

I thought you were taller. That could be me. Yeah. I thought you were taller.

Because somebody said that this weekend. I forget who it was. " Can't believe I was that big? Yeah, yes, yes.

I mean, they had heard you had been working out and everything, but they couldn't believe you were that big. I wasn't that massive. It's the cereal. It's all the cereal.

It's all the cereal. I heard about the cereal thing. I was listening to the bear show. Yeah.

Yeah. Cereal's fantastic. I almost died on the bear show. I heard.

That's why it was only two hours. Yeah. Normally bear shows is three, three and a half hours. I'm like, ooh, you've never met it.

I want to tell you right now at the two hour mark. Take a poop break bear. I was like, I would have had to tell him like, hey, listen, I'll be right. You give me a solid five minutes.

I will purge and I will be right back. Or you just take the phone on their way there. I go, what happened? This is only two hours.

I listened to it coming up from Miami and I'm like, it's over. " That was it. We like to leave you wanting more, so I planned the stomach bug. Yeah.

It was very interesting. Oh, you know my son's got it. Does he? Yeah.

Dude, it's making its rounds, man. Yeah. He called me yesterday. He was sent home from work today.

Really? I mean, it slowed me down for a whole week. Oh, I told him he's only got the day. Yeah.

You gotta get back to work. You need the money. Yeah, exactly. All right.

It's not, it's no, it's no bueno. No, because with the garage doors, he's up on high ladders and stuff. " Imagine you've got to shit up there. Right.

Oh my God. That's what we were saying last night, because they're at other people's houses. " What if there are people under you on the left? He said, "Emodium.

" Emodium helps. I'll take like seven. I don't think it's a cure-all. And eat cheese.

Just back yourself up. Lots of cheese. Kaopectic. But, you know, I've got to give bare credit, because I really thought that that was a really good interview.

You know what I mean? He did. He did a good job. He does.

Like, to see, you know, even, like, I think the last time I was on was, what, maybe two years ago? And, um, and he, that was a good interview. I felt that we had, you know, it was a good, the way that he handles himself. But I feel like he's made a lot of progress within that period of time.

I mean, yeah, he's, definitely. And, um, you know, he's, he's very well prepared. That's the one thing you'll know about him. He knows his shit.

Oh my God. Yeah. He's, um, I mean, I work with him on the Tuesday show, obviously. And, um, you know, like his preparation is second to none.

right i mean he's telling me about where i went to call i was like did i yeah i guess yeah i did go there yeah he'll pull up these facts you know and you don't even remember what the facts right yeah it's crazy yeah that's the other thing about the podcast and stuff too is you know when you go out and you meet a bunch of people they start fucking quoting you on some shit that you said i'm like yeah i did i i did yeah you're sure we were doing ftg down at caribbean actually when you guys were on oh yeah so yeah who was who was the crew uh it was the drew state guys okay Joe and on, Hector. Of course. Terrence came out. Terrence came out.

Ooh. Terrence was out that night, too. Rare FTG sighting. Yeah.

He was giving me. Except he says, heck, that guy. He was going up to Charlotte. He was going up to my neck of the woods when I was down here.

So he's giving me crap. I'm like, come meet me at Caribbean. I'm going to be there. And he did.

Very nice. I said, so before you go, yeah. But no Jack Taranio? Jack came out Monday night.

I think Jack had some. He was up in Washington. We did the video for me. He was up in Washington State.

Yeah. Right. Yeah. But Jack came out Monday night.

I ran into Alan at Weasel Fest, too. He sent me a nice little message. Alan did. Alan of the Caribbean?

Yeah. Oh, no, it wasn't Alan, so it was Vince. Vince Hilde. Oh, Vince Hildebrandt.

Yeah. Now, Sons Cigars. Sons Cigars? Yes.

That's good stuff. What do we have for time? I don't know. We're at 19 minutes.

We have plenty of time. Yeah. So is there anything else you want to cover? What else you got?

What else you got? Me? Nothing. You said you had the show wrapped up this week.

You wanted to kill Coop. Well, that didn't happen. We could do the play if you want. I still have that on my phone.

Coop, you want to show the play? I think the play is pretty funny. You want to? You can talk about it.

Or we could just give you the clip notes. Right, yeah. So it was going to be this whole skit where he... You called in to apologize for missing the show, but then we had strip club music behind you.

And then the young lady that works here was going to come up and go, Coopy, you want another dance? And then we had Boot, our construction guy who built the deck out for it. He was going to be the bouncer and throw you out for touching the dancers. No, I didn't even...

We told you, Mr. Coop. By the way, this is the first I'm knowing that there was almost a mix of the date. Well, I made a couple of comments on Abe's thing.

Luckily, you didn't see him. I was going to go back and check him out. And then he called me off. " I'm like, "No, no, fuck this.

" Yeah, so I'm trying to pull him back. I'm like, "Yo, it's okay. " I wonder if Abe was asking me questions other way. It's like, what's wrong with Palmer today?

He's a little angry. He's very agitated with you for some reason. Well, Abe kind of, I've been on Abe's case lately because of his bets, right? Yeah.

These bets, I told him, I said, if you're not going to disclose what the bet is, it's like getting a participation trophy. It is. Oh, that's right, you never say it. He won't say it.

And I said, just say what the bet is. Even if you say, hey, it's some business reason, I can't disclose it. Right, something. You don't have to, but these, they go kind of like, I don't know, I say they're kind of shallow.

Right, yeah, because it's just, it's just, I was right. Oh, I said it on the air to Abe, so, my goal is I'm gonna beat Abe at a bet, but the challenge is we're both pretty smart how we bet, so he's probably, yeah, so he's not gonna make a bet he can't win, and the same thing with me. Right. I can say, we'll help you cheat if you want.

We can help load this. We can sway this without any problem at all. We can infiltrate the Abe community with bad information. I know a couple of his guys.

Yeah, it's like, we could, you know, yeah, we could do this. We can do this. We can do this. All right, well, I'll set this up.

We got to set this up. And then we'll give Coop the... Because Ape doesn't listen to the show. No, no, he won't.

He barely knows we do one. Yeah. I don't even think he knows who the fuck I am. Actually, okay.

He does. He tells you the Polish guy. See, actually, you've missed some jukebox episodes, because I talked about the date, the weekend I was going to be down here. Yeah.

On jukebox. Yes, I have. You obviously put it on the text message, but he didn't show that. It was on the email.

It was on the email. Yeah, it was. I mean, it's totally on me. 120%.

It's all good. No, I mean, I would They would have done the same thing. That's why we get no exclusives here, because they sent him emails, and he just, no, I don't want that. You get 75,000 emails, and you're going 100 miles an hour, you blast two, and I said, hey, I was like, oh, that shit, we can't do Friday, and you're like, alright, Tuesday.

I'm like, alright, cool, Tuesday, I'll see you Tuesday. You know, like, I didn't even see which Tuesday. Yeah, right. I was like, alright, cool.

Yeah, well, I should have realized it was a double Tuesday, because like I said, I extended the trip, we were gonna leave today, and I said, well, I gotta come see these guys, so we were able to get a house another day, I'm like, let's just stay another day. So you got the whole fam? Well, they're all departing right now. My wife and one of my sons is still here.

Okay. But we had my brother-in-law in. We had my father-in-law. He lives down here.

And we wanted to spend a lot of time with him. We haven't seen him in two years. He's 87. Oh, that's right.

He's 87. For 87, the guy's still very, knock on wood, yeah. Very active. Yeah, very active, yeah.

Looking good. We had a bad storm on Sunday, though. Really? Yeah, I was out of Port Orange at a wedding, and it didn't rain out there at all, not at all, but when we got home, the signs had blown off my patio, all the cushions were in the yard.

Yeah, we had a flagpole where the house we're renting, cracked. I mean, the thing really cracked. Yeah. Rusty's flag's outside, the poles are there, but the fabric went like down the street or something.

Yeah, I mean, the first thing is we're trying to save the flag, because we don't want the flag, obviously. Right, right. My wife took it in, we cleaned it, but the flagpole was busted, and the umbrellas came down in the backyard. It was hail.

It was a lot of hail. Yeah, I heard it was hail. Yeah. We had shit weather in Texas on Saturday.

Did you? Yeah. Before the event, 'cause it didn't look like during the event. No, no, I'm sorry, Friday.

Friday. Ah. It's all one big day to me at this point. Right.

And that was the day at that shop down there. Yeah, Havana House. Yeah, Havana House. I'll tell you what, man, they got some gems in that humidor.

They got some stuff that, you know, it's like, how do you still have this? Right. I would say, you know, I probably saw 20, 30 things, I'm like, this is incredible. Turn me loose on this, I'll sell all this shit in two seconds.

Right. Let me have this. I can sell all this for a premium. You know, Southern Gunner's selling a bunch of stuff, do you see that?

Is he? Yeah. No, I have no idea. Well, you know, I was surprised to not see Hugh there.

Oh, I had a little chat with him today, because I was concerned there was something wrong. Yeah. But all's well? Yeah, yeah, for the most part.

Okay. Yeah, I mean, like, I think that, you know, the numbers for Weaselfest were good, I think that next year, with the proper time and preparation for an actual event without COVID being a fucking wrenching things, it's gonna sell out and you're gonna have a lot of pissed off people. Oh, I'm sure. You're gonna have a lot of pissed off people.

Well, they had pretty good attendance for the first time. Yeah. Well, they sold out. Yeah, it sold out and it was canceled.

Yeah. Yeah. And then this time was close, but I'm going to tell you right now, after witnessing the whole thing, and like- Oh, I'm sure. Everybody's seeing the videos that Rosales did, and all the photos everybody posted.

And then kind of perfecting what they worked, you know, like just improving on it, you know, polishing. I don't know what you're actually going to improve on, to be honest. I mean, it's got to be minimal. If Rosales takes dance lessons, I saw a lot of him dancing.

Uh, I think that he's a really good dancer already. Is he? Maybe he had a couple of drinks when I saw him dancing. Oh yeah?

Maybe just walking. He was walking like Gumby or something? No, no, he was dancing. Like the guy from Roger Rabbit after he got mulled over?

He was dancing. He was dancing. He was dancing. Well, I mean, as far as I'm concerned, you just get to run the shop now, so.

No. It's done. I did too well, I shot myself in the blood. It's a done deal.

No. I don't want that. Too well's an understatement. So we go out of town and this guy fucking blows numbers out of the water like he's hosting events back to back Friday, Saturday night.

I'm like, okay, well. Saturday it rained, too. Saturday night it rained. You made Chet look like Keanu.

And Friday I had no parking because I was fighting with the realtors next door. And yet you still sold everything. I'm surprised there's stuff in the shops. I evicted the realtors Friday.

You let them go? I let them out. That's fine. You know what?

You do whatever you want. You keep doing those numbers. You do whatever the fuck, hey, whatever he says. I'm not gonna argue with him, you know.

Alright, Coop, we appreciate you taking some time, Erik. Thanks for having me, guys. Glad we got to get this in, so it was good. So it's good to do a little quick catch up.

Yeah, shoot the shit for a few minutes. Yeah. All right. That's it.

Yep. All right. Is this going to be the end of the show? I don't know what to say.

Who the fuck knows? All right. This may or may not be the end. It may or may not be the end.

It may be a whole separate show by itself. We could stick this in the middle. Who knows? All right.

Again, thanks, Coop. We'll talk to you later. Thanks, guys. Bye.

This has been a Cigar Hustlers Podcast, a Mike and Mike production. m. for all new episodes. Hi, I'm doing, I'm Hoostoe-Raw.

Yeah, we just don't have to do a single, uh, single podcast ever again. Perfect. I'm good, Mike and Mike. How are you guys doing?

The Hojo, the... Hojo! It's the Hojo! Demandre-- You didn't even let him fuck it up all the way.

I gotta get past Hojo! I don't even have to try anything. He's not even gonna try. We're gonna, we're gonna cover a lot of ground here, Mike.

All right. Try to keep up. That's a sign of a good podcast. It's going to be like four cigars when I walked in a door.

All right, end this.

Show Notes

The guys shower BDP with weaslfest gifts!  a complete weasel fest wrap up! And a Cigar Coop Bonus Show