Every now and then, somebody shows up in our world who just fits. No awkward introductions, no forced conversation. Just a guy who loves cigars, shoots straight, and makes you feel like he’s been sitting in the garage with us for years. That’s Joe Macko in a nutshell. Episode 33 brought our first ever fan guest to the show, and if we’re being honest, the bar has officially been set.

Joe came in from northeast Georgia via the internet, settled into his pop-up tent smoker’s lounge, and proceeded to hold court for nearly two hours. We talked cigars, military service, the cigar vending machine business he’s building from the ground up, wholesale sales, and a whole lot more. This one had a great vibe from start to finish, and if you haven’t watched it yet, now’s the time.

What We Were Smoking in Episode 33

Here’s a quick look at what was burning around the table and on screen during this episode:

• The Vow by Avowed Cigars
• Uncle Lee by Room 101 (event-only cigar)
• Muestra de Saka by Dunbarton
• Patina Sumatra
• Amazon Basin
• La Aroma de Cuba Small Batch
• Crook of the Crown 5th Anniversary by Stolen Throne
• Arturo Fuente Between the Lines

Who Is Joe Macko?

Joe lives outside Atlanta in a little town called Braselton, Georgia. By his own description, he is quote, “the embodiment of what most folk consider country and or redneck.” Trucks, guns, bourbon, cigars. A veteran who served eight years in the Army, including a deployment to southern Iraq in 2009. He’s a family man with two daughters, ages one and a half and four. And he works in the cigar industry, which he stumbled into almost by accident and now considers one of the best things that ever happened to him professionally.

He found us the way a lot of guys do. Bouncing around YouTube, sampling podcasts, getting bored fast. Too many shows were either monotone, overly polished, or basically just extended product pitches. He wanted guys hanging out and smoking, not a TED Talk. So he landed on Smoke and Steel, stuck around through the early episodes, and became one of our most consistent early supporters. He watches every episode in chunks throughout the week, starting in bed the night the early release drops on Discord, finishing it the next morning while getting the day going. That’s the kind of engagement that means everything to us.

Stogie Joe’s: A Cigar Vending Machine Business Built the Right Way

The biggest topic of the night, and honestly one of the most interesting conversations we’ve had on the show, was Joe’s side business. He’s launched a company called Stogie Joe’s, and the concept is exactly what it sounds like. Plug-and-play cabinet humidors that function as cigar vending machines, targeted at liquor stores, golf courses, and local bars.

Each cabinet holds up to 28 facings with up to 20 cigars per facing. There’s an LCD display that runs local advertising when nobody’s actively shopping. Customers can walk up, browse, pick their smoke, and go. The cabinets also feature three drink pairing options, making them a natural fit for liquor stores where someone might want a recommendation alongside their bottle.

The humidification is handled with a system similar to an Oasis setup, with software that gives Joe daily reporting on what’s sold and alerts him when humidity drifts or inventory runs low. He’s managing everything remotely and doing restocking runs through a consolidated local area to start, keeping things manageable.

What makes this model smart, beyond the concept itself, is how he’s funding it. The advertisers pay for the cabinet builds. Host locations contribute a small upfront stock to fill the shelves. After that, cigar sales fund future inventory orders. Joe has not taken out a business loan and does not plan to. He’s building this thing lean and clean, which frankly is the right way to do it.

He’s also thought through the age restriction issue carefully. Most locations are naturally gated, like liquor stores that already require ID at the door. For bars, they’re working with facial recognition software that flags anyone who looks under 30 and triggers a key fob confirmation from the owner. The goal is to make it airtight before it ever becomes a problem.

When we asked about his first installation timeline, he said two weeks. Two locations had already agreed to take a cabinet. At the time of recording, he had just completed the full business license and tobacco license process in Georgia after three weeks of bureaucratic runaround where the state pointed to the city and the city pointed right back. Once you’re through that, it turns out the order of operations matters a lot. Tax ID requires a local business license. Tobacco license requires the tax ID. You can’t do them simultaneously. He learned that the hard way, but he got through it.

The long-term goal is around a dozen cabinets in the first year. After that, he wants to let data drive the decisions. What’s moving, what’s not, what to swap out. He’s not in a rush to flood the market before he can manage it properly.

Working the Wholesale Side at Santa Clara

Joe’s day job is in B2B wholesale sales at Santa Clara, which is the wholesale arm of JR Cigars. He sells exclusively to retailers, whether that’s cigar shops, golf courses, or liquor stores. He’s been doing it for about a year and a half.

He talked about how the job is currently evolving from a more open, reach-who-you-want structure into defined territories, which is going to eliminate the internal competition of two reps accidentally calling the same account. He also talked about the difference between cold calling and what he does now, which is more like warm outreach to existing accounts. Calling someone who’s already ordered a product to let them know it’s on promotion this month is a completely different conversation. There’s no script. It’s just useful information delivered to someone who’s already a customer.

He got into the industry on a tip from his wife’s boss, who basically told him if he was unhappy in sales, just find a way to sell something he actually cared about. So he set a job alert for anything cigar-related and a month later got a call from Santa Clara. The rest followed from there.

His supervisor gave him full support to run Stogie Joe’s on the side after Joe proactively brought it up to make sure there was no conflict of interest. Since Joe sells B2B at the wholesale level and his vending business sells direct to consumers, there’s no overlap. He’s also sourcing his cabinet inventory primarily through Santa Clara when possible.

On the Army, Iraq, and Fort Dix in February

Joe served eight years in the Army, did one deployment to southern Iraq in 2009, and still holds a grudge against whoever decided that pre-deployment training should happen at Fort Dix, New Jersey in November through February. For a guy heading to one of the top five hottest cities on the planet, nothing says “preparation” quite like knocking snow off collapsing tents at 2 in the morning.

He said he would rather do another full deployment than spend three more months in New Jersey. Sounds about right.

On the cigars-in-the-military conversation, he noted that while he didn’t have access to cigars at his outpost, the guys who did usually picked them up on rare trips back to a main base. Chewing tobacco was far more practical logistically and more common out in the field. Rob, who wasn’t at the table that night, used to send Copenhagen to his son overseas. A log a week. Joe knew exactly what that life looked like.

Standout Moments and Quotes

A few things from this episode that stuck with us:

“I just want to hang out and shoot the shit. And that’s why I like this podcast. It’s these guys hanging out, smoking and joking.”

That’s Joe explaining why he found us and why he stayed. We’ll take it.

On his smoking philosophy: Joe tries to match the cigar to the environment. If he’s working at his outdoor setup with the laptop, he’ll reach for something functional rather than precious. But when the kids are asleep, the bourbon is poured, and the music is going on Pandora? That’s his zen moment. He said it and we all nodded at the same time.

Jim lighting up one of the cigars Joe had sent us, having saved it specifically for the night Joe was on, was one of those quiet moments that tells you everything about the culture we’re trying to build here. Nobody asked him to do that. He just did it.

On the cigar business advice front: Joe made a point we really appreciated. Don’t try to be somebody else. Don’t look at what other podcasts are doing and start chasing their format. Keep it real, keep it unbiased, and let it grow from there. Coming from a guy who’s been watching since the beginning, that landed.

A Few Other Things We Got Into

We spent some time talking about the GOAT by AJ Fernandez, a cigar we had on a golf trip that blew everyone away and which we have been completely unable to source since. Best current theory is that it’s a shop exclusive in limited production somewhere, and if Joe spots any at PCA, we already told him to point us to where we could buy them for ourselves.

Joe is heading to PCA, working the booth set up beside the Altadis. We gave him the short list of people to go meet while he’s there, and if his schedule opens up, there may be a late-night invite waiting for him at Kyle’s place (LA Cigar Collective) where the ChiMolly guys will be hosting an event.

Dave West’s name came up more than once. Joe had reached out to him through the Discord about potentially getting onto a wholesale platform, Dave politely passed, and Joe respected it completely. The Avowed Cigars were mentioned as something Joe has incoming, and we’re confident he’s going to love them. We also talked about the new Hollowed Hands release from Dave’s line, and the New Dawn.

Share the Episode and Support the Show

If you’ve made it this far, you already know this was a good one. Do us a solid and share it. Post it in a group, send it to a buddy who smokes, drop it in a forum, whatever works for you. That’s genuinely how we grow, and it means more to us than any algorithm.

If you’re buying cigars anyway, consider using our affiliate links. Picking up your next bundle through Cigar Page or grabbing something from JR Cigars doesn’t cost you anything extra, but it helps keep the lights on and the heater running out here in the garage.

And if you’ve been thinking about repping the brand, head over to our merch store on Sticker Mule where you can grab Smoke and Steel hoodies and t-shirts. We wear ours, and now you can too.

Thanks for being here. Thanks to Joe for making this one so easy and so fun. And if you’re not in the Discord yet, come find us. This community is something else.