We hit episode 35 this week, and honestly, it was one of those nights that reminded us why we do this. Good cigars, good company, and a conversation that wandered from box passes to mental health to gambling machine fraud to scrapple. We covered a lot of ground. Here’s the full rundown.

Watch Episode 035 Right Here

What We Were Smoking

The important stuff first.

• Caldwell Lost and Found: Pepper Cream Soda
• Higher Calling from Avowed Cigars
• Don Emmanuel
• Gris Gris from LA Cigar Collective
• Oliva Serie V Lancero
• My Father Blue

Our First Box Pass Update

This is the one we’ve been most excited to report on. Our Smoke and Steel box pass made it to its first stop.

For those who missed the backstory: we put together a rotating humidor – a vintage Stogie Review travel humidor, stocked it with cigars from our community, and started sending it around to members. Fourteen people are in the rotation. Each person pulls out what they want, puts something comparable back in, and ships it to the next person on the list.

Aaron was stop number one. He pulled a few cigars, sent us a picture of his replacements, got the green light from the community on Discord, repacked the box, and sent it south. Big Rob in Louisiana is next.

The whole thing worked exactly the way we hoped it would. Nobody overthought it, the communication was easy, and it felt like what it was supposed to feel like. A group of guys sharing cigars across state lines without making it complicated.

A few practical notes for the people in the rotation. Shipping should run around $15 on average, though it varies by distance. Wrap the humidor well enough inside the shipping box so it’s not bouncing around. That box is built tough, but no reason to tempt fate. We’re also going to tuck a return label inside going forward, just in case something unexpected happens in transit. There’s a QR code sticker on the humidor already, so if it ever gets lost and a stranger finds it, at least they’ll know where it came from. Maybe they’ll subscribe…. LOL

For the guys who have their own shipping accounts through a business, it’s totally your call how you send it. Flat rate priority boxes are a clean option if you want tracking and a consistent price. Either way, when it lands at your door, it’s your show.

Fourteen stops, roughly a week each. We should be looking at the full loop completed in about three to three and a half months. We’ll keep you posted every step of the way.

Why Cigar Lounge Culture is Good for You – and We Mean That

This was the most honest stretch of conversation we’ve had in a while, and it started with a podcast we watched from Creekside. The episode had a health and wellness coach on – a guy who also smokes cigars, which is a rare combination. He made a genuinely thoughtful case for cigar lounge culture as something that benefits men in ways they don’t always think to articulate.

His main point was around friendship. A lot of men, especially after their 30s, stop making new friends. Not because they don’t want to, but because the natural structures that created friendships – school, teams, shared workplaces, they start to disappear. A cigar lounge is one of the few places left where men regularly sit down together without an agenda, slow down, and actually talk.

He had one specific piece of advice for anyone new to a lounge or new to meeting people in general: avoid the weather, politics, and sports as conversation openers. Not because those topics are off limits, but because they keep you on the surface. You can talk about last night’s game for an hour and still not know a single real thing about the guy sitting next to you.

Eric works from home. By the end of the day, the walls close in. Getting out, sitting down with a cigar, and having an actual adult conversation isn’t a luxury. It’s what keeps the week from grinding you down. He calls it a factory reset. That’s exactly what it is.

Walt talked about what it meant when his kids were young and he was home all day. After hours of dad mode, he was genuinely hungry for a conversation that didn’t involve whatever cartoon was on. The lounge gave him that. Not in a way that took him away from his family, but in a way that made him better when he walked back through the door.

This is the part of cigar lounge culture that doesn’t get talked about enough. It’s not about the cigars. Well, it is about the cigars. But it’s also about having somewhere to go and someone to go with.

One of our wives summed it up perfectly when her sister questioned how much time we spend at the lounge. She said there are no women there, it’s just guys smoking, shooting pool, watching whatever’s on, and giving each other a hard time. She’d rather have him there than at a bar. Hard to argue with that logic.

If you’ve been on the fence about finding a lounge near you or making time to get there more regularly, consider this the nudge. Cigar lounge benefits for men’s mental health are real, even if nobody’s writing prescriptions for a Lancero and an hour with your friends.

Community Shoutouts

Facebook Top Engagement of the Week

• Craig V.
• Charles R.
• Steve G.
• Matt K.
• John C.
• Craig B.
• Ron L.
• Mike P.
• Kevin S.

Facebook Top Fans of the Week:

• Preston M.
• John B.
• Brian K.
• Bruce W.
• Joseph, D
• Kayla D.
• Chase C.
• Eddie in the Streets
• Jim L.
• Thomas S.
• Joe M.

Joe M. and Jim L. are both sitting at five-month streaks. That kind of consistency means something to us. Thank you!

New members keep finding us through YouTube on their own, which is exactly what we’ve been working toward. The last four people who joined Discord all said the same thing: found you on YouTube, worked my way here. That’s the goal. Keep sharing.

The best way to support the show is to buy your cigars through our affiliate links at Cigar Page and JR Cigars. Costs you nothing extra, and it goes a long way toward keeping this going. And if you want to rep the crew, grab something from our Smoke and Steel Sticker Mule store.

The Burnable – A Shoutout Worth Making

One of our own on Discord, Helldorado, has been quietly building something worth checking out. His cigar review site is called The Burnable, and it’s legitimately well done. Real tasting notes, thoughtful photography, and a creative use of AI-generated imagery that he actually wrote about in detail on the site itself. He also contributes reviews for the LA Cigar Collective Website. If you’re into reading reviews from someone who clearly cares about the craft, go find it.

The Industry Side – Pricing, Distribution, and What Happens to Your Brand

We spent some time on an episode of Not a Cigar Show with Skip Martin from RoMa Craft. If you like understanding how the business actually works, it’s worth finding.

The part that stuck with us was Skip mentioning that RoMa Craft doesn’t sell directly to Cigar Page, even though their products are available there. That connects to a conversation we had with Mo Maali of Patina a while back about brands that get picked up by major online retailers without the manufacturer’s direct involvement. When that happens, the brand has no visibility into how returns are handled, how complaints get resolved, or how their product gets represented if something goes wrong.

Cigar industry pricing is more layered than most people realize. Keystoning – where the retailer doubles the wholesale cost to set a retail price, is standard. Add tariff structures, multi-country manufacturing strategies, and distribution layers on top of that, and the $20 cigar in your hand has had quite a journey to get there.

There’s also a real argument to be made for buying from people who have a direct relationship with the brands they sell. Your experience after the sale matters, and it’s easier to make right when the person you bought from actually knows the person who made it.

Everything Else from Episode 35

A few other things that came up:

Rewards programs. Cigar Page’s 1% back model is the one most of us use actively. The consensus is to hold points until they mean something. $100 or more off a box beats burning them on a branded lighter.

The Tobacconist University certification and cigar sommelier courses came up after someone asked whether formal training existed in this hobby. Turns out it does, and Jim actually went through both before working at a shop. Worth looking into if you’re serious about the craft or thinking about retail.

The great spring yard uncovering. Anyone with a large dog knows.

Skill-based gambling machines at local beer distributors and the counterfeit payout receipts that have been hitting stores in the area. It’s always something.

First Scheduled Online HERF

Right after wrapping the episode, we ran our first officially scheduled online HERF. We beta tested it on a Saturday with a small group and it worked well enough to do it again. Joe Macko put it best when we had him on the show – for guys who don’t have a lounge nearby, being able to jump on, light one up, and actually talk to people adds something that buying from a website can’t replicate.

If you want in on the next one, get into the Discord. We’ll post the schedule there.

Before You Go

If you made it this far, do us one favor: share this episode. Post it, text it, send it to the guy you know who smokes cigars and hasn’t found us yet. Every time one of you shares the show, someone new finds it. That’s how we grow, and that’s how we keep doing this.

Find us on all major podcast platforms, follow us on social, and come hang out in the Discord any time.