A Cigar Hustlers Podcast 236 Post PCA

Episode Summary

Episode 236 of A Cigar Hustler's Podcast is the post-PCA 2022 debrief, recorded on almost no sleep after the crew's flight home from Las Vegas. Mike and Mike (with Phil behind the cameras) start by settling contest business — announcing Corey Davis as the winner and upgrading his prize to a $50 gift card — before digging into what the show floor actually felt like this year. Their take: attendance was noticeably thin (reported numbers around 550, which they suspect was closer to 450), booths sat quiet, and while the small manufacturers may have taken a financial hit, nobody in the industry will publicly admit to anything but a "best year ever."

The bulk of the episode is an honest, day-by-day travel and trade-show diary: the pros and cons of renting an Airbnb versus staying on property (communal space was great, the algae-filled koi pond and daily commute were not), the earlier 5 p.m. close compressing dinner plans, the Luciano wine tasting, the Guy Fieri event Guy had already left, hanging with Jack and Hector, the Howard G crew (Leon Searcy, Ike Taylor), Eric Hanson storytelling, the Roma Craft team dinners with Skip Martin interrogating waitstaff over deviled-egg portion sizes, and a late-night visit to the cigar media house with halfwheel's Charlie Minato, Brooks Whittington, Brian Burt and company. They also cover the media coverage they did receive (halfwheel, Developing Palates, How About That Cigar), the lack of sample-hunters and influencers, and the fact that PCA's own Instagram never reposted any of their tagged content.

News segments close the show. The hosts break down the long-rumored Arturo Fuente × Padrón "Legend" collaboration revealed at the show — a 7x50 Churchill with distribution reportedly alternating between the two companies — and the far spicier legal story: General Cigar's court filing after Fuente's counsel sent a cease-and-desist claiming the CAO BX3's use of the letter "X" infringes Fuente's Opus X trademark. They read through the filings, joke about trademarking every letter of the alphabet, and note this is a big-dog-versus-big-dog fight rather than a David and Goliath. Finally, they amplify Robert Caldwell's public shot at PCA leadership for scolding manufacturers who leave early while board members were spotted in airport lounges before the show closed, argue the four-day format should be cut to two or three days, and talk about cigars still on their radar — the Eladio, Nick Melillo's Olmec and Macho Raton, and the hard-to-find Luciano Maria Lucia.

In This Episode

1. 01
   Contest Winner and Housekeeping
   The hosts announce Corey Davis as the contest winner, bump the prize to a $50 gift card, and field requests for BDP and Hustler Universe shirts.
2. 02
   PCA 2022 Attendance Reality Check
   Reported turnout of roughly 550 (likely closer to 450) meant quiet booths, fewer tire-kickers, and what the hosts believe was a rough show for smaller brand owners.
3. 03
   Airbnb vs. Staying On Property
   A candid pro/con review of renting a house in Vegas — communal space and cost savings versus commuting, a filthy pool, and no room to reset between the show and dinner.
4. 04
   Day-by-Day Show Diary
   The Luciano wine tasting, the Guy Fieri event, time with Jack and Hector, the Howard G crew, Roma Craft team dinners, and a late-night stop at the cigar media house.
5. 05
   Media Coverage and Social Snubs
   Interviews with halfwheel, Developing Palates and How About That Cigar, plus frustration that PCA's own Instagram never reposted the crew's tagged content.
6. 06
   Fuente x Padrón Legend Collaboration
   The long-anticipated Arturo Fuente and Padrón collaboration was unveiled as a 7x50 Churchill, with details scarce and distribution reportedly alternating between the two companies.
7. 07
   General Cigar vs. Fuente Over the Letter X
   A breakdown of General Cigar's court filing after Fuente's cease-and-desist claiming the CAO BX3 logo infringes the Opus X trademark.
8. 08
   Robert Caldwell Calls Out PCA Board
   Caldwell's post about board members sitting in airport lounges while manufacturers are shamed for leaving early sparks a debate about shortening the show.

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

I'm sorry. Where is his car? Window 10, memory total slash 9. That is not right.

Welcome to episode 236 of the Cigar Hustler Contest. Cigar Hustler Contest. Cigar Hustler Contest. I'm exhausted still.

I'm tired. I'm sorry. Oh, yeah, man. This is the pre-BCA show.

This is the post. Where are you going? Oh, post. Yeah, post, post.

Oh, you're going to be quite the idiot today. Quite the idiot today. Fantastic. Oh, thank you.

We got in late last night. I think I got in bed around 3:00, up at 6:00, because the wife had to leave. Where'd she? She went.

She had to go to work, so if she got up at 6:00, she got ready for work. Oh, shit. You too can become part of our podcast family and invest in our show or any of the shows on the Hustler Podcast Network. Put your products in front of thousands of listeners and viewers every week.

We heard in 13 different podcasts of ours weekly all around the world. com. Yeah. Well, I rewrote this for the other two shows.

Oh, I like that. Yeah. So smart. Right.

So wise. Because apparently, if you're watching just one of the shows on YouTube, we gotta somehow connect the network to the video. Well, do we, you haven't started YouTube yet for years, right? And you have, you have YouTube on yours?

Yeah, we have YouTube on ours. I don't know how that would work, what that would look like. Well, there are tiles at the end, you know, like the credits, when the credits run, there's tiles for like on this show, there's a tile for the other show I do, on my show, there's a tile for this show, but we're waiting on Phil's artwork for his show. Why are we waiting?

Why are we waiting? He added another guy, he had to redo the artwork. Oh. Put it up.

He's using Zephyr or something. Put it up, roll through, and then you add him. Who is that you using again, Phil? Fiverr.

Fiverr, there you go, Fiverr. Oh, Sixer. I heard Sixer's better. One, it's one better.

Yeah, just one better. Don't use Forver, though. Forver's terrible. Forver...

Forver is terrible. Forver, usually it takes three times as long. Yes. That's what I heard.

Right. That's what's going on. All right, all right, Phil. Well, hey, Phil back off.

Do you want to address the winner? Certainly, you can address the winner. Okay. Do that first, get that out of the way.

Okay, yeah, because I feel like it'll get forgotten. Is this like the last contest where you just announced a winner and then we narrowed it in the bracket? No, what I'm going to do is I'm going to... He commented to it.

It was the black and white ashtray. David did. David Morris. We took care of that.

Oh, did you? Yeah, I already sent it. Oh, I didn't know. Yeah, no, I've...

I'm not in charge of that. I have removed you of that responsibility. Yes, I'm not in charge of that. I'm down here all the time.

There's no shipping. I think the biggest issue is you always have been in charge of that. You've always handled any of that sort of thing. Oh.

So... No, you usually do with the people upstairs. I don't think so. " Okay.

Well, either way, it's my fuck-up, and I fixed it. So, but now Amanda's saying something about a t-shirt. She wants a BDP t-shirt, apparently. Oh, I have nothing to do with that.

No, I've had several people ask, because they're seeing the photo of me in the red shirt, like at the show. Several people want access to the BDP shirt. Ah, I've had several requests for the Outwork Everybody, as well as Superman. Oh, the Super P.

Yeah, the Super P. Super P. So, Phil's changing cameras as we talk. So what I'm going to do is I'm going to email Corey Davis, who's a dude I know.

He has his own shit show, by the way. He is the winner with a surprisingly low number of eight. Yes, there weren't many people. I think it's because he was there.

And that's exactly what happened. Because of the fact that he was, well, I think that there's a bunch of things that happened, but that was definitely one of them. So, Corey, do me a favor. com, and I will punch that in for you.

Or if you wind up just saying, hey, fuck that guy, and you place an order, say, hey, he owes me, what do you want to do, $25? For what? $50? What?

Gift card. Oh, $25. Where are we doing the, in place of? Oh, is that the price?

Yeah. Oh, $25 seems sufficient. $25 seems fair? Yeah, seems fair.

In today's industry, that's at least half a cigar. All right, let's go $50. I'm going to give you a 50 card. The whole cigar.

Yeah, you get the whole cigar. I don't want to spoil you. I don't want to cut it in half. Yeah.

So, a $50 gift card, bro. Congratulations. Yes, surprisingly low number. Yes.

I think that there was a surprisingly low number because I think of attendances as well, the attendees. I don't think that there was so many. I didn't see so many guys this time around. Do you mean retailers or people this way?

Yeah. Well, what was it? 50, did he say? Something like that.

Which means probably 450? I mean, if that. Right. If that.

It's tough. I had a great time, though. Yeah? I mean, I had my moments.

Yeah, right. There were some really nice things that happened that we'll get into here as we discuss the show. It's a stressful fucking time. But because of the low attendance, it wasn't as much fun as past years, I think.

There wasn't, I mean, 'cause you're going by the booth and everybody's just... Yeah, a lot of people were just kind of sitting down. Sitting back in the chair because nobody's coming by. Some of the Asian gentlemen were very aggressive.

They spent all those money, they got, you know, I think a lot of manufacturers, brand owners, the smaller guys, they got kicked in the teeth pretty hard. Right. You know, I mean, I'm just speculating here, I don't know exactly 100%. Yeah, we don't, we don't.

Because the reality is that no one will fucking tell you anyways, it was the best year ever. Oh, well, that is what everybody's saying though, if you look on Facebook. This is the best, of course. We killed it, we crushed it.

Oh my God, this is so amazing. It was so amazing. All three people that showed up bought at my booth. Yeah.

So, we weren't even... Careful, Phil. Phil's turning on the rabbit air. Rabbit air was there.

They were very aggressive. No filters, though, I asked. No filters. They didn't have any?

No. Well, their entire booth was made out of the filter material. I saw that. I offered to take, like, the stool, but...

Can I have this? No. We don't give that way. Go back with us.

I'd like to take this with you. So, you know, we were talking briefly, and we actually really elaborated on the Patreon as to what cigars we were really excited about. Yes. Is there anything that stuck out for you that changed?

Did you say, you know what, I wasn't, this wasn't really on my radar? Uh, I don't usually smoke the new stuff at the show. " No, I think the only thing I didn't get that I was after on my list was the Ya-Ya because I couldn't remember who made it. No Ya-Ya for you.

No Ya-Ya. I saw a picture. Somebody took a picture of the Ya-Yas, but they didn't say where it was. I couldn't remember who it was.

It's over here. Yeah. Now, wait, you didn't notice this, but, you know, people post every day when they're there and they tag PCA on Instagram. And then PCA takes the photos and puts it on their Instagram.

Yes. I mean, I did this daily. I saw you doing it all the time. Yeah, all the time, all the time.

They didn't use a one. Not a single one. Not a single one. And I saw Scott.

Oh, yeah, he was there. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. They should be.

The whole crew, yeah. I mean, yeah. The whole crew. And actually, I have something to discuss about that that I saw posted.

Ooh. Yes, so we'll get into that. Either this or the, I actually have it for the Patreon because of the other topic you wanted to do this. Excellent.

Did anybody say not relevant or anything like that? I did see Rocky doing his speech when Adrian and I were coming back that last day. He had the crowd up there. I didn't stop and listen, no.

Did he make everybody put their phones in a basket or some shit? No. No phones. There was the main crowd that were watching, and yay, Rocky!

And then over in the corner was Sokka and Pete and Abe, and they were all sitting on the couch with their backs to him, just having their own little party. Their own little things. A little party sitting over there. Hmm.

Yeah. So, I don't know if they purposely didn't use our stuff, or, I mean... I don't think it's intentional. Well, there were some bad photos.

I mean, why wouldn't... mine are good, in my opinion. At least there was some thought to them. You know, my face holding up, you know, with a lot of those.

Right. And I did mine early. Well, you know, maybe it was too early. No, no, early in the day.

That's what I'm saying, maybe it was too early. Oh, they did do the BDP promotional post that I did before we even left. So they did the one, maybe they want a different person every time. Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.

Interesting. I think, there we go, hey, that's at Cigar House for Podcast, don't put him up the one. Scott Pierce has been on the show seven times. I don't think they know who the fuck we are.

You don't think so? No. You know what? I bet you'd be surprised if people don't like us and they know who we are.

You know, I will tell you, I have been surprised a few times with the show, especially, I mean, even with the parlay of the making the network and having the shit show and, you know, people listening to everything. I'm like, holy shit, you know, this is pretty crazy. Right. Yeah.

Justin Andrews, you know what? Oh yeah, Justin Andrews. So Justin Andrews was, he, and this will get back to him, which I'm really hoping. Fuck.

Yeah, apparently one of his sales reps is a avid listener. Yeah. Hey, can we pause for one quick second? I got to take this call.

I've been waiting for this call. Sorry. Sure. We're back.

Pause over there too, Phil. All right, we're back. Yeah, sorry about that. That's all right.

Am I going to take a phone call? Oh, he's on camera three. So yeah, Justin Andrews, this was awesome for me, because, so somebody informed Justin Andrews that we asked the question to Matt Booth about how many handjobs are required. Right.

And he's like, you son of a bitch. Breaking my balls giving me a hard time. So maybe I should jump on the roadcaster here real quick. Should we call him real quick?

And see if he answers, hey, we're on the podcast. Ask him what kind of lotion he used to get the handjob. Yeah, it's not Monday. Oh, he might answer.

Yeah, he might answer. Try my phone. He doesn't have my number. I feel like he's going to answer.

Let's go. It's going to be awesome. Does he answer? Son of a bitch.

I'll tell you what. Well, whoever reaches out to Justin, if you could tell him we were wondering what kind of hand lotion he used for the hand jabs. Hey, listen, you know, whoever reported back to him, first of all, I appreciate you and I really thank you so much. I want to say that.

He didn't give up his source. But can you do me a favor and get back to Justin and let him know that if he doesn't answer the goddamn phone when I call, I'm going to let his phone number out on the show so that other people can call him. How's that sound? Oh, and they will call.

Yeah. Well, I'll make a contest out of it. I don't give a shit. It'll get real in here real fast.

We're just going to have to buy a new phone. Because I need to know exactly the number of handjobs it took to get Matt Booth into SDG. Oh, nice. And Justin's the guy.

Yes. all right so yeah i mean but that was really cool for me it was awesome that he said that he's like you son of a bitch it's cool to hear so many people listen right you know i could tell you one thing that i'm kind of curious about that i smoked one already and i you know i thought it was good but i don't want to like you said when you're in vegas right you don't want to get ahead of it but uh the eladio that wasn't i wasn't interested a lot of people were talking about yeah i wasn't interested at all until everybody kept bringing it up bringing it up bringing it up I'm like, okay, shit, well, maybe. Maybe. Maybe.

Maybe. Maybe. The shitty part is, do you know who the rep is? Fucking Alfredo.

Oh. God. Yeah, we saw him so much a day, we're never going to see him. Yeah, we got like eight interactions with him.

We walked up behind him every time he was anywhere, and he'd just laugh and shake it. Yeah, circle him like... I'm not giving you guys any more cigars. I don't care who this is.

Circle him like sharks. You know what's kind of funny is I feel like we get less and less cigars every year for two reasons. I feel like things have tightened up a bit. He's definitely tightened up a little.

You know, and we're not really, we don't really pursue it nearly as much as we used to. I feel like 13 years in the industry, we're just like, oh, yeah, I need something to smoke, ooh, who can I go hand? Yeah, you know. It's not like, I need to take all these home.

Right, ooh, look at my collection. Look at all these. Yeah, because half of you won't smoke anyway. More than half.

You don't give them to somebody else. 75% of them. People upstairs or something. Yeah, I like to give them to my people.

Yeah. We got to carry people. Right. You get one per day.

One per day. That's the rule you won. So, I broke down what I felt was the good things we did day by day. I don't know how you want to do it.

And then there was some news that stood out from the show or something that happened at the show that I grabbed. There was a post by somebody, but I think we can do it on this show. All right, what do you think about the Airbnb shit? I don't know.

Oh, the Airbnb? Now, see, I liked it. You did. But I had the big room, because I had Adrian with me.

Right. So, we did have the bed problem too. I did notice the second day where the head was something slanted or something. The TV didn't work the first day because I didn't have a remote, so I actually stole Greg's.

Oh, very wise. Well, I had a Roku remote, but no Roku. I mean, there was a koi pond that was fucking filled with algae. And filled with fish that nobody fed.

Right, there was a pool that needed to be cleaned. Yeah, Adrian had to skim it the day she used it and clean it. You know what I mean? Like, I'm like, what the fuck?

I like that we had a communal area, but like Greg said though, I don't think the connecting room would be the same thing, because it's not like we're all hanging out in your bedroom, or all hanging out in Phil's bedroom or something, we had a communal area where you're ready, then you come down, and you sit in the living room or whatever, I sit at the kitchen table. Well, I think the one big issue, again, is you always try and do things to reduce the most amount of stress, and obviously we had that time issue that one day. I don't know if you want to talk about it on here. Nah, we don't need to.

I have it, but we don't need to. We can bring it up. I'm okay with it. Nah, nah.

I think it's fine. You know, and like, that wouldn't have been an issue if we were on premise, right? Right. And whenever you fucking come down, you come down.

Right, you come down, you come down, you know? I didn't like having to travel there every day and travel back. Yeah, that kind of stuff. Because then if you wanted to, I mean, if you wanted to go out to dinner with another group, you had to go right after the show, you had to go right then.

Well, that's the difference, too, between the 5 o'clock closing and the 6 o'clock closing as well. You know, they really kind of fucked with, and I'm not saying it's bad or good, but here's one of the cons. You know, you have to fucking get going right out. There is no, all right, I'm going to go home, drop off my stuff, or go up to my room, you know, wash my face, whatever.

Brush my teeth and I've had seven cigars or something. Right. Like that doesn't exist. You just got to go out right then and there on the spot.

So I don't know if I'd do the Airbnb again. I just don't know if it's worth it. I mean, we saved a bunch of money. Right.

Which is fun, which is cool. I think we overbought on the food. It's always best. It happens every year.

It's better to have more than less. Yeah. It's not like I'm running out going, ah, I wish I had another. We probably could have drank another case of water, though.

Yes, we needed another case. Should have you had three cases. Yeah. Especially with the Roma guys.

Yeah, we didn't know we were bringing the Roma water people. Catering to our people. The protein and the water. Now, I don't think we gave any water to Skip.

So, you know, you can't really, you can't qualify him. No, I didn't think so. No. It was just the team.

Just the team. Tyler comes by. Tyler came. I'm going to bring this up.

Oh, he gave water to other people. Yeah, he's like, hey, can I get one? Can I get a bottle of water? I'm like, yeah, of course, bro, go get one.

So he goes, gets one and he's walking out with his fucking like five in his arm. I'm like, oh, dude, what are you doing? Oh, what the hell are you doing? I'm going to Placencia.

They were thirsty. Yeah. He's like, no, this is for everybody. I was like, well, everybody can come and see us.

Right. You know, I'll approve one at a time, as far as I'm concerned. One at a time. I said, unless one of them's for Sean, you can go give Sean his.

You can give Sean his. Sean's my guy. All right. I didn't really know John that well before that, John D.

Oliver. I would tell you that it wasn't the most I have spoken with him, but it was definitely the most I've got to learn about him, you know, like as an individual and, you know, his application towards daily life, which is pretty remarkable. Adrienne loved him. She thought he was a very sweet man.

He's a great guy. Yeah, he's very nice. Yeah, man. The whole squad's side.

Oh, yeah, sir. Yeah, but she had never met... They've weeded out the bad apples. Yeah, right.

They've taken a voyage and they've gone away. Well, yeah, but obviously she only she'd only met Michael before. Michael and Jamie. She'd never met Skip.

She had never met Sean. She never met John. She didn't know any of the other guys. Yeah.

She was quite impressed with them, too. What was cool about this PCA was, you know, it was kind of chill. Right. You know, um, which I guess is good and bad.

Yeah. You know what I mean? Like, it was fun to not be all right, I gotta talk to this guy. All right, right.

We didn't set appointments to just, you know, we're just sitting here. Yeah, I should probably set appointments. Yeah, probably. Yeah, probably have to fucking work a little bit.

Moving forward. How many, do you care, asking how many orders did you write total? Not dollar figure, but total. Not many.

Right, so what, were you set up half a dozen appointments over three days, or a dozen, whatever it was? Yeah. I mean, there were a lot of people that stopped by to say hi, how you doing, you know, and say hi, and high-five, gizzy, gizzy, hug-hug-hug. But there wasn't a lot of what I call tire kickers, people going up and going, you know, Oh, yeah.

You know, I've heard of you. Yeah. Tell me about this. I'm glad that, yeah, you know what?

And I didn't miss that. No, you don't like that anyway. I will tell you this though. I was kind of looking for that one new retailer.

Right. One new customer acquisition. A guy who's like, I fucking get you and you get me. Right.

And let's do this. And I didn't find that. That was the one thing that was probably the most unfortunate for me. Like I really wanted that one guy.

I didn't want five of them. Right. I didn't want 10 of them. Right.

Because I think, if anything, when I talk to some of the new guys, I scare them the fuck off. Oh, probably. Like, hey, listen, you know, there's going to be some things here. You're very passionate.

Like, I'm very passionate. Yeah. Like, we're going to be friends. The yellow lights bother me.

We're going to communicate direct. You know what that was? Uh, we needed a new fancy big light bulb. That one was going out, so I had to replace this with our, whatever we had.

See, that's in the chair. We've got to do what we've got to do. Yes. I did bring home a little, I'm a little verklempt as well.

Are you? Yeah. I felt a couple of people that were sick and they like blew their air towards me and I'm like, fuck, you know, we're in a whole lot of people that just stopped and asked for samples. I mean, that didn't happen hardly.

No, you know, that was pretty cool. I mean, you know, there's less people, right? But the reality, I was gonna bring it up. If there weren't the people that were there weren't the sample hunters there, right?

We're not if they weren't getting shit. And if you were there, if you were there, you were there for a reason, right? If you were a retailer, I will tell you that I was approached by several people that came up to look for things. And they had questions and stuff like that.

They didn't fucking get samples. Right. I'm just not giving it to you. You're like, you don't seem that serious, and I'm not going to just fucking dole these things out to you.

They're important to me. I didn't even see a lot of influencers running around either. No, you know what, you're right. Yeah.

There weren't. A lot of good media coverage, though. Oh, jeez, I mean, there were more media people there than retailers. ABC News was there.

Right. CNBC was there. MSNBC, Fox, you know, real media. He put up the post saying, I heard the show wasn't any good, people left early, blah, blah, blah.

Can anybody elaborate? I said, well, maybe we'll check in with the cigar media and maybe they can get back to you. And I tagged Aaron in it because Aaron had a little run in with him. So he took it down and sent me a message.

He goes, dude, it's not funny. Stop. He gets so mad. He, it's, you know what, it's so, it's kind of epic to me that like, you have officially trolled the shit out of the troller.

Right. And like, he's upset now. Right. It's like, whoa, dude.

Hey, come on, I'm just joking. Yeah, Luke, fucking chill out, bro. Well, let us troll a little bit. You've been, you've done it for years, decades.

Okay, we're just having a little bit of fun. Right, just having a little fun. For sake, calm down. Everybody hates Palmer.

Chill out, bro. Hashtag I hate Palmer. Yeah, hashtag I hate Palmer. That's what I should put up next.

Hashtag Lou Hates Palmer. Hashtag Lou Hates Palmer. That's fantastic. Oh, somebody's coming in.

Okay, so let's keep going. All right, day one, we did the wine tasting party at... Oh, that's my wife? Do you need to take a break?

No, let's go, keep going. The wine tasting thing at so-and-so's, Luciano. Yeah, Luciano. Oh, Luciano.

We did Luciano. My whole family's here. We have an audience now. Oh, nice.

Uh, let's see, what was the big thing on day two? Day two was when we went and hung out with, uh, Eric. That was, they just gonna mow over Luciano like that? Well, it's, it was the wine tasting thing.

Yeah, but you know, I got it. That was the thing that stood out that day. Okay, but like, I gotta tell you, the, the Maria Lucia, I smoked it there. Oh, I had something called the Luciano, I don't know what it was.

And I just, I love the fact that John McTavish hasn't had it yet. He's like, he couldn't get his hands on it, and we have two here that we're gonna review for the Patreon. Oh, look at that. And, uh, I smoked one there, so that's three.

And poor John. " I hope they have a lot of minerality and they're very delicious. Getting hits of minerality in that. So.

Yeah. I mean, we didn't stay long. It was hot. It was hot.

And you could just tell. You sit outside in the dark. Yeah. We were hanging out with the media guys and stuff and you could tell that everybody was kind of spent.

Yeah. " And what Phil, me and Greg grabbed a lounge chair, turned it long ways. Folded it down flat, sat on like three monkeys on a log, just sat there sweating, I'm texting my wife going, I'm miserable, I'm just sweating, it's hot, my knees are right under my chin, yeah, and none of us really drink wine, right, yeah, we're not wine drinkers anyway, so, yeah, poor Luciano's like, let me get you a glass of wine, I was like, I'm good, bro, I don't, I quickly walked past these 75 bottles of wine, I was like, I don't really drink, he's like, what do you mean you don't really drink, I'm like, I don't really drink, right, he's got, he still has to be eating strawberries and charcuterie boards, though, I mean, oh yeah, there's We used charcuterie boards for days. It was the size of the countertop.

It was huge. So yeah. Okay, go ahead. Day two is when we went to the Guy Fieri thing where Guy Fieri had already left.

Yep. But I actually had more fun with him not there. Oh, yeah. Because it wasn't asses and elbows, you're not sitting there, everybody going, Guy, Guy, Guy chanting his name.

I mean, that was a very weird situation how it all played out. But I will say this, I wasn't going to fucking hang out with Guy. I didn't want to touch him. Yeah, I don't care about me.

Yeah, I didn't need to, you know. I've seen, I've been this close to him once, that's good enough for me, I don't care. People that I respect, respect him. Right.

Like that means a lot to me, you know, and maybe one day I'll sit down and bullshit with him or whatever if the timing is right. Right. But I really wanted to go up there because I hadn't had an opportunity to really talk with Eric. Right.

I hadn't really had an opportunity to talk with Jack and Hector, you know, and I wanted to see them. Had I known that it was going to be as fucking chaotic as it was, I wouldn't even attempt it. Yeah. So it worked out that we got there and there was no one there.

No, you didn't just get Eric telling stories. Yeah. I like it. He's a good storyteller.

Yeah. You know, it's fun when some of these dudes hold court a little bit. I've never seen him smoke one of his cigars. You always just chews them?

Bro. It's always just, and it's way in his mouth. It's way back in there. Oh, yeah.

It's like that. I mean, it's half gone. Yeah. It's pretty intense.

I'm going to start rolling around like that everywhere I go. Are you just with one hanging out? Right. He's already going to love that.

" Don't worry, I won't light it, I'm just going to chew it. I'm just going to hang on to it. I have a horrible gag reflex. Oh, like your brother?

Not as bad. We didn't talk about that yet. Oh, yeah. I feel like we bring it up all the time.

I think every year. Every year it's the highlight of the... Yeah, it's very entertaining. It is.

Greg has a terrible gag reflex, he can't even brush his teeth, so... It sounds like someone's being murdered. Yeah, he's always the last one to get ready. and you hear him upstairs go, oh my God, it's so intense.

Terrible, terrible. All right. I don't know how he eats. Me neither.

It's like a vacuum. I mean, the banana, he took, you know, like half the pen, big giant, I'm always going to gag, like a monkey and then swallows it down. Yeah. All right.

Well, we ate dinner with Roman Crabb just about every night, except the last one. Yeah. That's always fun. Yeah, of course.

I mean, family meal. I mean, Skip's breaking down the fucking, He's arguing with the wagers over the appetizers. Yeah, which is fucking hilarious, dude. Yeah, he, I like the nachos, so he goes, nah, we're not getting nachos, because the only good stuff's on the top, then you go to the bottom, he goes, yeah, then he has the wagers, so what's, what's the best appetizer?

He goes, the nachos. I like that there's a logical explanation and breakdown for everything, like piece by piece, deviled eggs, like the deviled eggs conversation. Those were good. They were good.

She's like, he's like, how many, so how many deviled eggs are in an appetizer? Because none of it's disclosed, you know? Right. Well, you normally don't ask, but I mean, we had a table of eight, nine, something like that.

So she says, four halves. He says, so two eggs for $11? And we all fucking start dying laughing. I was at the other end of the table, I couldn't hear.

Oh my god, that's so funny, man. I could hear he was giving her shit, but I couldn't hear the details. Yeah. Did he ask about the corn dog stew?

Because those were cut in half, too. He tried to get, he tried to get the deets on all of it, man. It was pretty funny. But they were, I mean, other than we had fried onions, caramelized onions, onion rings, onion blossoms.

Because everybody wanted a different onion. Oh, is that what it was? Yeah, yeah. Oh, it's like they're everywhere.

At our end, when it was just me, Adrian, and Rosales down at that end, we had a pretzel, we had onion rings, we had onion petals, we had corn dogs. Yeah, we could have just had the apps. Yeah, right. We probably would have been better off.

Just with the apps. It was Trustworthy Brewery. Right. If you're going to go to Trustworthy Brewery, just have the apps.

Just have the apps, man. Yeah, I don't, my turkey sandwich was. It was fake turkey, but it was a little dry. And everybody was hype talking up the Peppermill for breakfast.

That place fucking sucks. Yeah, don't go to Peppermill either. Yeah, it's terrible. Unless you just go for the floor show, which is the drunk homeless guy getting arrested.

Yeah, that was fun. 17 policemen and the entire staff has to watch it out the window. Yeah, that was good. All right, keep going.

Day three, now you didn't do this, I don't know where you were day three, but that's when I went over and hung out, me, Boots, and Greg hung out with Jack and Hector in their booth. Oh, I was doing the half-wheel thing. Oh, that's right. No, that was, was that the same time?

Cause we, did we go from there to find him? They can't, they can't hear you nod. His mic, yeah, your mic's on. Yeah, that's, was that there?

He was in the black booth. Oh, because we went all the way back. Oh, okay. We went all the way back, found out that's where he was.

Yeah. Yeah. Who was watching the booth? My wife?

No, that was, that was before show opened. I was there. And then once I had gotten there, I was by myself. Right.

I think, or maybe me in 80. Yeah, 'cause she didn't go with us to see the boys. Yeah. 'Cause Phil needed a yellow knuckle.

I got to hang out with the Howard G. crew a lot. Well, they were right next door. Yeah, and Leon, Leon Cersei's fucking hilarious.

He was funny, but the poor man, football dude basically killed him. Well, yeah, of course. You know, but, so like a good comparison is like David Banner is, is Incredible Hulk. Right.

I would say like Samuel L. Jackson is Leon Cersei. You know what I'm saying? You know what I'm saying?

Yeah, yeah. Because, I mean, when you start, you start rapping with this guy, you start having a back and forth. Dude, he's fucking, he's pretty funny. He's pretty fucking funny.

And then, you know, Ike was doing his thing, Ike Taylor, and Howard's a fucking, dude, that guy's a beast, man. He's just going. He's just going. He's just excited and ready to go.

His fiancee told Adrian he's like that at home, too. I believe it. 24/7, that's Howard. I mean, there is no on and off.

That's the tempo. Right. That's the tempo. So they're cool dudes, man.

We had a good time bullshitting with them. Yeah, they'll be on the show here soon. I will say, yeah, they will, I will say that as far as real, honestly, media coverage with half-wheel developing pallets, how about that cigar, you know, bear, like the whole coop, like. Who all came by an interview, so you did your half-wheel one?

I did half-wheel, I did bear. You did half-wheel, and then you did half-wheel in the booth, so that's actually two, which, that was day two, I believe. They have you featured on their website. Oh, yeah?

On the half-wheel website, yeah, they broke it down, they broke it down by day. Yeah. Yeah, you're the day two. I'm kind of a big deal now.

Kind of a big deal. Yeah. Did How About That Cigar come by? Yep.

I didn't see that one then. Yeah, I did that one. I did Bear. You did Bear.

Well, Bear is Coop. Coop is Bear. Yeah, Bear is Coop. Coop is Bear.

Coop. I can't remember if they had a name for it. The Coop Collaboration or something like that. Oh.

I wonder how all that works. You know, I meant to ask when we were at the house, but when I was going to go ask Aaron and then all of a sudden, boop, he's here. Yeah. We'll have to get the info with the download from Coop is how that works.

Because they all had, well, Aaron might not know, because he's developing pallets, so they did their own thing. Man, I feel like there was somebody else that I'm forgetting, too. I did do somebody else. Somebody, the guys in the tan shirts.

Blind Man's Puff, is that, no. No, no, they weren't them. There was five of them. You did them.

I forget who they were. Shit. I'm sorry, guys. I'm gonna apologize about the rip, but it was cool to have all that media coverage.

Right, yeah. You know. Uh, Phil, I don't know what Yeah, was it, was it, how about that cigar? I already said that one.

No, you said that one. Welcome back to the conversation, Phil. Yeah, thank you for paying attention, Phil. I like the fact that you called somebody else's fake name, Phil, and...

Oh, and Phil got mad! And Phil got upset. Right, that's my standard fake name when I tell the story. Change the name.

He's like, hey, what the fuck? Uh, Bob, is Bob okay with you, Phil? Yeah, Bob sounds good. All right, Bob's my other backup.

No, Keanu's too hard to remember to say. How about Greg? That guy at the coffee at the airport did not get the Greg joke. That's the Greg joke you guys were doing.

No. He kept thinking you thought he was stealing your brother's coffee. Yeah. Is that Greg with two G's?

No, it's one G. No, one G. But he'd look at the cup. No, it says one G.

But who spells Greg with two G's at the end? It doesn't even make sense. Greg. Oh, Greg made everybody cry on day three.

Oh, that motherfucker. I didn't tell Brittany the story yet. I forgot about it. Yeah, I mean, fuck, you gonna bring this shit up?

Sure. You cocksucker. You fucking make this hard. That was one of the highlights of day three.

Yeah, he drops a bomb on us. Because Phil lost it. I wasn't even in the conversation and they dialed me in afterwards and I have to get up and walk the fuck away. What was the question, Phil, take your hands off of yours, Phil?

Well, you know, because, okay. Was it the question, who would you like to have a cigar with? No, no, so like, so Phil, Phil has a tendency to get googly-eyed over celebrities, right? So he gets to meet Ed Reed, he gets to meet Adele, he gets to meet Lino.

Oh, you're right, he was like, well, what one person would you like to be, yeah, because Greg, he couldn't come, Greg couldn't come up with anybody. Yeah, Greg said, there's no celebrities that I want to meet. Right, there's no celebrities. But it feels like there isn't one person that you would want to come across that would make you happy.

Right. And that son of a bitch says my dad. Right. Like, you fuck.

He's been dead for five years. Phil's losing it already. Yeah, yeah. And look, he's got his head down.

And the camera on Phil. So Phil starts crying. Greg starts crying. Right.

And they went and told you. Yeah, they start telling me, I don't cry. I'm like, I have to walk away, though. If I sat there, it would have happened.

I'm like, you guys, you fucks. You know? Well, I mean, my dad died in January, so I'm fighting, I'm like, I'm not even gonna save my dad. Yeah, let's, yeah, let's go trigger the whole, let's go, let's go fucking, you know, let's go make a mess of this booth.

And then the night, the day three nights when we went to the media house, finally. Finally caught them at home. And very, they're very busy men. Yeah, they were, you know, and again, that was because the time frame was all kind of fucked up, right?

Because they pushed it back to six. But like, that's one of my favorite times. Like how you know, I was looking, I was trying to do it every evening to try and get over them, but we need to go to the media house, we need to go to the media house. But then you look on social media, like okay, they're at Eroa's birthday party, they're hanging out with the knuckle sandwich guy, the guy Fieri.

Yeah, they're out and about, just living. Oh yeah, it's very popular to mend them out and even when we got there, it was almost 10? Yeah. Yeah.

And they just pulled up. They come rolling in. Sorry guys, we were hanging out with Mr. Padron, he all gave us the new cigars.

You're right. I don't know where they went. You know, like I look forward to that, that, that whole conversation because, uh, they're all pretty entrenched in the industry, obviously. Right.

Right. Um, you know, Ben, we haven't mentioned Ben's name yet, but you know, and Ben was, I was very quiet this time around. Ben's usually, he, I met, I saw him on day one. He was waiting outside watching somebody's bags or something.

Yeah. He came over and met Adrian and talked to her. And then that night he was nice enough to ask if she enjoyed the show. Yeah.

Yeah. He's such a sweet man. They, I like, I love all those dudes. You're not Ben, Bear, Bear, sorry, Bear.

Well, Bear is, well, first of all, I mean, fucking Bear is a, he's a complete beast when it comes to research. Like, you do a fucking conversation with him, and I'm like, son of a bitch, this guy, he knows more about me than I know about him. I'm like, oh yeah, that's right. So your brother always wears blue socks, I understand.

Yeah, it's like, so, is it still blue? Yeah. Right. I mean, it's crazy.

But yeah, you know, I enjoy, I really do enjoy hanging out with all those guys. They all sort of peeled off because they were working, they had an editing problem or something in the house. Yeah, Coop didn't say much this time around. Yeah, so Ben, Coop, and somebody else went inside too.

Bear? Yeah, but Bear came back out, the other two guys, because Ben did all the video stuff, so. Yeah, Aaron was sitting by the pool. He was sitting by the pool, loading his AK, just contemplating when to eliminate all of us.

Counting bullets over there or something. Yeah, writing our names on them. I'll have to cut that out. I'll just tell you right now.

Oh, yeah. All right, 3340. Yeah. I don't have anything else to say.

But I had a good time. Yes. Good people. And 3355 goes back in.

All right. Then you all go to Pepper, then the last day we went to Peppermill, and there's that long-ass triple. Yeah. Yeah.

So, I'm excited. I'm excited, and now, you know, I want to go and learn a little bit more about the Eladio stick, um, fuckin' Nick, man, Nick had some, he dropped some- He's very busy. You know what he's really excited about is that Olmec, that new one? Sure he is, he probably did all the research about the, uh, now he gets to talk about Egyptians.

Well, that's the other one. Oh. That's the new Heikler. Oh, in Olmec, the Heikler?

The new one? No. Olmec sounds very Egyptian. How the fuck should I know?

And you know, these, uh- Pigs? Mucho ratons. Or Macho Raton. Somebody said Mucho Raton.

Oh, you have many rats. Macho Raton. Yeah, it's right here on the band. Those look pretty good, too.

A little Wei Wensei action, a little Wise Man Maduro action. Nice. Yeah. And what's the other?

Oh, the other one's not his. It's somebody else's. Those are the Maria Lucie's. You had the Egyptian one, though, you said, didn't you?

You smoked it? I'm not going to liberally disclose any of that information. I have no idea exactly what you're talking about. Do I got to cut that out, too?

No, you don't have to leave. But I don't, I have no idea what he's talking about, just for the record, let the record show, delete. Delete 3340 to 3355. I'm going to make a very awkward delete too.

That's fine. That's fine. Make the clip where you got to make a clip, but sometimes, you know. I'm just going to make the video quiet.

It's for your own protection. No video quiet. It's for your own protection. Play the long game.

My pants are over there. My pants are over there. No, no, no, no. My pants are over there.

My pants are over there. What was said? Go ahead, my pots and pans are over there. What exactly did he say?

Yeah, you know, I mean, that's pretty much a wrap, right? Yeah, I mean, low attendance seemed to be the biggest thing, and then rumors they were going to go to somewhere else next year, but they're not. It's at the sands again. Yeah.

So the news, the big news thing that was that. It's very good. It's a stressful fucking trip, man. Dude, I can't even begin to tell you how many emotions I go through on this fucking PCA trip.

It's up, it's down, it's all around. I have that list here. Oh, okay. You have that as well?

At this day, at this moment. At this day, he was an asshole. On this day, he hugged me and said he loved me. At this day, you said he was an asshole.

I always love you. Sometimes you test me, though. Here's the real problem. I'm going to go into this a little bit.

Okay, go ahead. I'm a big proponent of having control of the day, right? Yes. So that's every day here, right?

Like I go to the gym when I want to go to the gym. And like, if the, if the building is on fire, you have to wait until I'm done with the gym. Right. Right.

And for us to call the fire department. Right. Yeah. Dial 911.

I'll be there when it's. You call Michael and tell him, you know, you can't call him. He's not done the gym till noon. He's in, like, and it's a, and it's a major, the major part of that is just being in control of your day.

Right. And the statement that you had made. Well, that was your statement and I threw back at you. Yes, exactly.

Well, here's what you don't understand, I don't work for you. No, you don't work for me, but I would have fucking left. Oh, well, if I would have left. That's not how you felt.

You said that she was in control of the day, she ran everything. I was making a joke. I understand that. And it wasn't even, we weren't even late yet.

But you get it, that it wasn't funny. She has hormone problems and she couldn't get her hair to dry because she was hot flashing and her hair was wet. Right. And she couldn't dry it because then it would be wet again.

If you want to go back to the previous episode, you understand how serious I am about fucking and how much stress I'm under when it comes to the show. Right. Right. So, like, making a joke at that time, saying, well, hey, kind of fuck you, ha ha ha, probably not the right time to drop that bomb, you know?

And I'm not, you know, obviously, I apologize for losing my shit. Yes, yes, you did. Because I did lose my shit a little bit. Right.

Right. But, like, the approach should have been like, hey, listen, we're kind of fucked here, you know, do you mind? Do you hangin' tight? Or do you really need to go?

Of course, I would've fuckin' waited. But we weren't late yet. Right. First of all, of course I would've fuckin' waited.

Right. You knew that shit was gonna be awry, right, when you dropped that bomb. No, 'cause I had not given a hope that she would be ready on time. And nobody knew she didn't brush her teeth until we got there and found that out.

Right. So, if the approach was, "Hey, look, I know that you're fuckin' a hard-ass dick about all this stuff, 'cause I fuckin' am, you know, do you mind sitting back or, you know, if you got to really go, just go or whatever the case may be. Of course I would have fucking said, all right, I'll just sit here. But you dropped the bomb on me.

And again, it was a joke. It goes back to the proponent of me. I would not make everybody wait for my wife to get ready. We all would have waited.

Yeah, but I wouldn't have asked everybody to. It's not like it was 20 minutes. I know, but if it would have been five, I would have said, go, we'll just meet you there. Not like I couldn't have got there.

Yeah. But yeah. Hell, I could have walked, it was only a mile. And you do understand that it is important for you to be there.

I know that I don't work, or you don't work for me. Yes. But I just meant with the attitude, I don't work for you. I know it's important that I'm there.

Yeah. I understand that. Right. I mean, everybody thinks I work here.

Everybody thinks you own here. Right. I know. Okay.

So, does that make, does that make any more sense or any more clarity? No, no. I mean, it's over and done with now. I wasn't even going to bring it up.

Yeah, but it's good content. Yeah, I know, but that's more personal stuff, though. Everything that I fucking say on the show is personal. Nah, not everything.

Okay, maybe not everything. Right. But hey, I want to make sure that this is ironed out. It is ironed out.

So we can move on. You apologize to her. I don't care you apologize to me. We get into shit all the time.

We almost dissolved the business one day, and I don't even remember why. Me neither. I don't know why either. I mean, we were emptying the bank account, divided up the equipment, and it was done.

I mean, my response is always Nagasaki. you know it's we're it's it's either where everything is fucking good to go everything's copacetic or i'm fucking we're burning this whole thing down to the ground now there's three of us though and you know surprisingly phil is kind of like the mediator between all of it that which which is really i i didn't anticipate adrian was afraid you weren't having a good time because you were very very quiet for the entire thing um i was just kind of taking it all in yeah truthfully Well, with you two and everything there. Well, you know, the difference is, too, though, he also doesn't work for me, but he wants to just fucking roll with whatever's going on, which I think you would have been with that as well if you didn't have the additional element. Sure.

Right? I thanked him for being there on Monday. I was exhausted Monday when I didn't go for the sushi. Yeah.

I mean, I was out by 7:00 that night. I know. I was so angry. Yeah, I know.

You know what? I thought I go, I'm so glad you're here, dude, she goes, you could have went, I go, no, I'm exhausted, we're going to order a hamburger and then I'm going to sleep. Well, you know, but that's, that's always the thing. Where did we go after sushi?

We went back to the square bar, right? Oh, yeah, yeah, those square bars important, important conversations go down at square bar, you know, I mean, I crushed an entire school of salmon, you always do. Yeah, it was amazing. I love doing that.

It makes me so happy. Oh, I don't know. Yeah, I think the count was 65. Yeah, something like that.

65 pieces of salmon. In the record, 70? I don't know what the record is, but I could tell you. For you, I thought it was 70.

Well, I could tell you this. I wasn't hungry when I sat down. You weren't? No.

I wasn't hungry, and yet I still felt the need to end worlds of salmon. Right. I think it was a competition with John at that point. No, it wasn't a competition.

You know, I just felt, I was kind of rolling. And once I kind of had my rhythm, I was in it, you know? Yeah, but you were trying to make John like the sushi place. I doubt that's true because it was supposed to be that, you know, they walked in there like it's a two hour wait.

Fuck that. We're not going. I'm like, hold on. Wait a second.

So I walked back in there and I'm like, how long is the wait? She goes, it's two hours. And I'm like, I don't even see anybody else here. How's there a two hour wait?

Well, we call people and she gives me this whole speech. I'm like, okay. " Within 10 minutes, we were sitting down and we're eating fucking sushi. " Well, she calls people, see if they want to come in?

Yeah, so what happens is people will book, and then they'll go sit and wait in their car. Oh, I'll get the heat, you know, standing outside. Yeah, fuck that. You know, I could feel myself re-moisten when I came back to the state.

I mean, for fuck's sake. Oh, you get off the plane, you're... Yeah, Vegas is terrible. It's so...

I don't think it's a dry heat. Don't give me a shit. It sucks. It's fucking hot.

I was thirsty from the moment we got off the plane. Yeah, the amount of nasal saline spray that I had to use the entire time was fucking atrocious. That's all my sinuses, but I was always, always thirsty, and wanted something different every time, like, water's not gonna do it at that time, I need a Diet Coke, or I need, you know, something strange and fruity, and what's up? Something strange and fruity, like passion fruit, with an umbrella.

Nothing from Phil. Nothing from Phil. Don't you remember that one day you didn't get it for me? Yeah.

That's okay, one day you didn't ask me either. Don't you remember that one day that you didn't ask me for it and I got it for you anyways? I did. That was like the punishment.

That was nice. If you piss them off in the morning, you're not part of the coffee deal. Yeah, no coffee, bitch. No coffee for you.

But you did ask Adrian, though, if she wanted some. Yeah. Yeah, but no, you just fucked me that day. I was trying to mend that fence, brother.

I was trying to let her know that we're moving on. Yeah, she goes, he asked me, and I go, hmm, did not ask me. Oh God, you're me. Yep, you triggered me.

All right, you want to do the top news things, and we're in 45 minutes of it. Yeah, yeah, let's go. All right, all right, Taro Fuente and Padrón show off the legend collaboration of the BCA 2022. So apparently we missed that.

It was confetti dropped from the ceiling and everything over there. The much anticipated Toro Fuente Padrón collaboration project was shown off in Las Vegas to throw most of the details about cigars still remain unknown. Yeah, it happened at 3:30, it's a 7x50 Churchill, two companies, blah, blah, blah. It's kind of a unique scenario, too, because I think like Padrón is going to handle the distro the first time and then Fuente Newman will handle it later on.

Yeah, like in the fall or something. They switch or whatever. Second, fourth, I guess. Hmm.

Uh, let's see. We don't need any more than that, but I have to have that one piece. That number 96 looked good. What was that there?

I meant to go back and get a sample from them, just to smoke a Padrón. We're not allowed to have samples from Padrón. I placed a pretty hefty order. I felt like I could have got a cigar that time around.

That's what you thought the year before, too. Yeah, but we were talking with George, I think, at that time. He don't give a fuck. Uh, George Padrón?

Yeah. Super nice guy. You want samples? All right, cool.

Oh, yeah. I don't want to go someplace else, then. Right. Hold on, I got to get a piece of medicine.

You want a cigar? No. Oh, I got it. Oh, you lost your...

I threw some away that I... You lost your info. I'm supposed to. I don't want to go.

Etero Fuente and General Cigar are having a legal battle over an X on a box. Etero Fuente who? General Cigar. Oh.

Ooh, that's a good one. That's a good one. That's a fucking good one. S.

District Court for Eastern District of Virginia by General Cigar last Tuesday, the outside counsel representative Toro Fuente sent a cease and desist letter to General, arguing that the CAO BX3 was an infringement of Fuente's trademark regarding the use of the letter X for cigars. General says the letter indicated that if the General did If not cease use of this, Mark, then any of the Fuente trademarks by July 8th, Fuente reserves the right to take whatever action is deemed necessary to protect its valuable trademark rights without further notice. So there were pictures as part of the story. I assume they're referring to the Opus X.

Right. Yeah, there's the X from the BX3 is the main logo for that. Ah, a little confusion there. A little confusion.

Arguably some confusion. That should be good. I like that. I like a nice "fuck you" to somebody else, especially like those two big dogs, because General really wasn't there.

Right. Yeah, General wasn't there. They were kind of there, but they weren't really there, you know, which was interesting. You know, I got no beef with either company, but like, it's funny to me to see them at odds.

I'm like, yeah. I feel like Opus X is going to win that one, too. General says the letter from Fuente was vague and didn't specify what Toro Fuente wanted General Cigar to do. Hey, we saw you're using an X.

Which, you know what, like, but listen, when you're up in that upper tier level, it's always mind games and fuckery. So, you know, like now, hey, we sent the letter. Right. We sent it.

You know what I mean? Hey, your turn. Hey, don't do that. Don't do what?

Oh, they said that they don't do what? Nah, they don't know what's going on. That's fine. Let's escalate this.

Charles' attorney replied on July 7th, indicating that the firm was still clearing conflicts, a standard practice in which law firms make sure there are no conflicts of interest that would prevent. Both of those companies have a lot of money. It's not like a big guy picking on a little guy. It's a big guy poking another big guy.

Let's see, on July 8th, Fuente's outside counsel replied with an even harsher letter that threatened to seek damages and demanded that the General Cigar immediately cease use of the infringing BX3 mark and logo, Mark and Logo, Including Shipment, Distribution, And Sales. Wow. See, they were supposed to ship the first week of July. This could get good.

This could get good. You have to keep on track of this. The complaint filed by General seeks a declaratory judgment from a judge that would enter an order declaring that General is not infringing on the trademark, award General's fees, costs, and expenses for lawyers, and grant General an other further relief as the court may deem just improper. So here's what we're looking for.

We're looking to keep the X, you pay for our lawyers, and then whatever else you think we might need. There's a couple extra bones here. I'll tell you what, General wins on the next car I'm making, it's called the X. Fuck out of here.

The X-ray. I want General and Fuente both suing me. Oh nice. Hey, you can't do that.

Oh, that'll be good. I mean, yeah, because our war chest is so deep. We're fighting with the city at the moment. What are you gonna do?

What are you gonna fuck with my pots and pans? What are you gonna take away? We hide the pots and pans now here in the studio. Yeah, we keep the pots and pans here.

That's right. We have a little paying ass choice. Thanks, Roma. Oh, they have a good point.

General's argument is that people are not going to confuse a CAO with an Opus X. Wait, so we can't have the letter? Is that where we're at? Wait, I have a red lighter and a yellow cutter.

They're not going to be the same. Trust me, no. Wait a second. So, yeah.

I mean, we own the letter. Right. Fuck. Nobody else can put an X.

I'm going to tell you right now, I'm going to file a trademark for every cigar. It has a P in it. A, B, I'm going for all the letters. All the letters.

I'm not okay with using that E there. It should be interesting. Then I have some notes about things to talk about on the Patreon. Oh.

We can do the one here. We'll do this here. We've got 10 minutes. Just give me a good picture.

We'll do this one. Okay, Robert Caldwell made a post. Oh, did he? Oh, yes.

Ooh, I didn't even really see him at the show. They were over on the far side, and they had a regular booth. But I did notice they took their black cloth that was behind them, and sort of like threw it over like a shower curtain over the top so it wasn't really behind them anymore. Oh, that's nice.

" Oh man. So they're looking at the phones going, "Hey, Poston, you left early. " That's a great point. He's got a great point.

He called them little bitches. What little bitches? I mean, you know, I wouldn't go that far, but you know, that's pretty funny. That was, that was funny.

" We gotta, we gotta go. But you stay here. That's right, you have to stay. There's no one else here.

Like, I mean, day four is a fucking waste of time. Who, who are we kidding? Like, day four? Oh, no, no, you didn't see, uh, that's when, uh, Terrence wrote a lot of his orders on day four.

Oh, yeah, it was a miracle, yeah. Espinosa, all their orders are on day four, but they crush it every day. Yeah, one o'clock, you know, fucking, you close at one. Right.

There's no one there. La Polina. I mean, you know, and that's the biggest problem is you guys are all fucking lying. Stop lying.

Yeah, there's no way all those people crushed it. Oh no, we want to go home a day early. Stop it. Make it three days.

Shit, make it two. And then apparently the red-eye last night had all the Espinosa guys on it and had Pete on it. I mean, it was just full of cigar people. Right.

It was probably just a madhouse all the way back. I'm going to tell you, you know, leaving the way that we did and getting home at the time that we did was the easiest way, I feel. Yeah, better than rolling in at 6am. Yeah, the red-eye shit, because at least we could...

You're fucked for the day. Look, we're all tired. Right. But at least we're functioning.

Yeah, we're not dead. I would be fucking, I'd be in bed still. Right, yeah. I'd be in bed.

Yeah, I would've rolled in as my wife was leaving for work. And then I'd be arguing with the dogs to sleep. Yeah, Bubbles was very excited to see me. I'm like, fuck dude, get out of here, get off of me.

Well, he tried to kill people while you were gone. That's right. That's what that dog is supposed to do. Exactly, yeah.

That's exactly, you know, that's exactly why he's there. So that nobody fucks with the family when daddy's away. And that's, that's like, and he respected that. Very passionate dog.

He's, he's passionate like his daddy. Right, very passionate. We should call you Bubbles. Go ahead, I don't give a fuck, call me whatever.

Hey, what else you got, anything else? No, I mean, I have some really good things, some really good things that I, that I'm going to hold back on for the Patreon. Okay. You know, um, some guerrilla warfare tactics that I was, uh, that I noticed.

Oh, nice. Yeah. I definitely wanted to talk about that. Oh, Phil, we were mentioned in the Powstanie thing on Half Whale.

Me? Uh, well, well, uh, Powstanie and the gang. Oh. I assume we're the gang.

Tommy from Nickel City said he was, he was, he really liked meeting you. Oh. I like me and Tommy a lot, too. Yeah, he's a good dude.

Do you remember which one, Tommy? Yeah, uh, with the hair slicked back. Yeah, that's him. I didn't know if he got, uh, uh, uh, uh, tobacology and Tommy confusion.

No, you can't confuse those two. No, no. Well, they both have long beards, I guess. You know, that's another thing we didn't talk about that.

I enjoyed meeting him. And how, who, Brett? Yeah, I'd never met Brett in person before. You didn't meet him at TPE?

No. I might have and I know him. Yeah, you did. Did I?

Oh, at the pool party thing. I didn't realize that's who he was. Yeah. He's a great guy.

Yeah, he's very tall. I mean, and he brought all those Hustler Universe shirts and then now everybody wants to Hustler. What's so funny is like I had to give him- We just had like a line of clothing. We did the Hustler Universe shirts, the BDP shirts, the Superman, the work harder than everybody else.

But what's funny was like, so, John Carney, Nick Melillo, and Matt Booth, all wanted the Hustler Universe shirts, they all got 'em, thanks to Brett having extras, you know, so, you know, it was funny, because Brett talked to John, he's like, you know, John's like, check this out, Brett's like, I fucking made that shirt, or whatever, that was my shirt, so John's like, Brett made that shirt for you, like, very confused, why would this guy make this, like, because we're all friends, we're all friends, because we all, you know, the, the, Somebody asked me, is he doing a podcast with you guys? You go, supposedly. Maybe. Allegedly.

Allegedly. Let's go, Brett. Quit bugging around. He just got it back.

No, what he got back was the trailer for his podcast. All right, good job, Brett. Keep moving. You know, I will say one other thing.

So poor Tyler, he was out working the patina booth. Yes. And somebody was super aggressive to him. Yeah, he hurt his feelings.

Yeah, and he was really upset. Tyler is a lot of things, but he never ever wants to legitimately hurt someone's business or anything like that. So he instantly feels guilty about that. I'm like, that guy's just a dick.

I don't know who he is, but he's obviously an asshole, bro. So don't let that type of thing bother you. You shouldn't let the boys all go over with you. In this fucking industry there are retailers, give me three, give me three, yeah, in this industry there are fucking retailers that are just so fucking full of themselves, and there's nothing you can do about it, they're never, you know, I don't know, maybe they have problems at home or something, or, you know, they're just, you know, they're just inadequate in general, I don't know, you know, born with the two inches instead of your standard five, I don't know, I don't know, but you can't let those retailers get to you, you know, they're gonna be assholes.

They're going to be assholes. All you got to do is just weed them out and have fuck with them. Is it going like, man, fuck that guy? Yeah, fuck that guy.

Fuck that guy. Absolutely. Look at you on point today with the soundboard. Nicely done.

Thank you. All right, I guess that's it. Yeah, that's a wrap. Episode 236, The PCA Show.

I don't know if it'll go up today or tomorrow. We'll have to figure this out. Yeah, today. Well, the audio will go up today.

The audio is easy. The audio? The audio. I just have to edit out in the one barn.

Thank you. All right, guys, we got to get out of here. Appreciate you listening. We'll talk to you next week.

All right, bye. 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. This has been a Cigar Hustlers podcast, a Mike and Mike production.

m. for all new episodes. Hi, I'm doing, I'm Hoostoy-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! He didn't even let him fuck it up all the way. I'm gonna get past Hojo!

I don't even have to try it. 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, right? It would be like four cigars when I walked in a door. All right, end this.

Show Notes

The Post PCA Wrap up Show!  Stories, Parties and Who we pissed off!!