I spent day four (Thursday) of ProCigar 2015 on one of the more interesting tours, split between Corporación Cigar Export (CCE) and Quesada Cigars. Or at least that’s what the program said. Our morning started off heading to De Los Reyes, the new name for CCE as announced at the annual white dinner on Wednesday. The name change affects only the premium factory run by Nirka Reyes Estrella, her father, Augusto “Foofy” Reyes, is in charge of a mass market factory in Santiago, a partnership with Swisher. Nirka’s factory reminds me a lot of Joya de Nicaragua: it’s colorful, clean, spaced out and an interesting clash of tradition with a twist from a younger generation. In a week full of visits to cigar factories, De Los Reyes impressed. No, it wasn’t the fact that every employee had embroidered shirts (and pants) with the new name on it. Rather, this was the most well run tour I’ve ever been on. Sure, the Bloody Mary bar outside helped, but the tour was divided into six stations, each manned by a different person including the company’s private label clients like Phil Zanghi of Debonaire and Gustavo de Hostos of Puros de Hostos. Each station lasted about 10 ...
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