{"id":34571,"date":"2020-04-03T15:34:43","date_gmt":"2020-04-03T13:34:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.cigarjournal.com\/?p=34571"},"modified":"2020-04-03T15:34:43","modified_gmt":"2020-04-03T13:34:43","slug":"the-cigar-authority-a-podcast-about-cigars","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cigarjournal.com\/de\/the-cigar-authority-a-podcast-about-cigars\/","title":{"rendered":"The Cigar Authority – A Podcast about Cigars"},"content":{"rendered":"

Would you eat a stick of butter for 50 dollars?\u201d It might not be a question you would anticipate on a podcast about cigars. Then again, if you\u2019ve ever watched or listened to The Cigar Authority, it\u2019s probably exactly what you would expect.<\/p>\n

As I\u2019m invited to sit next to the podcast founder and owner of Two Guys Smoke Shops in New Hampshire, Dave Garofalo and co-anchors, Barry Stein, Jonathan Barbeau (who goes by his DJ name, Mr. Jonathan) and Ed Sullivan, I\u2019m prepared to talk about anything.\u00a0Dave had compared their show to one of the most famous sitcoms ever. \u201cYou know on Seinfeld, they say it\u2019s a show about nothing,\u201d he says. \u201cWell, this is a show about nothing \u2026 and cigars.\u201d<\/p>\n

But let\u2019s recollect \u2026<\/p>\n

Two hours earlier, I\u2019d arrived at the Two Guys Smoke Shop location in Salem, New Hampshire. Dave Garofalo started his business more than three decades ago and today has three top-notch shops in the south part of the state. The two-hour show is broadcast from his professional studio on the second floor of the cigar shop, at least when it\u2019s not shot at a special location, like a Connecticut tobacco field, or Barry Stein\u2019s wedding party, or the IPCPR trade show. With eight-plus years on the air, The Cigar Authority is the longest-, continuously running cigar podcast.\u00a0\u201cAs a 50-year-old guy I wasn\u2019t that much into social media, but I read it was attracting customers and becoming an authority on a subject. So, there was the name, right off the bat.\u201d He started by setting up a Facebook and Twitter account before he met a DJ named Mr. Jonathan.\u00a0\u201cHe came into the store and told me he had a podcast I should listen to. I thought that was amazing, so I asked him if he wanted to do one on cigars. Being 50, I saw Johnny Carson in front of me. I wanted to talk cigars, do interviews and reviews.\u201d Jonathan was to produce the show and Dave brought in his friend and customer Tommy Grella, who had been on the TV show Food Network Star.\u00a0\u201cI also wanted a funnyman to bounce things off, so we hired a nightclub comedian, but he only lasted one show since he thought he knew more about cigars than he did.\u201d So for the second show Jonathan joined instead.<\/p>\n

At this point it was all audio; they tried bringing on customers and retailers, but most of them froze when the microphone was turned on. Then they introduced a phone line, which only resulted in people trying to promote their own businesses. \u201cSo, we thought we\u2019d go to people who were really passionate about cigars, like bloggers. But again, the same thing. They could write, but not talk, with very few exceptions.\u201d One of those was Barry Stein. \u201cHe was able to bust balls when he was on, which is what we wanted,\u201d Dave tells me.\u00a0\u201cIt came naturally to me, since I\u2019m from New York and these guys are from Boston,\u201d Barry says. \u201cThere\u2019s a rivalry there, so we ended up mostly talking about the [baseball teams] Boston Red Sox versus the New York Yankees.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

The Cigar Authority professional studio on the first floor of the shop in Salem | Photo:\u00a0Micah Gummel<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Since 2011, The Cigar Authority has also been visual. Co-hosts came and left. Today, Dave, Barry, Mr. Jonathan, and Ed make up the team.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs you can see, Barry and I love food,\u201d Dave says, rubbing his belly. \u201cAnd you often use food analogies when describing a cigar, so we\u2019d sometimes compare the taste to, for instance, putting butter on a pop tart.\u201d But Jonathan is the opposite; he eats health food, is almost a vegan and doesn\u2019t want to hear comparisons between cigars and Twinkies. \u201cOur listeners get a kick out of this,\u201d Barry continues,\u201d so nowadays they send us snacks. We don\u2019t even have to buy them ourselves. It drives Jonathan crazy.\u201d\u00a0The only preparation the team does for the show is a quick glance through some notes just before the show. The producer goes \u201cCheck, check, check\u201d into the microphones and then they\u2019re on air.<\/p>\n

\u201cLight \u2019em up, light \u2019em up, light \u2019em up, everybody!\u201d Dave welcomes the viewers. \u201cWelcome to the only show where we not only allow smoking, we insist and demand you light up with us,\u201d Jonathan adds.<\/p>\n

The theme of the day is unicorn cigars \u2013 cigars already produced that may or may not exist because of the new FDA rules. Half an hour into the show, I\u2019m invited up and we discuss everything from my work to dreadlocks, coffee cakes, the age of Crocodile Dundee star Paul Hogan and how we Swedes celebrate Fat Tuesday.<\/p>\n

The relaxed atmosphere and ball busting is probably why the show had 1.5 million downloads last year, and that\u2019s not including the people watching on Facebook Live. Dave and his men have indeed become cigar authorities. \u201cIt\u2019s mind boggling,\u201d Barry tells me. \u201cThere are people in South Korea who want to listen to us for two hours. Sometimes I don\u2019t even want to do that. There\u2019s also a cigar shop in Thailand that has Cigar Authority Wednesdays.\u201d Because the show has been on every Saturday for more than eight years and now reaches people in 80 countries, Cigar Journal magazine awarded The Cigar Authority the Cigar Ambassador 2016 Cigar Trophy. They even attract fans outside the cigar world. Dave tells me about his dry cleaner, who saw his license plate one day, which reads \u201ccigar.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cHe said I sounded like the guy on the radio talking about cigars. \u2018I am that guy!\u2019 I told him, and went to my car to get him three cigars. It turned out he didn\u2019t smoke cigars, but he never misses the show. He just found it very entertaining.\u201d So, what about the butter challenge \u2013 \u201cWould you eat a stick of butter for 50 dollars?\u201d Some fans, including Barry\u2019s wife, are in the studio audience; they all laugh when Jonathan\u00a0seems offended by the butter proposal.<\/p>\n

\u201cI most definitely would not!\u201d he says emphatically. \u201cIt\u2019s so much fat that you have to flush through.\u201d The other hosts and I all say yes, some of us hesitating a little, and Jonathan\u2019s disgust increases.<\/p>\n

Finally, Dave caves in as well: \u201cGive me six crackers and I\u2019d do it for 50 dollars! I\u2019d divide the butter into three pieces and put them between two crackers.\u201d \u201cYou mean you\u2019d do little butter sandwiches?\u201d Jonathan asks with a contorted face. \u201cYes!\u201d \u201cThat might be the most disturbing image I\u2019ve ever imagined,\u201d is Jonathan\u2019s final comment on the matter.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Every Saturday, the podcast The Cigar Authority rea ches 23,000 viewers around the globe, even if the show hosts sometimes compare cigars to Twinkies. Or maybe because of that \u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":34572,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false},"categories":[49,5378,692,3042,44],"tags":[6239,2892],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cigarjournal.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34571"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cigarjournal.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cigarjournal.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cigarjournal.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cigarjournal.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=34571"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.cigarjournal.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34571\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cigarjournal.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/34572"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cigarjournal.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=34571"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cigarjournal.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=34571"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cigarjournal.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=34571"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}