SMOKE: What business were you in before coming to Nassau?

GARZAROLI: My family is from Como, Italy. My father had a stocking factory where I worked for a while. He actually wanted me to stay with him in the factory business, but I wanted to be a hotelier, so after attending one of the best schools in Europe for it, that’s what I did.

SMOKE: How did you become involved with Graycliff?

GARZAROLI: In 1972, when I had a hotel in Luxembourg in a partnership with an airline, I used to fly often from Luxembourg to Nassau. I came here once on a business trip and was introduced to a lady who, it turned out, knew my grandfather. She told me the English owners of the house were afraid of being kicked out by the new Bahamas government that was coming into power in 1973. The island had been ruled by the English, but was becoming independent. They wanted to sell.

SMOKE: What did you do to make this house into a successful resort?

GARZAROLI: The moment I opened the house, I transformed it into a club. Understand that, under the old government, this was a forbidden area for most people in the Bahamas. It is one of the oldest, most famous houses here, yet people would pass by it almost in fear; they could never reach that level where they would be allowed inside. I invited all of the new politicians who’d come to power came here, to show that it was no longer a place where natives could not walk. Suddenly it became a success. It was already a very prestigious house; I retained the servants who had done the work here because they knew how to treat the clientele. I was flooded with guests. I started with just the lounge and the rooms, and after a year and a half, I brought in a chef from my old hotel in Belgium to start doing dinners.

SMOKE: Were you always interested in cigars?

GARZAROLI: Oh, yes. When I was in Italy, there were only two cigars you could smoke: Romeo y Julieta Churchill and Montecristo No. 4. For years, these were the only cigars and sizes allowed into Italy from Cuba. There were the Italian-made Toscanos, but I didn’t go much for those. I’d buy the R&J or the Monte every time I could scrape some money together.

SMOKE: Why did you decide to open a cigar factory at the resort?

GARZAROLI: The situation in Cuba - and I’m not talking about the quality of the product, but the scarcity of it. Basically you had to bribe people in the Cuban cigar business to even get a good box. The shops were keeping the garbage up front; you had to make a deal to get a decent box. I was dealing in the Cuban cigar industry so I knew just about everybody in it, including some great rollers, so I finally just said, the Hell with it - I’ll get some people together and manufacture cigars at a new plant in the Bahamas. It also made sense because duties on Cuban cigar imports in the Bahamas are over 200 percent. The Bahamian government took a long time to give me the approval [to make cigars] - it was a new idea for this country. To the best of my knowledge, cigars had never been made here before.

SMOKE: When did [Cohiba creator] Avelino Lara become involved?

GARZAROLI: Before I had the factory, Avelino used to visit here every year for a few weeks, and he brought Cuban materials to roll some cigars. He first started coming about 1993, going up and down, back and forth. He’d make about 10,000 cigars then have to go back for more material. Then I had the factory up and running by October 1996.

SMOKE: What steps did Lara take to ensure the quality of the cigars at Graycliff?

GARZAROLI: First of all, Avelino knew just about everybody in the business, so the rollers we brought up were considered the best rollers available from Cuba. All of my rollers are Cubans. We wanted the best we could get our hands on. Because Avelino had been coming here a long time, I got tobacco from many different areas, and we spent most of our time trying to emulate the taste of a Cuban cigar. We started using Nicaraguan tobacco before the Nicaraguans started making cigars. Avelino knew certain ways to treat the leaves, and ferment them. The result was our first cigar, the Red Label, originally only available here at the resort.

SMOKE: At what point did you realize you had a hit on your hands, and put the Graycliff cigar on the open market?

GARZAROLI: You have to understand, at that time, for cigar smokers, there was only Cuba and Santo Domingo [Dominican Republic]. And all the cigars from Santo Domingo were like children of the same mother. They all had the same flavor, same scent, same looks - everything. There were no great personalities in Dominican cigars yet. Then people started to understand the blending. Meanwhile, cigar makers in Honduras and Nicaragua were starting up, and starting to pay attention to the soil, and improving the quality of the leaves. Because of the boom, everyone was under pressure to produce.

We tested our cigar on people who came here [to Graycliff] until we felt we had something that was worth offering to the market. We actually came in at the worst possible time. It was the tail end of the boom, and [manufacturers] were selling cigars for cents on the dollar.

Quality Control check at the Graycliff Cigar Factory in Nassau

SMOKE: How did the market react to the high price point at that time?

GARZAROLI: Most people thought it was pretty ballsy to introduce a new, very expensive cigar at that time. But the moment they tried the blend, cigar smokers were saying, “This is worth it. This is different.” During the boom time, anything was selling, regardless of quality. It’s not like now. There was a shortage of cigars, and everyone was supposedly “the best.” People were buying names. People who had never smoked a cigar in their lives were suddenly manufacturers: lawyers, dentists, anybody could make cigars. Most of them are out of business now. It is difficult enough to make a good cigar, but if you really want to come up with something great you really need to control the process from the seed to the final product.

It’s like a wine; do you think the Baroness would be happy to have her name on a bottle of Chateau Mouton-Rothschild if she didn’t know those grapes were being taken care of properly? Most cigar manufacturers depend on the same few suppliers of leaf. Some have great marketing, great packaging, and great success, but they don’t own the blend. Some manufacturers barely ever visit the factory; they just find a blend they like and finance it.

SMOKE: Does a small factory enable you to maintain better control over the blends?

GARZAROLI: It has advantages and disadvantages. If you want a production of two million cigars, it’s not the right scenario for you. The bigger you are, the more you are subject to the demand. How do I know a big grower is not going to give me, pardon the expression, his shit? It’s like owning a five-star restaurant, buying the food in bulk from the guy down the street, then just serving it on a plate. I’d rather have my chef [decide where he gets the ingredients]. When you’re a grower who produces cigars, you tend to take care of the leaf you’re using so much more than the leaf you’re selling to others. I like to control everything from zero to 100, from my leaves to my blend. In fact, we’ve just started growing tobacco at our own farm in Central America. There are people who work for me with a lot more experience than I do- Cubans who have spent years in the business - so I discuss every step with them. I also don’t want just any cigar shop to carry my cigars. Sales are important, but image is important, too. It’s why Davidoff - and companies like Prada and Gucci for that matter - have their own teams, their own stores. Do you think Davidoff could sell Zino Platinums for $50 at a gas station?

SMOKE: Why did you decide to extend the line with the Professionale?

GARZAROLI: I thought that the market was ready for something different. The Professionale was a little but fuller; less perfume, more power. I approached the brands like wine: usually, you start out with a light white, move up to a light red, then to a complex red, then to a very muscular red. The same theory is behind my cigar lines. The Professionale was an evolution, brought about by the boom, where people started discerning more differences in cigars.

SMOKE: You followed that up with the Crystal, a stronger blend. Was that in response to the consumer demand for fuller-bodied cigars?

GARZAROLI: That one was to be more complex, with more muscle. The people perceive it like a car. You can’t sell a Porsche that only goes 80 mph. They want a car with that extra kick. Right or wrong, we saw the market moving toward stronger cigars. Don’t forget that the Cubans are seen as very elegant cigars, but they could never be described as “light” cigars. I wanted to reach that level, in the complexity, flavor, and scent as well as the strength. The new Espresso is the latest evolution.

SMOKE: Recently, you tried a bold experiment: the Emerald, a candela cigar. What inspired you to release that, and what makes it unique from other candelas?

GARZAROLI: I’ve always had a lot of smokers here to play golf, and some are eccentric people. They wanted something powerful but different. So I tried a green wrapper. I came up with a candela with quite a bit of power. In Europe, where the market isn’t as advanced, they love that type of cigar. The blend gives it strength, but the wrapper mellows it out. It’s a cigar that makes a statement: either you like me or you don’t. A lot of people find it hard to accept the green, until they try it and like it. Some have become real devotees. They say, “I never thought a candela could be so smooth, so round, so powerful.” It’s a very elegant cigar. In some places, like Italy, they are a novelty.

You want to hear something funny? At last year’s Habanos Festival in Cuba, I brought lots of the Emeralds with me and gave out one to everyone in Havana I could find. This year, I’ve heard the Cubans are now making a candela cigar!

SMOKE: How many cigars does your factory produce per year, and in how many countries are they available?

GARZAROLI: We have 12-14 rollers making around 400,000. They’re in Australia, Singapore, Germany, France, Italy, Serbia, and a few in Russia and Syria. Then, of course, there’s the U.S. and Canada.

SMOKE: So you’re head-to-head with the Cubans in lots of market.

GARZAROLI: Yes, my cigar is competing in all of the Cuban strongholds. In France, I think we actually outsell them, thanks to a blind tasting there in 2001 where my Graycliff Pirate outscored a Montecristo. Of course, the Cuban cigars’ quality has improved since then.

SMOKE: Some famous people have smoked at your resort. Can you name some of them?

GARZAROLI: We’ve had lots of famous folks here. Michael Jordan; Nicolas Cage; Pierce Brosnan actually put us in one of his movies. I hear that John Travolta is using our cigar in a movie now. The fellow from Gandhi - Ben Kingsley - is also smoking one in a recent movie.

SMOKE: Have you ever considered selling a bargain-priced or bundle cigar?

GARZAROLI: We have the Bahiba, which is made mostly for the Bahamian market. We sell a few of them in the States. It’s a very good cigar, but the U.S. market is too crowded for us to sell too many of them. Here in Nassau it sells very well.

SMOKE: Your children are in the restaurant/resort business with you… do you expect them to carry on the cigar business?

GARZAROLI: I hope so. My son is already very involved in it. He’s the one who goes to many of the stores in the U.S.

SMOKE: Do you think we will see the end of the Cuban embargo any time soon?

GARZAROLI: If the Democrats win, it’s possible. If Bush wins, it’s not possible. On the other hand, we’re only seeing our side of the embargo; what’s important is on the other side. The United States wants the Cubans to do certain things, and they are not ready to do those things. Those who have always smoked Cuban cigars will manage to keep smoking them, no matter what, even in the U.S. Those who haven’t may have already developed a different taste. They may find the Cubans too strong. Don’t forget that before the embargo, Cuban cigars weren’t selling that well in the States. They were a minimal part of the market. They certainly would do better now that the market has matured. People are developing new tastes, plus they have been experiencing the expertise of the Cubans who have left for different countries - Nicaragua, Ecuador, Honduras, Dominican Republic. These nations are all producing good cigars now that would be competitive with the Cubans.