Jack Torano from Torano Cigars Origin Series Episode 10

Episode Summary

Origin Series Episode 10 sits down with Jack Torano — brand ambassador for Torano Family Cigars — for a long, candid conversation about four generations of a Miami tobacco family and one of the industry's more turbulent career arcs. Jack opens with the Miami "sewing circle" (formerly "F That Guy"), the Monday-night gathering at Caribbean Cigars where industry guys like Hector Alfonso, Alfredo Cruz, Pete Hernandez and Alan Schumann trade rumors, and talks about life as "Out of Town Jack," running events three or four days a week from D.C. to Texas to the Carolinas — including Jungle Jim's in Ohio.

The origin story proper starts with the loss of his father at 13, then his years selling leaf at his grandfather Andres Lopez's Lopez Leaf Tobacco on 8th Street in Miami — a shop that supplied local rollers and counted the Carrillo family among its customers. When the 1980s cigar market dried up, Jack moved to Chicago and spent two decades producing and singing on TV and radio jingles (Bud Light Super Bowl spots, Cap'n Crunch, Velveeta) until licensed music gutted the business. In 2010 his cousin Carlos pulled him back to Miami as Torano took distribution back from CAO, and Jack moved into marketing and customer relations — Torano-branded wine fridges and an antebellum Torano wine, and a Miami Heat courtside promotion with Charlie Torano in the LeBron era.

The heart of the episode is September 11, 2014: Charlie Torano sold the company to General Cigar, and the entire sales team — Miguel Schoedel, Brian McGee, Armando Lupito and Jack — was out that morning. Miguel brought Jack to Roberto P. Duran Premium Cigars, where Jack spent 19 months, pushed for the company name change to Duran Cigars (after a Myrtle Beach crowd showed up with boxing gloves expecting the fighter), and learned he disliked straight sales work. He kept lobbying General until a five-minute conversation with new president Régis Broersma at a Pennsylvania trade show — with help from Rick Rodriguez and Michael Giannini — got him hired in June 2016.

Jack closes with where the brand is now: the repackaged four-blend Vault line built around retailer margin and price protection, and 2018 re-releases of the legacy predicate-date blends — Exodus 1959 50 Year, Exodus 1959 Gold, Cameroon 1916 and Casa Torano — plus hints at a future collaboration (AJ Fernandez, or possibly cousin Benji Menendez). He answers the show's standard questions (a cigar with his late father; "find something you love and you'll never work a day"; Casa Torano Connecticut as his favorite), names the Punch Grand Puro Nicaragua and AJ's H. Heltman among current non-Torano smokes, preaches expanding your palate beyond one brand, and tells a very funny movie-theater confrontation story.

In This Episode

1. 01
   The Miami "Sewing Circle"
   Jack explains the Monday-night Caribbean Cigars industry gathering, formerly known as "F That Guy," and its regular cast of Miami cigar guys.
2. 02
   Life as "Out of Town Jack"
   A rundown of three weeks on the road, why Thursday is the big event night up north, and a Jungle Jim's event in Ohio.
3. 03
   Lopez Leaf Tobacco and the 1980s
   Growing up in a cigar family, losing his father at 13, and running his grandfather Andres Lopez's leaf business before the market collapsed.
4. 04
   Twenty Years of Chicago Jingles
   Jack's detour into music for TV and radio — Bud Light Super Bowl spots, Cap'n Crunch, Velveeta — and how licensed music killed the business.
5. 05
   Marketing Torano: Wine Fridges and Courtside Seats
   Returning to the family brand in 2010 for the Torano antebellum wine promotion and a Miami Heat courtside giveaway with Charlie Torano.
6. 06
   9/11/2014: The General Cigar Sale
   The morning Charlie Torano sold the company and the whole sales team learned General didn't want them.
7. 07
   The Duran Years
   How Miguel Schoedel brought him to Roberto P. Duran Premium Cigars, the push to rename the company Duran Cigars, and 19 months in straight sales.
8. 08
   Coming Home to Torano Under General
   The Régis Broersma pitch at the Pennsylvania show, rebuilding retailer trust, the Vault line, and 2018 re-releases of the legacy blends with price protection.
9. 09
   Three (Plus One) Questions
   A cigar with his late father, best advice, Casa Torano as his favorite smoke, and Bill the Butcher as his fictional smoking partner.

Brands & Cigars Discussed

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Transcript

Every day I'm hustling, hustling, hustling, hustling, hustling, hustling, hustling, hustling, hustling, hustling, hustling, hustling. Every day I'm hustling, every day I'm hustling, every day I'm hustling, every day I'm hustling, every day I'm hustling, every day I'm hustling, every day I'm hustling, every day I'm hustling. Welcome to a Cigar Hustlers Podcast, where we take a closer look at the people of the cigar industry, with your host, Mike and Mike. Hustlin', hustle, hustle, hustle, hustle, every day, every day, every day, whole love.

So say hi, Jack. Jack's an all-around good egg. Jack is a good egg. Hi, guys.

So Jack is actually part of a sewing circle down in Miami. I don't know if anybody knows this, but in Caribbean Cigars, if you know, if there isn't a rumor going on by 12:30, they'll be sure to start one for you. Yeah, it's had a few different names. It was FTG.

FTG? It was "fuck that guy" for a while. And then we decided to make it the sewing circle, because it's just a bunch of guys in the industry around, and, you know, it's usually on a Monday night, so if you're in the cigar industry and your ears are ringing on Monday night, you know, you know where it's coming from. Who are the core guys that are in that group?

Hector Alfonso, Espinosa, Alfredo Cruz, the broker, Mike Denny's occasionally makes an appearance, Pete Hernandez, when Pete and Steven make an appearance, it's just, everybody's ears are ringing there. All bets are off. And then Alan Schumann is the ringleader who just sits by and just shakes his head at what is spoken. We had a special guest appearance by Steve Saka a couple weeks ago.

Oh, he was in town. We had him on the show. Did ya? Yeah.

Nice. Very nice. He was everywhere for about a week. So what's really funny about the Caribbean Cigars is whenever I'm close to Miami, I always try and get in.

Besides when I'm out of town. Right. He does that on purpose. Nothing for nothing, but you're the fucking world traveler, bro.

You are out of town every single day. That's what they call me, out of town Jack. So like, I mean, give us a quick rundown of where you've been the past three weeks. , West Virginia, Virginia, Texas, Dallas, and Houston.

I've been to Alabama. Right. Wow. I've been to North Carolina, which is Charlotte, to Charleston, to Asheville.

How many times do you go home in that stint? You know, usually the travel time is about three, maybe four days a week. Okay. But that's still a shit ton.

But a few of them have coincided with, and it's nice when I get to come home on Friday, but there was a two or three week period where I was coming home late Sunday. So I like to spend a little time with the wife, even though, you know, I got her convinced that absence makes a heart grow fonder. Right. And I repeat that phrase often at the house.

Often. Sewing on a pillow. The majority of cigar events have to happen on a Friday or Saturday night, no? Well, oddly enough, up north, I don't do a lot of events in South Florida, but up north, Thursday night seems to be the go-to night.

Really? Yeah, a lot of guys will come out to that event on Thursday night and really support whoever's there. And then, come Friday night, a lot of these people, especially in big cities or near big cities, they live out in burbs, and they've got to get home to their family after work on Friday. I mean, with the exception of Jungle Gyms in Ohio.

What a great place, man. Yeah, it's a pretty cool place. I left that event, I did an event at Jungle Gyms, the Keys Gate, or whatever they call it, whatever that, their newest location, and I liked this, in the event, Miguel, Miguel Chaudel, told me, You know, you should check out the store. I was gone for like an hour and a half, man, it was insane.

Yeah, the first time I went there, I parked in the front, I didn't know anything about the entire store. And like I had to, you had to literally walk all the way around the entire store to get to the cigar area. Yeah. So it was a, it was a pretty good experience.

Or you park in the back and you're right there. Yeah, that made, the second time I was there, I parked in the back. But you know, hey, I got the experience at the store. I didn't know shit about shit.

You know, what's funny is, that was, Miguel now in Crown Heads, I feel like I got to meet Miguel at actual Jungle Gyms when he did an event, but before when he came in from the show, into this store representing, you know, the other brands, it was just so formal and like this, you know, this fucking, I don't even know, you know, but then when I got to meet him afterwards, I'm like, dude, I feel like I finally met Miguel for the first time. Yeah, Miguel's funny because, you know, we all came to, I think one of the first times I came here was with Miguel, and actually it wasn't, I came here a lot before Miguel, now that I remember that correctly, and I kept trying to get you guys to bring in Duran and bring in Duran and bring in Duran, and then oddly enough, and Miguel had nothing to do with it, you guys happened to pull the trigger on bringing in Duran the day I brought Miguel here. And to this day, Miguel tells everybody that it was him. He takes all the credit.

It was all because of me. He takes all the credit. Well, you know, I'm going to back that story 110% of the devil because of Miguel without saying, you know, I mean, for sure. I'll take that.

All right, so. I stuck you with a lot of merchandise. I'll take that. Yeah.

We still have some if you're interested. Buy two Taranios. Get a Taran free. So, are we all smoking or am I the only one smoking?

No, no, we're all smoking. All right. That's the shameless plug section of the show. Okay, so Mike, who's Mike 1 and Mike 2?

He can be one, I'll be two. The answer is yes. Yes. Mike 1 is smoking the Exodus 50 year.

Okay. It was the number 12 cigar cigar aficionado in 2010 in their year-end list, which is the last time Taranio made an appearance in that list was in 2010 with that cigar. The Exodus 59 gold that Mike 2 is smoking was the number 5 cigar in 2006. So, a lot of history in those two blends right there, that's a five country blend you're smoking, that's the one Mike One is smoking is a Brazilian Arapiraca wrapper, Nicaraguan binder filler, it's got a lot of the things people are loving about the Amazon Basin series, it's in that cigar right there.

Oh, it's really good, so far so good, I'm a quarter inch into your taste, and you're not smoking? I am smoking the Caso Torano, which I tend to, our Connecticut blend, which I tend to smoke pretty much all day long. Yeah. Yeah.

That's like your go-to as you jump in and out of shop and stuff. Oh, dude, if I was paying for these cigars, we'd be... We're not, we're losing money. Yeah, we're losing money.

All right, so this is obviously more of an origin story, right? So we kind of want to know people of the cigar industry, or this is the origin series, and we want to know more as to what you did prior to and how you kind of got into the tobacco industry. Okay. Well, with my family, cigars have been a part of my life.

Right. So my dad passed away when I was 13 years old, 1974. Or if he would have lived into my early 20s, I would have probably been, this would have been my calling my entire life. Right.

But after high school, and after a little bit of college, I went to work with my grandfather out of a little warehouse on A Street in Miami, selling leaf tobacco. Okay. And we sold leaf tobacco to all the local rollers, and he had a really nice business, it was called Lopez Leaf Tobacco, so I did that for about five years, like year three or four, my grandfather passed away, he was 91 years old, so I took over the business and knew very little about it. Right.

But, so about a year later, it was like, this isn't working, and again, it was the '80s, you couldn't give away cigars in the '80s, everybody was struggling in the '80s. So I decided to get out of that business back then, and then the boom hit, and I was doing music for TV and radio commercials in Chicago. Really? Yeah, so we worked on a lot of great campaigns.

Like jingles and things? Jingles, did the Real Metagenius campaign, we did a lot of the Super Bowl Bud light commercials you saw, we did music for that, and I got to sing on a lot of commercials. Really? I sang on a Captain Crunch, a Velveeta Cheese, I, I, the residuals from those commercials were insane.

Yeah? Yeah, insane. And, you know, you were, you'd go to the mail and all of a sudden there'd be 30 checks in there and they could be anywhere from $6 to $6,000. Wow.

But it was just a, it's, it was a great time to be in that industry. And, and in about 2007 that started drying up a little bit because if you listen to and watch TV and listen to radio now, You know, radio now, it's all licensed music, once bands stopped selling CDs for the most part, and all the streaming was interfering with their income, it was no longer considered selling out to sell out to commercials, and so now every commercial you see is somebody's hit song from the 70s, 80s, 90s, you know, and... No original music anymore. No original music, so that kind of, you know, we went from billing a few million dollars a year to 300,000.

So the studio's still there. My brother's doing really well. He's actually now in a band with Daryl Jones, a bass player for the Rolling Stones. Oh, wow.

And he'll be, they have a concert in Chicago March 9th, so I'll be over there watching my brother on stage for the first time in a long time. Then, about 2010, I'm in Miami and my cousin Carlos said, you know, at that time CAO had the distributorship of Taranio. And he said, you know, keep in touch because we're going to take it back from CAO, and we're going to continue to run things here in Miami, so stay in touch. And six months later about that, I was living in Miami, I didn't think I'd ever leave Chicago, I was living in Miami and working for the family and truly that's when, you know, that's when the passion that must be bred into me came out.

In the '80s, it was a struggle, but... Too much work. Too much work. Yeah.

You know, it wasn't really dealing with cigars, it was selling leaves. Right. You know, it wasn't that interesting. And the passion really came out quickly.

And truly, I just, I can't think of doing anything else. All right. So then, around 2011, you became marketing... Marketing Customer Relations.

Yes. For Taranio Cigars. So that was kind of your first... And just jump off into actual cigars, not just selling leaves, right?

Absolutely. That was my first foray into selling cigars, and as I got more acclimated with that role, you know, I'd worked a little bit in advertising and done a little thing, so I was able to bring some of those things to the table, and I was involved in blending, but not by any means a master blender. I mean, my involvement in blending is letting the guys at the factory, telling them, you know, our portfolio is missing this, this drink flavor, this drink, or this flavor profile, this type of cigar, and by the time we get to the factory, they've made, you know, 10 cigars, and it's basically picking and choosing, to promotions, to market development, you know, everything that had to do with selling cigars. So, what was the coolest thing that you did back then when you were doing marketing?

I don't know, I came on board during a wine fridge promotion that was pretty cool, we had a real good time, and we bottled our own Taranio wine, an antebellum wine, out of a place in somewhere, Tennessee. No shit. Yeah, and we made about 50 cases of this stuff, and then after we got it in, we realized, shit, we can't send this to a lot of states, it's illegal to send this to a lot of states. It was legal to send this to a lot of states.

So some of the wine fridge, some of these stores that had signed up to give away this wine, we had no way of getting it to them. So unfortunately we were stuck with about 10 cases of it, you know, and... Was it good? Did it taste good?

It was real good. Was it really good? Yeah, it was aged in whiskey barrels that had a real nice taste to it and they're all gone. I was gonna ask, are there any hanging around anywhere?

" Oh yeah. So if you're listening, you have a bottle of Taranio wine. We are looking for a bottle of Taranio wine. So the wine coolers, so like you actually like gave them fridges?

We gave them, yeah, yeah. We had, you know, mini wine fridges, branded Taranio wine fridges. Oh shit. You know, we did, we picked 50 accounts across the country and we ran this promotion for a month.

And then, aside from that, probably the next one is the Miami Heat promo we ran in their heyday with LeBron. And we did a promo where you sat, if you won this thing, you were gonna sit courtside on the court with Charlie, unfortunately not with me, I got to take them to dinner, but they actually sat courtside with Charlie Taranio, and we worked it out with one of the, we were working with one of the brokers that sold tickets in Miami, and they hooked us up with these tickets, and it was an exchange thing, I mean, those tickets were going for like five grand apiece or something, but we worked it out with one of the brokers that sold tickets in Miami, and they hooked us up with these tickets. It was an exchange thing. I mean, those tickets were going for like five grand a piece or something.

But we worked out a deal in that. That was a lot of fun. The guys that won that were very excited. So who won it?

Some cop. Really? Yeah, some cop from somewhere. So, you know, we flew them in.

We had dinner with them. We did everything. And then we turned them over to Charlie, who got to sit courtside. You know, we were the fluffers.

No shit. Me and my cousin, Carlos Gacca, were the fluffers. That is awesome, man. I mean, I've never done anything like that.

I may, like, you know, I obviously have the Bucs tickets, so I'll take somebody to the Bucs game, but it's not like a contest or anything. Maybe that's an idea. Yeah. I'll have to call up Charlie and have him take them.

Charlie, get these guys I'm taking to dinner. Can you take them to the game? Alright, so somewhere along the lines, around 2013, 2014, you leave Taranio Cigars and you join Duran Cigars. Well, I leave Taranio Cigar is a funny way to put it.

Okay. My cousin Charlie sells Taranio to General Cigar. Right. And we find out September 11th, 9/11 of 2014.

That was our own little 9/11. Not to diminish the real 9/11, but that was, you know, our own, you know, Charlie. It's not a good date, isn't it? No, no, not a good date.

We were actually, me and my cousin, we had kind of seen a little bit of the ride of the ride. We were standing on the wall with some of the things that were going on that were odd, and we thought, one of the ideas was, you know, Charlie might be selling, but we always imagined, if Charlie sold the company, whoever bought it would surely need us, but it's called Taranio Family Cigars, you know, you need a Taranio in there, so, you know, the double whammy was that morning, Charlie telling us, you know, boys, as the news isn't good, as of yesterday, I sold the company to General, too, they don't want you guys. So it was... So, like, you had a job on Tuesday.

Thursday. You had a job on Thursday. Yeah. And then you lost the job.

Everything was gone. On Friday, he's drinking the last bottle of Toronto wine. Yeah, literally an hour after Charlie made that announcement, the people from General were in the building, inventorying everything, so it was... You're downstairs waiting.

Charlie said not come until 5:05. I mean, everything, you know, you expected something, and Charlie and I laugh about it now, He goes, "I got a great relationship with Charlie," but at some point you expected to hear good news, but everything that came out of his mouth was worse than the last thing, you know? Okay, that's a good idea, Charlie. How much time do I have while they're in the elevator?

They don't want any of you guys, they don't want any of the sales guys, okay? They're going to be here in an hour. We're painting your parking space right now. Any way you guys can help them.

Carrying boxes for them as you're carrying yours out. Yeah, so it was a rough, rough week and a half. And it's your last job. Can you move the furniture around for the guys they like it?

So how did you find your way to Durant? So, actually, Miguel found his way to Durant. Okay. You know, we had a really good team.

We had Miguel Shodel, we had Brian McGee in Texas, we had, um... Bigfoot. Armando Lupito in Florida, Bigfoot in Texas. And so our reps were the type of reps that are in demand.

Right. I mean, Armando was out of a job for about five minutes. You know, Brian McGee, it was just a matter of picking, him and Miguel were just a matter of where they wanted to go, so everybody was offered jobs, and then, you know, actually the sad news is, I was the last, it took three weeks in total, it felt like three years to me. Right.

Yeah, you know, these guys, hey Miguel's taking this job, Armando's taking this job, my cousin Carlos Yacca, I'm going to work for Gurkha, you know, and I'm looking at my phone and it's not ringing, and Charlie would tell me, don't worry Jack, your phone's going to ring. I just wanted to hit him with my phone, you know. And it was Miguel. Miguel said, you know what, I'm going to take this Duran job, and I think there's room for you there.

I think we could do some good things with this brand. And we've known Roberto for years. And I talked to Roberto, and Roberto said, you know, come in on a Friday. That's three weeks after trying.

I'm still shell-shocked. I mean, the dust hasn't settled. " So, at the end of that meeting, Roberto makes me an amazing offer, this amazing offer, and I unleash, well, Roberto, let me think about it, and I'm going to talk to my wife, and I'll get back to you on Monday, and then I go home, and I tell my wife what Roberto has offered me, and she says, like, call him right fucking now, call him right now, we literally called Roberto, and I said, Roberto, I don't need the weekend to think about it, I'm good, I just need, you know, I needed a week, I needed a week, I just, my head was in the wrong place, right? Give me a week and I'll start on whatever it was, I think October 13th or something.

And we left, I signed the papers with Roberto and we went and bought a car. Right. It had nothing to do with what Roberto paid me. You know, Charlie did take care of us.

Well, the fact of the matter is that you're now employed. And now I'm employed again. So, uh, so, so, so that, that began the Duran, uh, the Duran run, the Duran run. And, uh, and it was tough.

I mean, if I If I had to qualify, I went from now being a marketing and public relations guy and, you know, getting to work at the factory and doing all the really cool things, to being a salesman, and if I had to list all the things that I enjoy in the cigar industry, at the very bottom of that list would be salesmen, you know, having to come in here and convince you to bring in a product that, unfortunately, you really don't need, you know, it wasn't easy, it was a very hard road, and it was, you know, it was tough. It was a tough way to go. So you handled the sales in the state of Florida? I handled sales, I did, you know, our graphics designer, Humberto Arias, that worked with Taranio, was already working with Duran.

Okay. So I also started working on marketing, and it was funny because I signed the contract with Roberto, and the name of the company is Roberto P. Duran Premium Cigars. " And he looked at me like I was insane, you know, and I said, no, this is a famous boxer.

We're not calling it Taranio. Yeah, this is a famous boxer. You have it there. Just Duran cigars.

Duran cigars is the way to go. Right. No, no, no, I can't change the name of the company. I can't change the name of the company.

Roberto, we're going to be, you know, identified with a boxer, a legendary boxer. Right. Everywhere we go. " I'm like, dude, I never did.

There's people that still think that. It's a totally different Roberto Duran. So it was kind of funny because, you know, Miguel is like, "Well, you know, we tried," and this and that. " Great idea.

So it took about six months. But yeah, we got it done. I mean, that's got to be difficult, too, to have a company and have somebody that you just signed on give you an opinion about what your name is for a brand. And, you know, I could see it taking a little bit of time to have that come-to-Jesus moment where you kind of change over.

Yeah. So, you know, hey, if it took him six months, that's kind of kudos in my opinion, you know? Well, we had some funny moments. I did an event in Myrtle Beach.

Yeah. And as I drive up to this event, I'm by myself. " They were all expecting to meet Roberto Duran, the fighter, they brought boxing gloves, and, you know, it ended up being, it ended up being, but that's the kind of stuff I was dealing with, and I, you know. " So, uh, so yeah.

Is this one of those awkward pauses that we were talking about? No, I think we're doing pretty good. That's right. You know, I think that you took him off base when you chimed in.

Because you were going to say something else, but that's okay. It's all right. We're moving on. We're moving forward.

Moving forward. Moving on. Mikey, too, with a foul. Need the applause again?

Leave that fucking thing alone. That is the actual studio audience. I don't know what the hell you're talking about. Live in front of a studio audience.

So how long are you at Duran? 19 months. 19 months. 19 months.

A little less than two years. And, you know, the thing was that, you know, listen, it was no secret to anybody that my heart was with Terranio Cigars. My heart is with the heritage of my family. So, you know, once the dust settled, once I started working the Duran, I still remained in contact with General Cigar.

Okay. You know, whether it be via email or whether running into people or some of the reps or, you know, I always made it clear to them that, listen, this is where I want to be. This is where I want to be. Right.

This is where my heart is. And eventually, you're going to need somebody to go out with the name and promote this and, you know, I can do this. Right. The day you give me a shot, I can do this.

Well, with the president at the time of general, I got nowhere. Right. You know, and not nowhere because I did get a couple of meetings. I met with a VP, I met with, and then it was, you know, it was a roller coaster ride.

You know, I'd come home and tell my wife, "Dude, the interview went great. He went great, I talked to the VP, and I think they're going to hire me, I think this is going to be, this is it, this is it, and it would drop, and then my wife would see me rise again on another when I would meet them somewhere else and it would die again. So actually I was up here when it finally came to fruition, 19 months later, I had met them all and the new president at CFest in Pennsylvania the month before. And, you know, Ricky Rodriguez, Michael Giannini, those guys were instrumental in getting me hired.

Right. And they were kind of coaching me along the way on what to say, what to do, and… Just to kind of better clarify for people who Ricky Rodriguez is. Rick Rodriguez is a brand, master blender, brand ambassador for CAO. Right.

Michael Giannini at the time was La Gloria Cubana and Foundry. Okay. Sorry about that. No, you're good.

That's my job, to make sure that what you say is fully clarified for the audience. I'm just over here nodding like I do exactly the wrong way. It's funny, because where I got nowhere with the old president of general, the bottom line is I really didn't get anywhere with him. Five minutes after meeting Regis, the new president, I'm in the Taranio booth at CFest, and I meet him for the first time, and we talked for about five minutes.

" It just makes sense. I mean, the guy with the name. That's what I kept telling him. Yeah, no, it definitely does make sense.

So, you've been-- Firing Ronald McDonald from McDonald's and going-- So, you've been with them since 2016, right? I've been with them since June of 2016, yeah. Okay. And what do you got new that's coming out?

What are you excited about? What are you excited about? Well, we, you know, we, the issues that we had to, and at the time they had already repackaged the vault, they had redesigned these, the vault lineup, the blue, the green, the yellow, the purple, the four unique blends, the amazing price point, the great margins to retailers, because the thing was that we needed a cigar to get us back in the good graces of not only consumers, but retailers. Because a lot of retailers, listen, that's, Taranio gave, the relationship that you guys have is with the rep, 90% of the time.

Right, exactly. " Right. You know, it happened to Villager, with the Villagirls, you know, and it's a rough road back, and in 2008, all the reps of Taranio were let go in December. And the brand was given to CAO for distribution.

Right. Then we take it back, we build it back up to a level where General's interested and all the reps are fired again. Right. A lot of them fired for the second time.

Right. A lot of them fired for the second time while they're on the road. Yeah, that's never good. So the backlash came to the brand and, you know, listen, I'm traveling around trying to sell Duran and walking into stores and seeing Taranio in bargain bins.

Right. So it was a tough road to get back in everybody's good graces. So we had to create a good cigar with a good margin for the retailer and in turn a good price point. What does that mean?

Very little money for general. It's just to get the name back out there with quality cigars. And, you know, that brand is still alive and kicking. The vault lineup is still doing very well.

And then what we're going to do this year is we've redesigned nothing as drastic as the vault lineup. Just basically logo changes and maybe a secondary band of the cigars you guys are smoking. The guys are smoking, and I'm smoking, the legacy brands. I mean, that was Taranio's bread and butter for a year, the 50 year, the 59, the Cameroon 1916, which I don't have with me right now, and the Casa Taranio.

So we will be re-releasing those this year. So all those blends are predicate date, right? All those blends are predicate. All those blends have a great price point, and we are following up with that with price protecting them online.

Right. That was one of the big things. They weren't price protected, and they were being sold very cheaply, but they will now be price protected with brick and mortar in mind. It's not going to be that internet, you know, hey, $70 a box, you know, unfortunately, but it's the cigars that kind of put Taranio on the map.

And then, hopefully, we'll have some sort of collaboration coming up soon. Ooh, a collaboration. We have some stuff in the works. We have some stuff in the works.

Is it the same person everybody's collaborating with now? It might be, it might be, listen I love AJ and if it ends up being AJ, but you know a lot of people, what a lot of people don't know in this industry, and the funny thing is the general didn't know it a lot was that Benji Menendez is my cousin, Benji's our cousin, so that might be a cool twist. And who is Benji? To bring, Benji's a legend from Partagas.

Right. So Benji's a legend in this industry, and he worked for General for years and years and years. As, oddly enough, my dad worked for General in the '60s, my two stepbrothers worked for General, and so there's this long line of Taranios that have worked for the Coleman's before, and then, you know, and now me. But, yeah, everybody likes to joke that I'm the last Taranio standing, but...

The last Taranio. The last Taranio standing. So we're looking at that possibility. There's a couple of more maybe interesting twists, but again, Taranio has to continue on that trajectory upward.

So, if you could pick anybody to work with. It would be you, baby. No, I don't own a factory, you know. But you know a guy.

I do know a guy. You know a guy. I do know a guy who's pretty good at what he does. If he wasn't maxed out.

If he wasn't maxed out. You know a guy. He wasn't past production levels every fucking year. Yeah, but we're hoping he gets a bigger place.

Okay, so I'm gonna let that fucking, yeah, I'm gonna let that die then where it is and leave it at that, and yes, we are all hoping that he gets a bigger place, that's for sure. Yeah. Um, so, uh, we have a couple of questions that we like to ask, and since you've never listened to the podcast-- We're taking questions from the studio audience? No, no, no, we had it, you know, we have three questions that we like to ask everybody that comes on the show.

Yeah. See, and if you'd have listened, you'd be ahead of the curve, you know, for some people-- Can we have that going for us? Nobody listens before the curve. You're like, oh, wait, shit.

So, the good part is that it goes, that sometimes these questions, obviously, you may have said them somewhere else because you are on every single fucking podcast and review site, you know, known to man. You do a great job of that. Thank you. So, you know, you might be able to answer some of these questions effortlessly.

Effortlessly. Effortless. Effortless. Now I can't say anything.

Effervescent. Mike number two. Okay, here we go. You ready?

What one person, living or dead, would you like to have a cigar with? Actually, I have answered that before, and it's always been the same, my father. Yeah, I figured you'd say. Yeah, yeah, it has to be my father, because if, you know, again, he passed away when I was 13 years old, and kind of cigars left my side of the family at that time, but I think if my dad could see where I am now, he'd be so proud, so having a cigar with him would be really cool.

Oh, that's great, right. And now I'm going to cry. All right, bring it back together. Now, so your grandfather, he was your dad's dad?

My mom's dad. Your mom's dad. My mom's dad. Andres Lopez, man.

The legend and like a best friend of Ernie Carrillo and Ernie's dad. No shit. They used to come and buy leaf tobacco from us. It's so crazy because it's like everybody thinks the cigar industry is so big and it kind of ties back into the whole fucking over sales rep shit.

But like it really is super, super small. Yes. And you know, all you gotta do is screw over one person and it's like a domino effect. And your name is shit in this industry, yeah, exactly, yeah, so true, next, okay, second question, best piece of advice anyone ever gave you?

I don't think that's happened yet, you know, listen, the best piece of advice I've ever heard, and it didn't happen to me until I was 50 years old, you know, is find something you love to do, and you'll never work a day in your life, and I've truly found what I love to do. And I don't consider this work at all, and if you've watched me today, it doesn't even look like work. Well, that's why we love it when you come up, because we stop working as well, you know? Alright, final question.

What's your favorite cigar? My favorite cigar is the Casa Taranio that I'm smoking right now, the Connecticut. Excellent answer. Now, what's your favorite cigar that's not yours?

That changes. Okay, currently. I mean, listen, currently, that's not ours, would probably be that H. J.

Fernandez. Okay. It's not even a general product, but on the general side, it would be the Punch Grand Puro Nicaragua. I smoke a lot of those, too.

's blends lately. You know, the La Mista that he did for us, phenomenal. The Time Flies that he did for us, really, really good. And, you know, but again, there's a rotation.

And if you're, you know, there was a time where Powstanie was my favorite cigar, and you guys, you guys know that. So if that's what you were trying to get out of me. No, not at all. You shameless plug.

And I still tell people all the time. I never bring up our stuff, ever. No, never at all. Is that not true?

Never, because it's not about the... Let me tell you why this podcast started, okay? I wanted to do something that wasn't about advertising for the person that's doing the interviews, right? And that's kind of how it came up and came into its own creation, so it'll never, ever be something… So you'll never be on your own show?

I mean, that could happen. We're working on one where we might interview each other, or… Right, I'll tune into that. That's the one you can listen to. You know, questions and stuff like that, that could very well occur, but you know, I've been on stuff where I have felt that it's like, okay, this is a big fucking advertisement for you, and you really don't give two shits about what I have to say.

So I care about what other people have to say, and I think that there are a lot of great stories in this industry, not only from cigar makers and manufacturers, but reps, brokers, and how they all got into it. Absolutely. Right. And none of them have a story, none of them have a platform to tell their story.

Well, listen, and that is, I see a lot of guys that, whether it be the Florida Cigar Club, or whether it be Cigar Obsession, or whether it be these Facebook pages and these things, all these manufacturers do is plug their crap and put ads, Right. And put ratings. You'll never see me do that. You know, I want to interact with people in these groups.

Right. But on more of a personal level. Right. Not, hey, smoke my cigars.

Right. Because that makes more sense to actually care about an individual. Yeah. You know, one of the guys, Don Smith in Tyler, Texas, biggest Taranio fan there is out there.

I was just with him a couple weeks ago. I gave him like 15 cigars that had nothing to do with General or me. Just cigars that I had in my travel humidor that people are always giving me. Right.

And they're cigars that I like, so they've stayed in my rotation. " He's been posting them all week. " You know, you try to tell him, "Listen, we're running specials on Taranio," or whatever the hell you're promoting. " That humidor is full of great cigars.

Try them. Expand your palate. You know, if this industry does well, we all do well. And I want everybody to thrive.

That's very admirable of you. You're a sweet, sweet man. No, but I'm not letting him off the hook. So wait a second, before we even go...

Has this been half an hour? It's been over a half hour already. So first of all... What a wonderful show.

Let me ask you a question. I was thinking about adding a fourth question. I'm adding a fourth question. Oh.

So I want to ask you this question. It did not come up in the production. No, I haven't. Dude, I've been dying for the past week.

Don't you need to run this shit by each other? Yeah, no, usually I do. That's the idea. Usually I do, but it's been a rough week.

He's gone rogue. Well, I didn't add the applause today. He did kind of incorporate some fucking applause. The studio audience.

The studio audience. I have bickering hosts in front of me. So let me ask you. It's a good name for a cigar.

Instead of, you know, who would you rather smoke a cigar with, living or dead? So what fictional character would you want to smoke a cigar with? Oh, I kind of like that. Comic book, movie, story, any person that you've seen that you're like, wow, that'd be a bad person to fucking smoke with.

Bill the Butcher from Gangs of New York. There you go. That is a great answer. One of my favorite characters in all movies was Daniel Day-Lewis.

That was a fantastic movie. Oh my God. But I just couldn't get enough of that character. The way he played that role was phenomenal.

That was phenomenal. I think he'd probably kill me at the end of that cigar, but… Eh, maybe. But, yeah. Unless he could use you for something.

Yeah. And I would definitely convince him that he could. He'd provide more cigars. So, what do you think?

That's a pretty good question, though. I'm writing it down. I'm writing it down. Write that down.

It's been accepted. Write that down. We all voted. I'll vote.

Okay. So, hey, dude. You're obviously a great friend to me. I appreciate that.

We've known you for a few years. I fell in love with you guys the day I walked in the door here. And we so appreciate that. When you guys threw me out, I felt great that day.

We did not throw you out. You did. That's a fucking lie. You didn't.

And, you know, but you've always had our back, and it is kind of funny to hear stories about shit that's going on, and our name gets involved, and you know what's true and what's not true, so I get a big kick out of that for sure. And, dude, you know, we hope to have you back on here again. On that note, we'd like to have you down in Miami on "Fuck That Guy". Oh, I'd love to be on part of "Fuck That Guy".

That guy guy, because you are the atypical person that would have a great time on that. Oh man, you know. Unfortunately, we can never go live with that show. Right, no, that wouldn't be good.

We could go on the road. But you being there in person is just as bad as being live. " Right? Exactly, you know it's true.

That's why you're laughing. Don't tell anybody. All right. Check this out.

Don't say words to anybody. I'm like, hold on, hold on, hold on, let me get a pen, let me get a pen. You want to tell people I get a hold of you, Jack? Yes.

How to get a hold of me? Yeah, email, Instagram, Facebook. You know, I'm a little more active now on Instagram, Twitter, I don't do much on, but my Facebook page is where I answer the most questions. So, Jack Taranio, does it say Taranio on the Facebook page?

I think it does. But on my Facebook page is the best way, whether it be a message or just post something on my page. I usually get back to you within five minutes. Awesome, excellent.

So that is the easiest way. m. on a Tuesday? m.

m. , that's when my alarm goes. Well, my alarm doesn't go off, we just naturally. Yeah, just kind of get up.

Kind of get up at that time and I go have a cup of coffee and answer Facebook messages. Starts this day. And you'd be surprised how many people in the middle of the night are sending me messages. Oh, yeah.

No, I hear you. That's nice that a lot of guys think of you in the middle of the night. That was a horrible habit for me to break because I'd pick up the phone and respond. Really?

Oh my God, man. So I just had to push the phone, make sure that the phone's further away from me so that it's completely out of reach. Well, I had to silence my phone, so my phone is on private from 10 o'clock to 6:30. No shit.

I wake up sometimes and I have a bunch of text messages. I won't hear them in the middle of the night, but I had to cut that deal with my wife Because the phone kept going off in the middle of the night. Right. And she's not a happy camper when that phone goes off at two in the morning.

I'm sure she isn't. She's a petite woman, but she will get quite ornery. Feisty. Quite ornery.

She was ready to kick ass in the movie theater last night. You know what? That was a good part, too. Do you mind telling that story?

Come on. That's a great story. So me and my wife have become members of... And don't play it down.

You've got to say the whole fucking story. So we've become members of this movie pass, I don't know if you guys have heard of movie pass, it's like $10 a month, and you can go to basically a movie a day, no blackout day, so we decided we'd go to one week, she'd pick a movie the next week, I'd pick a movie when I'm in town, and there's no veto power, gotta go to that movie. So it's worked out the first three weeks, last night, we tried to get into Black Panther, we couldn't get in. Just the show that we selected, the time that fit us, was sold out.

" So, we picked The 1517 to Paris, which I've heard sucks. But, hell, we had to pick a movie. Oh, that's the one where they use the actual people? The actual people.

Yeah, and they shouldn't have. At least by the first 15 minutes that I got to see, they shouldn't have. And we go walk into the theater, we get our tickets, the theater is ours. There's no one else in this theater.

And we go through the 20 minutes of credits, and you know, we're having our popcorn, and shooting the shit, and the movie's about to start, just now mind you, we are the only two people in this massive movie theater, and just as the movie's about to start, this other couple walks in, and they sit one seat away from me, and I look at her, and I smile, and I'm like, you have an entire theater, go sit somewhere else, and you know, and they got their, they got their back, but okay, they're not bothering me, they're not talking about anything. 15 minutes into the movie, a couple walks in and sits directly behind us. I look at my wife again and, alright, we go to settle down and watch a movie. Now they're talking like they're in their living room.

So, a minute or two into this, I turned around and I said, "Guys, really? Can you hold it down? This is the movie, not the credits. " It has started.

The guy tells me to turn around. I said, "No, I'm not going to turn around. This isn't your living room. This theater is empty.

If you want to talk to your wife or your girlfriend or whoever this is, you could sit up there and talk to her and we won't even know it. The girlfriend or the wife, I think she identified herself as a wife later, told me that it's a free country. You know what, dude, this is a free country. And I said, it is, but this isn't a free movie theater.

And I paid. And I don't want to hear you fucking talking anymore. So the guy, again, all the guy could say was sit, you know, turn around, turn around. So I didn't turn around.

I stood up and got in his face. And basically called him out like in the 50s, we're gonna duke this out right now you fucking asshole you know you know you guys wanted to take this to another level it starts getting ugly and she's insulting me that is insulting me and the girl you know I usually my wife is like what the hell are you doing and she's like now I got these two people and my wife yelling at me but the girl said something uh to my wife like you better calm your man's down or something like that. And my wife said, I would if you guys would shut the fuck up. I was like, yes, Sessie's on my side.

And so I said, listen, two things are going to happen. I'm going to go get the manager and have your ass thrown out of here, or I'm going to kick your ass. And I said, you sit right there. I'm going to go get the manager.

So this is like a 20-year-old kid that I go get. And I said, you're the manager? He says, yes, sir, I'm the manager. I said, well, look, And now, I mean, my blood pressure's up.

I'm like, I said, this is what's going on. I tell him the whole story. He goes, all right, come with me. So we walk into the theater.

My wife has left already. You know, as I'm in the theater, I get a text message from my wife. I'm at Old Navy shopping. So the movie's over.

I mean, we've missed 10, 15 minutes of it now. And believe me, the first 15 minutes were horrific, so I didn't care. And I said, and I see the kid go up to him, say something to him, and they nod. And he comes back, and he says, they said they're going to be quiet.

I said, are you out of your fucking mind? I said, you think me and my wife are going to go back and sit in front of them? What if they start talking? If they start talking, it's just a matter of punches flying.

It's not a matter of me going back to get you. He goes, well, sir, I'm sorry. I can't throw them out for talking. I said, what are you talking about?

That's the whole idea of the movie. The whole idea of the movie is silence your phone and shut the fuck up. It says another thing. And he's like, yeah, you know, I'm sorry I could give you a few passes, and so the kid, you know, I'm a member of the movie pass, I don't need these damn passes, but he gave me four passes to the movies and we left.

50, that movie's gonna, I was gonna go back, you know, wait for it outside, and I was like, calmer heads prevailed, I was like, alright, just let it go, let it go, but that was our excitement last night. See, that's a good story. It's a good story. And now it's on the podcast.

That's right. For all to hear. All right, well, on that note is don't piss Jack off. Don't sit behind me in a movie.

Don't just shut the fuck up and watch a goddamn movie. Yeah. That was just... So if we go to the movies with Jack, we need to sit.

That's it. No, I'm going to be like, hey, hey. Look at that. I mean, listen, honestly.

There's a bad guy. There's a bad guy. Honestly, it escalated so quickly. And I probably overreacted a little bit, but they were pissing me off.

Right. Dude, here's the lesson here. If you walk into a movie, whether it be when the movie is starting or whether it be 15 minutes into the movie, and there's two people in the goddamn theater, go sit somewhere else. Right.

Don't sit next to them. Yeah, no doubt. I wouldn't do that. No, I wouldn't either.

I'll tell you what I like to do is when I go to the movies, if I'm with somebody, I'll buy a big fucking popcorn. And stick your dick in it? No, no, no. I know that joke.

No, that's, come on. You do that on dick. So what I'll do is, I'll have them hold the popcorn, right, and then since it's full, as soon as we sit down, I put my hand in there, I go like this, and I throw it everywhere, all over them, and then I just look at them, I'm like, I don't know, and it's a standard move for me, I do it all the time, well, I don't really go to the movies, but when I do, it's bad for the other person. Well, at least you're working out, you're ready to fight now.

Yeah, you know. Yeah, yeah, yeah, you're ready to throw it out. Of course, I'm ready to throw it out. I mean, fuck it, as long as I get it.

You got that Boston in you, you're ready to throw it out. Right. If I can get it out of the way before the previews end, then we're good, you know? Somebody comes out, what happened?

He fell. I don't know. My pet peeve is that we tend to get to the movie a little too early, so by the time the movie starts, we're out of popcorn. Ah, that's never good.

" Right, exactly. No, you gotta eat it. You gotta eat it. So, lately we've been, you know, maybe we should start showing up 15 minutes later.

Well, you gotta figure that you have a 20 minute window for the previews, right? Right. We live two minutes from the theater. Right.

So you've got to leave 10 minutes after the showing has started. If you like what we're doing, please tell your friends about us. Leave us some feedback. We always like to hear what the hell's going on and if you're enjoying it or not.

I've had a couple people come up to me this week and said that they really loved the show. Oh, that's great. That's really appreciated. At least two people are listening.

Yeah, we're actually up a little bit higher now. Are you? We've got 13 followers, and we've had 720-something downloads. Well, as soon as I get off of here, you're going to have 14.

Boom, boom, we're done. And I think that'll pretty much conclude today's show. Did I leave anything out? Nope, that's it.

Mike 1 and Mike 2, thank you for having me. This was a lot of fun. Thank you for sticking around until I can hear you. Mr.

Taranio was my dad. I'm the last Taranio standing. The last Taranio. All right, that's it.

Goodbye. All right, gang, that's it. Show's over. Time to put out that cigar and get back to work.

Ain't nobody gonna do it for ya. Everybody get hustlin'. " The fire's in their eyes and their words are really clear, so they're so clear. Beat it, just beat it You better run, you better go

Show Notes

Big Jack sits down with us this week and tells us how his humble beginnings working with his GrandFather selling tobacco lead him to his current position of Brand Ambassador for the Brand his Family Started!

You can follow us on IG @Cigarhustlerspodcast or go to our fan page on Facebook at a Cigar Hustlers Podcast.  Leave us your thoughts and comments, as well as suggest a possible guest you would like to hear us have on the show!

You can follow Mike Szczepankiewicz on IG @cigarhustler and Mike Palmer @Floridacigarclub_mike.