Ep9 • The David Garofalo Interview

A cigar shop can look busy and still be losing its future one customer at a time. We bring on our first-ever guest, Dave Garofalo, owner of Two Guys Cigars and host of The Cigar Authority, to break down what separates a “store with a humidor” from a true brick-and-mortar cigar business that lasts for decades.

Dave takes us back to 1985 and walks us through how cigar retail has changed, why he committed to going cigars-only, and how he learned to build loyalty with service and selection instead of constant discounting. We talk customer lifetime value, why an “event” is not the same thing as a deal, and how the right in-store experience turns casual buyers into long-term regulars. If you care about cigar customer service, humidor strategy, and building a cigar lounge community, this is packed with real-world lessons.

We also get into content marketing for cigars, including why Dave started podcasting in 2010 when most people had never heard the word “podcast,” and how education creates better customers who recognize quality and keep coming back. Then we go rapid-fire on what retailers should start doing tomorrow, the biggest product-mix mistake that fuels online cigar discounters, and what both retailers and consumers should demand from a great cigar shop, from cleanliness to professionalism.

Subscribe, share this with a retailer or cigar friend, and leave us a review so we can keep bringing you more maker-and-retail insights like this.

Transcript

Welcome To The Perdomo Podcast

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Welcome to the world of Perdomo Cigars. We deliver the most authentic in-depth cigar education to you, the Cigar Enthusiast. Recorded at the Perdomo Studio in Miami, Florida, brought to you by third and fourth generation Master Cigar Makers. This is the Perdomo Podcast. Your hosts, Nick and Nicholas Perdomo.

SPEAKER_01 0:26

Today we're bringing on someone that who's really mastered cigar retail. This is something I'm extremely, extremely proud of, and really our first guest. Um, we're bringing on the owner of Two Guys Cigars, the host of the Cigar Authority podcast, and really our good friend and our retail partner, Dave Garoffalo. Mr. Dave, we want to welcome you to the Prodomo podcast, and we're glad to have you as our first guest.

SPEAKER_02 0:55

Thank you, and what an honor. First guest, I become a trivia question now. Anybody ask you is from now, the first guest ever on the Prodomo podcast, it's me. I am a trivia question and very excited to be part of it.

SPEAKER_01 1:08

It is you, it is you, and we're grateful to have you on, Mr. Dave. And we have a bunch of questions. This is gonna be pretty cool because it's usually me asking my dad a bunch of questions or my dad asking me questions and so forth. So we're excited, and so we're gonna fire off and we're gonna ask you some questions. And I and really we want our viewers

How Dave Entered Cigar Retail

SPEAKER_01 1:25

and our audience to get to know you, right? And we want to know, and my question to you, Mr. Dave, is how did you get in the cigar business? And back when you got into the cigar business, what did retail look like back then and how has it changed?

SPEAKER_02 1:37

Yeah, I got in the cigar business in 1985. Terrible time to get into the cigar business. Business was dropping, they tell me 6% per year in those days, but I didn't know any better. And I was a nightclub disc jockey looking for a little hot side hustle to do in the daytime because the nightclub DJs worked nights. So I didn't go in till about eight o'clock at night, got out at two o'clock in the morning and would go bother my friends at work all the time. What am I gonna do? I tried golfing, tried hobbies, I could never get into anything. I love work. So I opened a little cigar store with a buddy of mine. He owned video stores of all things, and after about a year or so, he said, This isn't going anywhere. I'm opening more video stores, I'm out of this. I bought him out, I took my brother in as a partner, and we went from there. After about three and a half years or so, and I was hoping the day would come that I could make enough money to survive in the cigar shop business. I made a lot of money in the nightclub business, but the cigar shop was actually taking the money, building the company up as those years went on. And the day came where I felt like I could do it, giving a hundred percent of my attention to the cigar business at that time, and able to, within two years, open two more stores and have three stores. This was in Boston at the time. Again, this is still the nine the eighties, and we were growing because we were brand new, and the industry was dropping, though, is what the cigar reps would come in and tell me. Like you you missed the uh boom of the 70s, and here it was now towards the end of the 80s. But we were growing, things were going good, things were different in those times. Two guys was called two guys smoke shop because there were no cigar shops. There was cigar and pipe shops because there could be money to be made on pipes, and you could maybe survive doing those two things, but being a cigar shop by itself, the name didn't even exist. So uh we sold everything. We sold cigarettes and pipe tobacco and pipes and lottery tickets and coffee and magazines and all kinds of things like that. And until Philip Morris put pressure on me that they wanted 50% control of my shop, and I told them no, they put an all-out effort in to try to hurt my business by running promotions all around our store. And one day they came in and said, You know, what do you say? You're gonna sign on to this after they were uh running buy two get one freeze around me. And I put out the white flag and they said, Okay, sign here. And I said, No, putting the w the white flag out because I'm going cigars only. And they said, No, you're not, because I was a big cigarette store, probably the biggest around the Boston area at the time. And again, being a smoke shop and carrying everything, I said, I'm gonna go cigars only, because the margins actually started changing within the cigar industry. Little companies started getting in there and offering better margins than the terrible margins we were getting in those days. By the way, they were 12, 2, and 5. Those were the numbers. So it would be a 12% discount, is what you were selling cigars at, a 12% from what you paid for the cigar. Unless you bought so many, you got an additional two. That's not two on top of it, it's two off the new lower price. And then the next one was an additional five percent off the new lower price. So you weren't even getting 20% anyway on the cigars, and it wasn't enough to be cigars only. That started changing, and I could see that, and I go, I think I can become a cigar-only shop at these new type of margins if I would take on these new brands that nobody knew. Because the old brands were still those margins, the new guys coming in were the better margins. But in order to do that, I would have to push and promote those brands because, like today, people come in and ask for the ask brands. So you had work to do to make that happen, but I did it. When it came to the music business I was in, I was breaking music, and when it came to the cigar business, I was breaking the new cigars. That actually set me apart from the big competitors that were there. In Boston at the time, we had two major cigar shops, cigar and pipe shops that were there, and they were both over a hundred years old. And here I was a 25-year-old kid getting in there, and I had to differentiate myself from them, which is what I did. And over a few a few years, I was able to become the biggest shop in Boston, and I went from there. Taxation ended up moving us into New Hampshire, and it it went from there to starting all over again. This was in 1995. But as as luck would have it and hard work would have it, business continued to grow, and it's been 41 years. It's hard to believe, but it's 41 years in the same same industry right now.

SPEAKER_03 6:47

Dave, it seems uh with all the all your hard work and you and I are wired very similarly, everything you touch turns to gold, but it's through a lot of hard work where a lot of people don't realize the amount of effort you put in everything you do, and it's all about quality and and the customer service you do. You've written an incredible book that I actually gave my whole sales team to read, David versus Goliath, and maybe a little later you can talk about your newest creation, and it's just such a such an excellent read, and it really helps a lot of young entrepreneurs whether they be in the cigar business or not. And you talk about you're you're building you build some of the biggest cigar stores or best-selling cigar stores in the Boston area, I'd venture to say I think you've built three of the b best cigar stores and biggest cigar stores in the world today, and that's a big attribute to all your hard work. But you know, most cigar stores are very similar, and you're you're really at the pinnacle of doing things a little bit differently. And

Going Cigars Only And Winning

SPEAKER_03 7:45

I just want to ask you a question very simply. At what point did you realize that just having cigars on the shelves wasn't enough? Because you do things very differently.

SPEAKER_02 7:57

Well, uh what what I want to do is specialize in something and say that we we'll be the experts in this field and we'll do it very good. If you look at something like Five Guys, for instance, Five Guys says, we're gonna do burgers, fries, and shakes, that's what we'll do, and we'll be looked upon as with an expert in it as opposed to having chicken sandwiches and larger menus things. I'm I'm gonna hone in on just this. And you know, it was funny. Uh back in the day, we were like the top Garcia Vega El Producto sales around. And at the same time, we were the number one Davidoff cigar store in the nation. And people would say, you know, why are you carrying the the low-price cigars and the high price cigars? I said, Isn't it a niche that I only sell cigars to begin with? And then it's just to say I'm gonna niche into a into a certain thing. I'm gonna have every cigar available, like a great casino would have, that you have penny slots and 25 cent slots, and then you have the the room where the high rollers go too. So they they're taking your money in every every way. If you're a cigar smoker, I built a place for cigar smokers to go. It doesn't matter, and you shouldn't be embarrassed what your budget is. We have a cigar for you, and we're gonna figure out what the right cigar for you is, and try to hang on to you forever. You know, I I don't call it greedy, it it's a bit of long-term greed that we try to hang on to a customer as long as possible. I was the second company ever to have an online source. Why did I put the online source? I did it so if my customer moved away, I put so much work into them. I wanted to keep that customer even if they went away. So that's another thing, too. Of it takes forever. I've heard the words out of you from your dad, it takes forever to get a customer and in two seconds to lose them. I hear that loud and clear, and that's what that's what we try to end up doing. Some of that is give them an experience. You know, coming in and getting a buy three, get one free to me is not an event. It's actually a catastrophe when I end up seeing that. You're losing, you know, 33% of your sales are gone out the window, and you call that an event. It demoralizes the brand on top of it, devalues it. And, you know, that wasn't part of it either. But it's the easiest thing. I get it. It's the easiest thing. That's not what I'm looking for. I'm looking for what's the best thing long term, not a short term. It's always been long term. I even 41 years into it, I still look long term. A new customer comes in and I go, what is the lifetime value of that customer? Not do did I sell him in an extra $100 worth of cigars, oh score. No, I want that guy. If I can hang on to him and he and he spends $5,000 a year and I can keep him for 10 years, it's a $50,000 customer. When we lose one, I look at it the same exact way. That, you know, how many $50,000 sales do we want to end up losing? The answer is zero. Thing is, people move away, people unfortunately die, people stop smoking, we have to bring them in faster than we lose them. And the certainly the ones we have, we have to hang on to them. Love the ones you're with, take care of them. And doing the same thing over and over, even when it's a winner, you got to change it up. You got to keep them interested. That was the same in nightclubs. Nike, the same owner of a nightclub I had, I was there eight years with a certain nightclub owner. He changed the name of the club three different times, and it was the same guy that owned it. But it looked like the new Hut nightclub each time he ended up doing it. So that's what we want to do too, is change it up. There's something always happening at two guys. Uh, we hear our I'm a brick and mortar guy. We do do online, but my my forte is the customer that comes in the store. I happen to love it, and try to get into their minds and figure out what keeps them coming back more and more and hang on to it. Sometimes we have a customer that goes away on vacation. I've heard it more than once, and they buy cigars before they go away, and they come back and they come to see me and almost apologize that they ran out of cigars while they were on vacation. And I said, So what'd you do? And they said, I went into a store there and I got this, and I said, How was a store? And I'm asking them what they thought, but the reason why they're telling me is to basically apologize for cheating on me. And I go, no, no, don't feel like that at all. But they do, they feel like part of the family. And, you know, that goes for e even manufacturers, great partnership manufacturers I deal with, that, you know, if if I didn't buy your new product that came in, you'd feel like, you know, what why did we let you down? What did what do we do? And it wouldn't maybe it maybe it wasn't right for me or whatever, but you would feel that way, and I would feel that way not to do it. And that's how customers feel with me too. So, you know, I try to do it the same way the customer feels with me. That's how I like to do it with the manufacturers at the same time.

SPEAKER_03 12:56

You know, it's a loyalty issue, and I think you have such a loyal customer base. And I wrote a book, it's coming out very short, took me a long time to write because I was waiting for my grandchildren to be born while I continue to book, and I was honored to have Dave write the forward. And one of the things that that that Dave writes is sometimes he feels like he's cheating if he doesn't if he doesn't buy something from me. It's this loyalty that we have together, and there's also a loyalty between the manufacturer, a great manufacturer, together with a great retailer. And I'm proud that that you're not only my friend, but also a phenomenal retailer. And I hear it from the consumers all around. There's there's nowhere I'm not around where whether it be a challenge coin in my pocket, do you have the two guys challenge coin or whatever, you you just got a a a worldwide presence, whether it be two guys cigars or the cigar authority, and you do a phenomenal job.

SPEAKER_02 13:51

Well, it is a partnership, no doubt about it, that I do look at the manufacturers as partners. I have some great ones like you, and I have some not great great ones. Sometimes it takes them a while to figure out that we're in this together. I can certainly buy cigars. The question is, are we gonna be able to sell them and churn them? You know, eat when when a cigar comes in, I'm gonna sell the first round of that cigar, no doubt about it, because I'm gonna get excited and show the customers, my staff is gonna show the customer, here's what's new. The question is, are they ever gonna get there? We're gonna go order the second round because we're gonna sell the first round. Then it becomes, are we ever gonna buy the third round? There's so many that don't make it through the third time. That's when we have to start working together. So, what are we gonna do on the third round to end up making that happen? Is it gonna be events? Is it gonna be promotions? Is it gonna be gift with purchase? Is it gonna be some sort of, you know, I have a podcast, I have somebody on there, and let's get this train rolling. Let's get let's get it going. As much work as it is to try to to get a good customer and hang on to them, the same happens with a good partner, uh, somebody I'm buying cigars from. I don't want to keep looking for new friends at the trade show. I want to certainly hang on to the ones I have. Every once in a while, there's a there's a new hot guy out there, but some of these other manufacturers, to be honest, drop off. They they're happy they made the sale and it's over. They they rub their hands together, it's over. They've made the sale and it's over. It is not over. It's it's just beginning. That same thing happens when I get a new customer that comes in. They're new, and now I want to get them into the engaged into events. If we could break bread together, if they can do show up at one of my events, if they can go to cigar school with me, if they can be a watcher of the cigar authority, then we're curating long-term customers. Same happens with a manufacturer, and there's this a few that get it, most don't. And you've been with me, oh my god, since the very beginning, when you know your slips would be handwritten before even computers. So you know, I look at that and it's it's been a long run, it's been a great run. You get it, and it's been a back and forth of helping each other out. That's partnership, that's what the uh a retailer needs to do. They have to find great partners in this business.

SPEAKER_03 16:12

And the consumer sees it.

Why Content And Podcasting Matter

SPEAKER_01 16:15

Yes, yeah, absolutely. Well, Mr. Dave, you know, one of the things too is you know, outside of building an incredible business and being a great partner not only with us but with a lot of different companies, you did something totally different. You started working and you you really were early on content, right? And one of the big questions I have to ask you is, and I think you've been going on I think 16 years now with the Cigar Authority show. I had the honor of being the you being the Cigar Authority being my first ever live interview that I ever did, and I think I was 17 going on 18 years old in my senior year high school, so that was cool. And what what motivated you to do that and and really how did it change your business?

SPEAKER_02 17:05

So we we have uh issues being selling cigars because for whatever reason people think that the product is bad, so there's no law against advertising cigars, but a lot of companies decide they want no part of it. That goes for social media. We cannot advertise on social media, they won't allow it. The newspapers, the magazines, the radio stations, TV stations around here. Back in the early days, I advertised heavy. I understand advertising pays. You know, people say advertising costs, it also pays done properly. So I did a good job. I I I got the name out of it, but as time went on, I would see new people moved in our area and didn't know who two guys was. I I built it years ago, but as new people move in, they don't even know who we are. So my daughter, Gianna, you know Gianna, and she's the one that said, Dad, you got to get on social media. So she sets up a Facebook account for me, and I said, Okay, and she says, put something on there, and I put something on there. A whole bunch of people friended me and answered back from whatever I wrote. And a day goes by and she says, Hey, do you all these people wrote to you and you just posted another post? You're supposed to answer what the people wrote. And I said, Well, I have no time for that. I said, You answer, and she said, I don't know the answers. I can't answer it for you because I don't know what the answers are. And I said, I just can't do that. I can't be on there and answer hundreds of people's things when I'm operating my three stores and my online business, and there's no time to do that. So she said, You have to. It's social media. The idea is to be social. So I said, I'm gonna have to figure something else out. And I bought a book on social media, going to the airport, going to see somebody. I grabbed the book at the airport, it said social media, and I read about social media, and in it said podcast. So I read about that and I said, Wow, this is kind of one-directional. I get to say it, and the information is out there. This is even before there was any video to it, it was audio only at the time. And I said, Okay, I'll uh I'll try that. So we put a podcast together in 2010. Nobody knew what a podcast was. I I remember even telling people they would come in, I said, You got to listen to the podcast, and they go, Well, I don't have podcasts. And I said, Let me see your phone. And I said, See that little purple thing? It says podcast. Click that button, let me do it for you. And it was really hand-to-hand combat at that time. But very quickly I learned that podcasting wasn't my local advertising, it was international, that our our listeners were coming from Canada and coming from England and usually English-speaking countries. But as I was looking at, I go, these people from everywhere. So it be it became a pivot at that point and say, okay, this is not going to work for that, but it works. So what do we do with this? And the whole idea was to educate the consumer. If I can do that, I believe an educated customer is my best customer. If if they really know about cigars, they can re they can look and see two guys as probably probably caring for their cigars, seeing the vast inventory we carry and that there's something for everybody here, training my staff to know about cigars, they would come in and say, Wow, those guys really know about cigars. When you when you don't have an educated consumer, they they don't see it yet. So you get them educated and then they realize how good we really are. So that was the idea of it. I'm not a quitter. You know, I there was nobody at the beginning. It took us three and a half years to get our first advertiser on the show, which which helps fund the show to begin with and keeps me motivated, to be honest. If if if I'm seeing nobody's listening and nobody cares, I'm gonna care less or say it's not working. All of a sudden it starts working. You get all the reps that are Road Warriors that these guys are are doing lots of time, windshield time, they call it, and them contacting me, I start showing up at trade shows and they go, Oh, I listen to you all the time. There was more people talking to me at the trade show, not for being two guys, but being for the guy on the cigar authority, which to me is, you know, like 41 years of working very hard on this on two guys, I became the guy from the Cigar Authority because the power of media, right? Social media, which is the podcast, you guys are brand new with it, but you're you're already seeing drastic numbers. Well, I'm I'm watching anyway, that huge numbers of followers that you have listening to our podcast already. What's the magic that's gonna happen is you're gonna get people that aren't your customers, and maybe they smoke something else, but you're gonna educate them anyway, and they're gonna appreciate what a Perdomo smoke. Cigar is and the work that gets put into it as they learn of what's happening. It's you you see it when you have your tours that all these people that go to the Perdomo Tour, and I don't know if it ever happened that you know people that aren't into Perdomo cigars end up going on the tour or somebody goes with somebody that isn't there. I would I would tend to bet that they leave a Perdomo fan after they have got educated. So an educated consumer for a good product, which I believe two guys is a good product, an educated consumer becomes my best customer and a will for you.

SPEAKER_03 22:36

I agree with you 100%. You know, we kind of mirror each other, like I said earlier. Your daughter talked to you about social media and podcasting, and Nicholas is the one who brought it up to me, you know. And one of the things we were excited about with our podcasts is this is what we do for a living. We're on cigar farms. You know that you've been to my facilities numerous times. And you being so educated, being in the industry for over four decades, and being in numerous factories all over the world from the Dominican Republic, Honduras, Nicaragua, Cuba, you've been everywhere. Your knowledge is vast, but there's a lot of bad knowledge out there and a lot of bad bum dope that you hear, and you hear it all the time too. And one of the things that Nicholson brought up to me when we were doing this podcast was really to meet the makers, the guys who actually do it every day, not a guy who picks up hints of plum and you know, button wood and all these other things that I don't really taste in a cigar, and probably you don't either. But you know, one of the things that we did is, you know, we've been in the industry for over three decades, and I'm proud of my son, and he taught me something which was really great, and that's that's the truth. But you know, we launched the Prodomo 30th anniversary, then we then we launched Proudomo Legacy, and now I'm proud to say we've launched the Prodomo Legacy father and son together, and we're launching it with you, the three most really special brands in our family's portfolio. And people asked why'd you why'd you launch it with two guys cigars? And my answer is to them is they just don't sell cigars. And my question to you is you really don't just sell cigars, you build brands decades ago, and today

How To Build Real Anticipation

SPEAKER_03 24:20

I think you do even more. You build anticipation, and that's something that's special that people don't get. And I wanted to, if I could, ask you if you could walk our audience through on how you do this, some of these ideas that are just you know, I'm like a sponge. I want to listen and learn from everybody. And when you came out with your first book, I was on a flight to Italy. I think I took a picture of it. I was on a nine nine and a half hour flight. I certainly wanted to take a little nap, but I couldn't put that book down. And I literally read that book. It took me nine hours and thirty-five minutes. I read that book from cover to cover, and Janine kept saying, Are you gonna go to sleep? I said, I can't put this book down because I'm you know, I'm fascinated by things I can learn from. And my dad always used to say, if you don't learn every day, why I'd live, you know what I mean? And I just wanted to see if you could walk our audience on how you do these, how do you build the anticipation, where others really get a lot of benefits from it.

SPEAKER_02 25:20

They do. And and I know, you know, and after you did the first one with me, which I was very grateful that you did it, when you came back for the second one, I said, why don't you go to somebody else? Because I don't want you to get any negative pushback from it. And you fought me on it, and you and it made sense that you said, listen, you're really helping the other stores because you're you're you're getting everybody excited about it. This is, you know, there's people in the cigar industry that are in the cigar industry that were my customer first. And these are big, some big names that are out there that lived in the area and used to shop. And I remember them as they started shopping with me and what ended up happening with them. And they said that my excitement of the product is what drove them into the business. And there's many people that get excited to listen to the cigar authority, and they say, I want to get in the cigar business, and I try to talk them out of it. And I said, I'm just m getting getting you excited about it, but I w you you need to know the the bad end of it and the business end of it because it's it's not easy, it's uh it's a lot of hard work. And what what ends up happening, and and maybe some of this comes from the nightclub DJ stuff too, because I had to fill rooms every single day. I worked Wednesday through Sunday at stores. I had seven clubs going at once, and that would be the deal I would make the barum that I would turn into the nightclub, and they would say, Well, what are you gonna do on Wednesday night? And I said, Well, Wednesday night is ladies' night, and ladies get in free. And the guy says, Oh, we don't even charge cover charge. I said, Well, we're gonna start covering shut cover charge and we're gonna let the ladies in for free on Wednesday, and this is what's gonna happen. And then what's gonna happen Thursday? Because they could they could pack the place on a Friday, Saturday, everybody could. But what are you gonna do for your retail store on Tuesday? Well, it's slow on Tuesday. You need to do promotions, events, and things to drive people in. You got to create excitement. And some of this excitement, we're gonna launch the Prodomo Father and Son Legacy on a Wednesday, and we're gonna jam-pack a restaurant on that day with over 200 people, and then we're gonna launch it in the retail stores on Thursday, and then move you around Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and three of our different stores, and we're gonna blow it up, and then we're gonna run out of cigars. And I said it to Nicholas was getting a little pushback from a retailer. I don't know if he's listening, and I'm sure he is. I get it. I get the I get the the thought of why you're doing it with him and you're not doing it with me. Please understand what is supposed to happen here. I would never try to hurt the Perdomo company, family, or brand. Quite the contrary. What I'm hoping to do is actually blow it up and get the anticipation for their cigars. And we saw it because as I'm pushing back, I'm saying the question that I end up acting asking Nicholas is after the fact, and I go, What ended up happening? And they said, they didn't receive their cigars yet. My phone's lighting up, and they ordered X amount of cigars already. And they said, I want to place an order. And he said, You already ordered. And he says, No, I want to double the order because now customers are coming into them and saying, When are you getting that? When are you getting the new Podomos in? When are you getting the new Podomos? And the guy realizes, oh my God, 20 people already asked me. I'm going to need more of these. And they're ordering more. They come in and they end up selling. I wish, I wish everybody was doing this for everybody and rise all chips. Let's rise them all. But that that comes with excitement of the product. I truly, I'm not an actor. I truly am excited about the product that comes in. I couldn't fake it. It's genuine. And the people end up biting. You know, they get excited too. If I yawn, that's contagious too. You'll yawn too. If I get excited, you'll get excited too. So what do we want to do as brick and mortar retailers? We want to get excited over the product. The customer will get excited. And where I have the platform of the cigar authority, unfortunately, the idea was that it would narrow down to my stores, but that's not what ended up happening. It went international. So we're going to blow it up. And as we do this, internationally, the Prodomo Father and Son Legacy is going to be talked about, thought about, and that person wherever they live is going to go into that store, hopefully, and we know already it's worked already twice. Why shouldn't it happen the third time? It should. And I'm a proponent on that. If I have a slot machine, I put a dollar in and two comes out, when do you start putting that dollar in? Never. Just keep doing it. So you're saying, okay, here's the third one. Is there another guy to do this? I hope there is. Maybe somebody's in in the learning process of this and said, okay, let me hype something up and see what ends up happening. I'm telling you it works because it's worked for me for 41 years. It works for you too. Hype it up. I'd be happy to sit on the sideline and waiting for the people to pour in because it's going to require a lot of work on my side. I'm going to do it. It's going to benefit for me, but it's going to benefit for everybody, including Perdomo, at the same time. My fingers are crossed, but we have experience already that we've done it not just twice with Perdomo. I've done this a hundred times. And I feel proud that I can actually bring a brand to life. I try to do it. I've done it many times. I did it with music. Back in those days, in the music days, this is disco era. I would take a song that hasn't even hit the radio yet, ever, start pushing it, pushing it in the nightclubs that I was controlling. The radio stations would call me on a weekly basis and say, what songs are working? I would tell them the songs that are working on the floor. The radio stations would then start adding it into their mix, and the next thing you know, there's a hit song. If you go back in those days, you'll see that that's what happened in those days. I was breaking the music. I think I've been breaking cigars, good cigars. I got to stand behind them. I'm not going to, you know, I thought about it once and said, I wonder if I could take a crappy cigar and blow it up and it would be popular anyway. Eh, but then all of a sudden it'll ruin my reputation. So I never ended up doing it. But I think I could, but my reputation would be shot at that time. So if the cigar was lousy, no, I'm not going to do it and blow it up and tell everybody this is the next big thing. But if I believe in it, I can do it. And I'm not special. I'm just going to put the effort and work into it. They should do it too. And right now, feed off of me of what I'm doing. And if you're able to step up and do it, I would be honored to step aside and feed off of you. The only thing is I I hear, I hear it that retailers say it's not my job to sell the cigar. That is the only reason why you came to work today is to sell cigars. We are cigar salesmen. We sell. Or you're a cashier, one or the other. You're a convenience store, a convenience to them to walk in and grab that cigar that they're going to be there, or you're selling cigars. I'm a cigar salesperson. And that's what I'm going to do is sell. If everybody can get in that mode, I think we could actually defeat and beat the online discounter. And that's what the book was. Dave Drus Goliath, how to compete and beat the online giant, is me helping a retailer once again. And it was for all retail, but again, I've been in the same business for 41 years. This is all about cigars. I would just sell less books if I just told, just said it was about cigars. It works for anything. So let me sell the book to everybody because I'm a salesperson once again. And I'm I'm trying to do that. And rising tides raise all ships. If I can hype that cigar up, I don't know, I don't know how many regular legacies you sold, Ashia. We sold a lot of them, but after the fact, did it work? Did you sell more legacies because I did that? I know you, Nick, and Nicholas. You wouldn't have come back to the well if it didn't work. You're not stupid. So you came back to the well three different times. So I'm delivering.

SPEAKER_01 33:28

You are, but one of the things too is we want it, we wanted to be like the LA Lakers, the Chicago Bulls. We're looking for a three-peat with you. And so, but also, too, this is this is very personal. You know, I consider you like a second dad, Mr. Dave. You've always been there for me, and especially when I needed questions and advice. I mean, Pronomo Legacy was a was a it was a thought for me. And you know, I called you and it was a secret. My dad had no idea about it. For a long time, Arthur didn't know about it. Just I was I was really piggybacking piggybacking off of you in terms of your advice, and you have helped set the stage, so I'm forever grateful to you. And but as much as this is about business, this is really personal, and I take it that way. I know my dad does too, and Arthur, and we're we're grateful for the partnership. But I think with our audience, you know, the tremendous amount of retailers who are listening and people who want to get into cigar retail. You know, there's these stories. This is why we're doing this podcast, right? This is why we have you on again as on on as a guest. This is why my dad and I, we do this a couple times a month. And you know, we're this is what it's all about. So I'm I'm really grateful to have you on. I'm grateful that we we're having this conversation. I I think you agree, Dad.

SPEAKER_03 34:41

100%. So I'm gonna ask you the next question if you don't mind.

SPEAKER_01 34:44

This would be rapid

Three Retail Moves To Start Tomorrow

SPEAKER_01 34:45

fire.

SPEAKER_03 34:45

Yeah, and I think this is gonna not only help the retailer, but also the consumer is probably gonna echo everything you say because one of the great things about your store is your customer service, too. And so my question is, Dave, if you could give me three things that every retailer should start doing tomorrow.

SPEAKER_02 35:05

Okay, rapid fire means I go short versions of these long stories I have. One is gonna be price the box of the cigars. And the answer is you've never bought anything in a store that didn't have a price on it, I'm sure I didn't, and they don't either. And I hear from retailers that say I don't sell very many cigars, and I say, I've never been to your store before, but let me guess. It says $10 with a magic marker written on the side of your box, maybe a crayon, and that's all it says on there. And they go, No, no, I use a label maker. I said, Okay, does it say how much the box is? And he says, No. And I said, Well, how do you expect somebody to buy the box if the price isn't there? What do you give a discount if they buy the box? And he said, I'd give ten percent. I said, Well, you're here with me right now. Who's working in the store? How much will they give? Well, nobody's buying it anyway. I said, Nobody's buying because the price isn't on it. Put the price on it in a year. Will you give me that somebody's gonna buy a box of cigars? Let's take a $10 cigar, it's a box of $20, it would be $200. You're gonna take 10% off, which would be $180, and the place to go would be $179.99. It says $10, it says $179.99 next to it for the full box of $20. They can see that they're saving $20 on the box. Is somebody gonna buy a box in the course of a year? And he says, Yeah, of course. I said, How many boxes do you have open? He says, $700. I said, that's $700 if they only buy one box a year. There's 700 boxes. I just changed your life. I probably doubled or maybe tripled your your your business for the year, but you got to actually do it. You know, you only have to do it once. Until the price changes of that product, you only have to do it once. That's the number one thing that I look and see that that's missing. Selling 20 cigars instead of one is 20 times more that that'll happen. Are you gonna get 100% of them? No. But if you visit two guys, 80% of the cigars I sell, 80 is by the box and 20% by the single. Nobody else is probably doing 20% by the box that I have seen yet. You can tell me you go around the stores, I don't, but I don't I don't see that happening. And that so you know, going against the the mail order guys, almost 100%, besides gift packs that they make, 100% of their sales is by the box. They don't sell by the single. So people are buying by the box, just not from you. So we got to change that up. For that, the number two thing is inventory. You need to have inventory to be able to do it. Maybe you're not putting the price of the box on the box because you don't have the inventory. You need to have inventory, it's the most valuable thing you have. Besides your mailing list, the people's names and addresses you need to get a hold of, the second biggest thing you need is inventory. You need to have that product on hand. Even when the guy comes in and says, Listen, I'm going away. Like I was telling you, my customer feels bad when they buy a cigar when they're going away. They bring a box with them, but they go through it. Well, the next time he comes in, he's not going to buy a box. He's going to buy two boxes. But I need two boxes for him to be able to do that. And at Santa Maria's my buyer, he does a great job, three different stores that we make sure we have plenty of product on hand for that to happen. Besides the oddball thing of somebody lowering their price of the product, and the only person I can think of that ever did it is Nick Perdomo for the FDA that lowered the price. Usually the price goes up, meaning my inventory value goes up every single time there's a price increase. I should be happy actually when the price increase happens. The value of my overall uh inventory goes up when that ends up happening. So kept properly, the cigars last longer. There's not a problem. It's not like we're we're selling food that goes bad. These cigars are kept properly, the value ends up going up, but have the inventory. What I did early on is every month the money that was coming in, I didn't take the money, I invested it back into my business and built the inventory. Every year our inventory level goes up and goes up, and our business goes up and up at the same time. If you don't have it on the cart, you can't sell it. And then you say, you know, where can we go? I have plenty of inventory. Even my accounts have have have said you need more turns, you're carrying too much inventory. They're wrong. The the inventory level helps me grow, and that's why an accountant is a historian. They just look at what the history is, they're not looking into the future. I look into the future. I want to grow. How do I grow? And you grow by inventory. That's number two. So put the price on it, grow the inventory. I'm looking for a third thing. You have to take care of your customers. Your customer is the most important thing. When a customer comes in the door, they're the only reason why you came to work. That is it. I say it to my employees all the time. There's a little dinger that goes off, a little bell when somebody comes in. All of the three, two guys, you'll hear it when you walk in. Certainly our employees do. It's showtime. If you are pricing cigars, if you're doing something else, drop it, and we're on the customer at that point. We're there to serve the customer, get them everything they need to have a great experience. And that includes every add-on you can possibly think. The guy comes in and buys four torpedoes because he's going golfing, and you don't tell him that he needs a lighter and a cutter, the guy's gonna have a bad experience with that torpedo. Imagine showing up and trying to gnaw through a torpedo because you, as as a experienced tobacconist, didn't explain to him that he needs a cutter on that golf course to cut that cigar. He's gonna have a bad experience. And he needs a lighter. And here's the here's a jet lighter, a windproof lighter that's gonna help you on the golf course, and that is customer service. That is not adding on. If you get them for the car ashtray, you get them for extra cigars, all that, all that is good of hey, if you tried this, you'll probably like this. That's all great. But the the regular stuff of what you need to have a great experience, or else you're just acting like a convenience store. If you're a convenience store, then you're carrying out of convenience these items for them. They're gonna find somebody that has it cheaper, closer to them, more convenient, or whatever. You have to differentiate yourself or do things that are different than the online guy does. We have things that we can do that they can't do. So you have to do more of those things, which is suggestive selling. What do they need? So that is the the third. I got a million of them, but those are if you ask me three of them, those are the three.

SPEAKER_01 41:31

Thank you, Dave. Thank you. Appreciate it. What is it? Promo cut the S chip. That's right.

SPEAKER_02 41:38

They're the only ones I can think of that ended up doing it. My, you know, it's it's funny when that happened, and I was talking to Arthur and your dad as you were preparing to do that, and you said, Well, what about your inventory? And I said, What about it? And they said, We've devalued your inventory. You got a lot of inventory there. I said, Nick, we've had price increases at that time for 30 years from everybody. I never called a manufacturer back up when the price goes up and said, by the way, this is how many cigars I have. I must owe you some money because the price, the value of my inventory just went up. I've never even offered that. So I'm certainly not going to ask you to cover my inventory for the one time that the price went down. I think I think that would be very unfair and unreasonable to ask. I said, Don't worry about it. Happy to do

The Product Mix Mistake Retailers Make

SPEAKER_02 42:25

it, and let's see what ends up happening.

SPEAKER_01 42:27

Okay. I get it. And I guess the second fire, you know, rapid fire question I have for you, Mr. Dave, is what is the biggest mistake that retailers are making right now?

SPEAKER_02 42:40

They are going, it's it's what they're carrying in the humidor. So I have I have a graded system where I try to take the personality out of it and say, what is good cigars for me to have in my in my store? And there's there's some big name brands, and I'm not going to name them, but there's big name brands. If you if you're a retailer, you know what it is. It's it's online at real deep discount prices, and you're hearing it from your customer. Your customer's coming in and saying, How much is that cigar? $12? I can get it for $6 online. Those are things you have to have out of your store, out of view, because they're looking at that and they're assuming everything in your store is overpriced. But the customer's asking for it. Well, brand switch them, find something else for them to do and get that poison out of your store because it's actually degrading it. But again, in order to do that, you're gonna have to do some work. You're gonna have to find an alike product for it, show it to them, explain it to them, and brand switch at that point. I've taken brands out of our store that we do huge numbers with, some numbers higher than some stores do in their whole store. And you gotta bite the bullet every once in a while, and you've got to say, this is hurting me in the long run, not in the short run. In the short run, you're gonna make your your $5 or whatever you're gonna make in profit. In the short run, you're gonna lose that customer. Customer, because he's gonna buy that single from you, overpriced, then he's gonna buy the box from them, and they're gonna do it right actually, by the way, right in your lounge as they're sitting there. They're smoking the cigar, trying the tasting rounds, which is your store, just a tasting round, tasting the cigar and say, wow, it is really a good cigar. I like it. It's good. It's a $12 cigar, it's really nice. Now they're gonna start searching. Oh, here it is for six dollars. Let me buy a box or two directly from them. They bought a single from you, two boxes from them, and you're saying, wow, I don't really sell cigars. It's your product mix. You gotta change your product mix when and if that happens. And the majority of stores are carrying these poison brands because they're asked for. Guess how they built, got built in the first place? We, the brick and mortar store, built them. Me, I did it too. I was part of that too. It wasn't a problem until it became a problem. And some of these brands own the biggest discount mail order places that there are. They're the owners of it. Of course they can sell the cigar cheaper than you can. They sell it to you and they make money selling it to you. They make more money selling it to your customer. It's called brand acquisition. They acquire your customer. Customer acquisition. They're acquiring your customer. I don't think you should be partners with them. That's not a partnership where they sell you cigars and take your customer away. They're just gonna put you out of business.

SPEAKER_03 45:25

Makes total sense. Here's a tough one, but it'll help a lot of people, I think, in the future if they'd want to do something. If you started if today you

Starting Over Smarter With New Tools

SPEAKER_03 45:35

had to start a new cigar store, is there anything you would do differently?

SPEAKER_02 45:41

My new book that's coming out, Don't Burn Your Hand on the Stove, these uh business and life mistakes that have made, and you learn from your mistakes. That's what the whole book is about. So I do learn from my mistakes. That that if if I have to say what's my magic sauce of it, is I don't make the same mistake twice. I certainly make mistakes and probably more than most people, but I probably get to bat more than most people, but I make a lot of mistakes. But making the same mistake twice, I hate myself if that happens. So I try not for that to ever happen. And if I'm looking at how I run two guys now, I'm running it with none of those mistakes. There'll be new mistakes, there'll be other mistakes that end up happening, but I I there's there's nothing that I'm doing right now that is a mistake or I would have corrected already. So it it's it seems you know crazy to say I'm running perfect, but I'm constantly looking at something. If something's wrong, it gets fixed as fast as humanly possible. So there really is nothing. If you want to see something running at 100% of the way it is, this is it. And as this next thing falls, and that could be the next company buys another discount mail order catalog, and I have to start working that brand out. But short of what's happening behind closed doors right now that I don't know about, this is the way a new store should open. And I've had retailers that already exist come and spend a little time with me and see how it operates, or some come before they open their store, and that's very smart of them. Come to look at somebody successful and see how they do it and emulate that success. And unfortunately for me, I didn't have that option to do. I just, you know, did it and made mistakes along the way, corrected those mistakes, caught costly mistakes at that time, because I didn't have very much money, and when I made a mistake, it hurt. But if I made those mistakes today, they would really cost a lot of money because I order lots and lots of cigars now. So a mistake would be lots more painful. But I'm wiser. I'm wiser today than I was. So listen to the people that have been around for a long time. Because and I do, not just in our business either. It could be any business. I'm learning all the time. If you look at my bookshelf, it's marketing, promotion, advertising, sales. I'm studying all the time. If you look at my phone, you'll see all the books on tape and stuff that I listen to. That's what I do, and it's nonstop sharpening myself because times have changed too. How would I have known about podcasting if I didn't read something at that at that time to know that the next thing exists? AI is something now. Looking at, I'm looking at it, studying it. I'm like, what is there that can help me as a brick and mortar retailer that's happening on AI? I'm trying to learn as it goes on. I'm usually first to market with all these things. I was the second male online cigar store. I was first at a lot, a lot of different things that ended up happening in the cigar industry. And as I'm getting older, I know that there's younger minds. I employ younger people. I ask them all the time, you know, how how do I get the younger person to come in here? What is is happening? And they say, you know, the young younger people like experiences. Okay, so let me do the New England Cigar Expo that I started three years ago. Let me create a two-day experience where somebody new could could dive into the cigar industry. I we have the Cigar Hall of Fame that we're creating up here in our second floor, and it'll be a place for people to go so they can have these experiences because that's what this generation supposedly is into. We'll see as it goes on, and I'll uh I'll pivot when I need to pivot.

SPEAKER_01 49:27

Yeah, it's it's great. Yeah, I mean, 100%. I you know you look and you know, everything's about

Choosing Brands By Core Values

SPEAKER_01 49:35

just you know, my next question to you, Mr. Dave, is what for you, and even as a consumer for in your opinion, as for a cigar consumer, a retailer, but specifically for yourself, what makes a cigar manufacturer, what makes a cigar brand worth your time? And how how is it personally for you and how is it professionally? I mean, there's got to be a balance, right? It's just there's a connection, is my point.

SPEAKER_02 49:59

So one thing I learned recently is it seems like certain people mend well with the same type of person. So I have core values, and I'm living by them very, very strongly lately in my later years. And as I go back historically and I look at people I dealt with that didn't have the core values I have, uh, it never worked out well. And they end up either getting away from me or I get away from them. That includes employees, that includes partnerships with manufacturers that I deal with. I want to deal with people that are like-minded from me, that are honest people, hard-working people, that, you know, the handshake is good enough. They say they're in, they're in, fast and efficient, work the way I work, and I work very well with people like that on on the ones that are different, and not to say it's better or not, their their core values are different than mine. If you really look at it, you'll see that they, the people that they're dealing with is all the same as them. They say that people you hang around with, that if you average the weight of all these people, you end up weighing in the same group of people that weigh what you weigh. So you can imagine I have guys that are heavier than me and guys that are lighter than me. Same goes for you know what they like, what they're interested in, what you know, family type people that care about their family, and and you know, that becomes today, and if I could go back in time, that's the thing I didn't understand most recently, is the core values. And say if I could ever go back, I would have not done business with certain manufacturers in the first place. I wouldn't be uh hiring certain people that I hired and didn't work out. But today I feel like the core people that I deal with on a day-to-day basis have the same core values that I have. I'm happier for it and business is growing because of it.

SPEAKER_03 52:01

Makes total sense again. You know, Dave, this last question I got

Competing Without Hating Other Retailers

SPEAKER_03 52:05

for you, I think, helps the consumers equally on this question. But I wanted to ask you would you give us your five what final advice would you give to retailers that are listening? Because we have a lot of retailers and consumers that listen all over the world. What advice would you give them?

SPEAKER_02 52:24

And I'm not telling anybody to do it exactly the way I do it, because if you have somebody doing it in your area the same way, I even say it to local retailers that open near me. And we we're unique unique in this state of New Hampshire. We have the by far the best state organization, the Cigar Association in New Hampshire. We retailers get together usually on about a monthly basis. Uh, we all get together here at two guys, and these are all my competitors, and we have a lobbyist and we fight legislation. We're one of three states in the country that have no tax on tobacco. It's not by accident, it's a lot of hard work. But retailers seem to hate each other for whatever reason elsewhere. When I was in Boston, that's the way it was too. They hated me in Boston. If they hate me in New Hampshire, they're keeping it a good secret because they come visit me on a monthly basis, they call for help, we help each other. We're living the same life. So we don't need to hate each other. We need, we're the only friends we have, is each other, to be honest with you. And, you know, people will say, well, that store is right on top of me. I don't know if they push back and say, don't sell that cigar to this other one because this one's right on top. You guys know better than anyone. You want to know about a cigar store that's right on top of each other. I have a cigar store on top, on the next floor from us in our natural location, literally on top. We have nine cigar shops on the same street as us in Salem, New Hampshire, and the same goes for Seabrook. Competition is never negative to me. I like it. It makes me better. I work harder around competition. It brings everybody up. If you want to compete, if you want to work hard, open a store near David Garofalo, and you're gonna work hard. You're gonna be forced to, or you're gonna go out of business. So the folks we have around us are hardworking. And you you make your way around New Hampshire. You probably do well here in New Hampshire because they all work very hard. But don't they try to be me. I be I'm me the best because that's what I do. And I say to them when they do it, you know, if I were you, find find another way around this. Be be a little different, carry different products than I do, uh, do different events because whatever you're gonna do, I'm gonna try to do better than you're gonna do, and you're gonna be in second place. So do it different. That's what we have around here is a bunch of great retailers doing a different job. There was one time I was invited to the Cohiba 25th anniversary in Dominican Republic, where Edgar Cullman, who owned General Cigar at the time, took the top 25 retailers in the country, got us together, and said, You guys are gonna make the next cigar. You're gonna pick the blend, pick the packaging, pick the pricing. We're gonna do it all together as 25 people. Well, we fought like cats and dogs for two days till he threw his hands up in the idea and said, It's over. Have a nice couple of days here, rest and relaxation, because you guys can't agree to anything. These were all successful retailers, and we all did it differently. So I'm not telling you to do it my way. They were all successful doing it all a different way. So you can do it a different way, but let me tell you, every one of those 25 were hard-working, smart retailers, and that's what they had to be. We we we had some things in common, but some people wanted to sell the cigar for a real lot of money and make it look old school. Other people wanted to make it high-tech and look new and be lower priced, and this was the fight that was going on. Well, one of the retailers was in Las Vegas where they were selling hundred dollar cigars, and another one was in New Hampshire selling Garcia Vegas, which was me, and everything in between. So we we your area is different, your customer base is a bit different. Some of the things connect exactly the same and and shouldn't change, but some of the things do. So be yourself, be honest with yourself, be true, uh, be excited about the products that you carry. Uh if you're yawning about it, so is your customer. If you're excited, it'll be contagious. It'll be they'll be excited about it too. Get off, you know, I hate to say it, but get up off your ass and work on your business.

SPEAKER_01 56:36

Great points. Yeah, it's awesome. I mean, thank you, Mr. Dave, for those great,

What Consumers Should Demand In Shops

SPEAKER_01 56:40

great answers. My question is, you know, what what should consumers look for in a great cigar shop? What makes it a great cigar shop and and why should consumers what what do consumers actually have to look for to designate it as a great cigar shop, in your opinion?

SPEAKER_02 56:57

Well, nobody likes a filthy store. And I know some of it was, you know, I want to look like that. It looks rough and rugged or whatever, and it's dimly lit lights and it and it's not displays thing, and this is how we do. We want you to feel at home. Unless you live in a shithole. Nobody wants it. And nobody wants a dirty bathroom. I promise you. The the place has to be topped off and cleaned multiple times a day during the day. Empty the asheries, clean that place. It looks like junk. Get your feet, get make sure the customers get their feet off the furniture. They have to act a certain way too. Every once in a while you gotta fire a customer, which is very, very painful to do. Again, hard to get them, but they have to act a certain way too. It's a business, it's a real business, it's not a hangout. You're there to to sell product. It's as much as some of these guys hang out and spend the day, it's not their clubhouse. It has to be treated like a business. And they'll there'll be especially if you've been doing that for years and you're listening to me and say, I'm gonna make a change. Let me tell you it's a painful change when you make that change, that the pushback is gonna be dramatic that happens. So do it carefully and with with a heart as you make these changes. But you you have to treat your business as a business. Most of the retailers that are out there and you know seem like hobbyists, that this is their hobby, uh, this is what I want to do when I retire and have a place to hang out. Well, open a open a little men's club or something like that. But to call it a cigar shop in a in a business, it's it's not gonna go well. And you know, you believe me, your customer doesn't appreciate being around that filth and and the your business will

Hard Truths Book Tease And Closing

SPEAKER_02 58:40

grow if you do it right.

SPEAKER_01 58:41

Absolutely. No, I mean this was Mr. Dave, we can't thank you enough for being on the show. This was it was great.

SPEAKER_03 58:49

I think the customer and the the retailer got a tremendous amount of knowledge from Dave in his 41 years, and I can speak for myself. I certainly did. Every time I talk to him, it's always something new.

SPEAKER_01 58:59

Yeah, it's great. I mean, this is the episode where we've talked the least, so I love it. I love it. We appreciate it.

SPEAKER_02 59:06

I I'm honored to do it. But you can see 41 years later, I'm still passionate that and I excuse my language if I you know when you when you said something that that sparked a a nerve in me, this is the way I talk, and this is the way it is. This is how I was brought up. You know, you know my mother and and how it is. It is what it is, this is it. And and some people don't like to hear the way it is, but I think they need to. I need I think they need to hear the hard truth. And I'm not, I don't know who they are. They're watching this. If you're watching it, don't push it aside. If this is you, look at yourself, look at yourself in the mirror, basically, and clean up your act, and it's not too late to to do it. And you'll believe me, you'll see the fruits of your labor as it goes on. But doing the same wrong thing over and over is not only insanity, it is unprofitable. And you you'll hear it in in the next book that comes out for me, Don't Burn Your Hand on the Stove. People are gonna get triggered by it, they're not gonna like what they read. And I get it, and I say it a few chapters in, and I go, here's another one you're gonna hate because you are gonna, if it's you, you're gonna hate it because I'm talking to you as it goes on. But the person I'm talking to, the the book comes out on April 29th. It's my grandson's James birthday. And that's why what I put it on on purpose for that to come out for him, because I'm talking to him. I love him, and I want him to hear the hard truth. And he's not even gonna read this book for another 10 years, probably, but maybe I'm gone someday, and he wants to know the the hard, ugly truth. Some people need to hear that. I think everybody needs to hear it. So that and that's what I just said to y'all listeners here. This is the hard, ugly truth. Can I do it in a different way? I suppose I could. I don't know because I never did. This has always been me. I just come out and say it, that's what it is, and you know, and I hear the things. You're pretty harsh, Dave. You you know, whatever. And I go, I'm just telling you the truth. And if you don't want to hear it, don't ask me, because that's all that's gonna come out every single time is the truth.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:08

Well, that's where you and my dad are pretty much identical. You know, you you guys never lie, you just say the truth. If you don't want to hear it, just don't ask. And that's that's just the way it is. But I think the biggest thing when you look, it's it's discipline. You know, discipline's doing something day in, day out that you really don't want to do, but you do it because it's important and it makes a difference. And I think when you look at Promo Cigars, you look at two guys' cigars, we're very disciplined companies, and that's what that's what drives us at the end of the day. But I can't thank you enough for having you on, you know, being on our show with my dad and I and listen to our retail partners. If you guys are listening and and watching today, you know, if you apply what Dave just shared, you won't just sell more cigars, you're gonna sell more more experience and really one-of-a-kind type of experiences. And you'll build up your retail store or retail stores. So the consumer is going to get a much better experience.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:02

100% enjoy going more to the store. I still believe that people want to come touch, feel, and walk into a cigar store and feel and feel good about it. Yeah, yeah, 100%.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:14

But we have power. We brick and mortar retailers have the power. Every single cigar that uh is out there that's very popular was built in the brick and mortar retailer.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:25

100%.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:26

The the the online discounter only wants it after we have already built it. So we have built it. Don't let them take it.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:34

100%. 100%. Well, thank you again, Mr. Dave. We appreciate you being on the show. Dad, thank you very much. Thank you again to our audience. Absolutely. If you're if you really enjoyed the show, please like, subscribe, hit the notification button on our YouTube page at Perdomo Cigars. Also follow us on Instagram and Facebook. We appreciate the support. Thank you. Have a wonderful day, and we will see you soon.