I had an Uncle who smoked Cubans he would buy on trips back in the 1950's. I never forgot the smell. Started up about five years ago on cust reyss 1858's I belive than I found cbid a little over a year ago and now I have to rotate from credit card to credit card and I have to have my next door neighbors wife who is home all day hide my ups packages so the wife does not find out how much this little hobby really costs. But the most peace I get in this world is with a good hand rolled and good drink. Also the best damn people I know smoke good cigars.

It's been awhile, but I think a friend of mine got me started. I didn't start smoking regularly until about 3 or 4 years ago. Found a non CI catalog, (rip-off) company (you've all heard of it), ordered some humidor/25 stick starters and went from there.

Then got a pipe and a sampler of pipe tobacco. Haven't smoked the pipe in quite awhile though. One of my bartender work-mates has the proper 7 pipe tray for each day of the week. Calls 'em his poor man's cigars. He's pretty serious. Used the pipe to give up ciagarettes, a very good move if you ask me and inexpensive too.

The first cigar I ever had was given to me by a neighborhood old Italian who cut lawns in my town.
I was thirteen or so and he gave me one of those small
dry cured DeNobile's after I showed some curiousity.
The old man had a good laugh at my expense as my head began to spin, I turned green and nearly pucked.

As to when I started to smoke cigars on a regular basis, that seems to have occured about the same time as I started playing golf in college. Golf and Cigars
just seemed like a natural coupling to me. One on the
front nine, One on the back nine and One at the 19th
watering hole!

First cigars were Swisher Sweets! Ugh!

C

I never liked tobacco... But my wife smokes. Now I get to stink her out of the room. Pay backs, you know. Anyway. I was in Kuwait for Iraqi Freedom. And our Colonel would have his smoke everyday at 4:30. No music to salute to out there. But he blew some good smoke everyday instead. After I got back I tried every cheapo in the store on base. But wasn't satisfied. Being in Germany I got down to the local shop and bought a Cohiba. After that I was hooked. I started searching Online for good stateside companies who would ship to a PO box. Cbid has just fed my newist obsession. And a great job they've done.

ajeroth

To the best of my recollection, my grandfather smoked El Productos or Roi-Tans or some other cheap stick. He used to use holders and leave them on his desk, to the chagrin of my grandmother.

I don't admit this to too many people, but for the longest time I considered cigars "cool" looking and thought over the years that I'd like to try them. (It's stupid, but that's how my mind worked then). I'm a huge Groucho Marx fan, too, so I imagine that helped.

I went to Pittsburgh in 1991 to work for a radio station. There were two stations in our building, and the boss of the other station was (and is, I assume) a HUGE cigar freak..this was back in the days of color catalogs that equalled the Penneys Christmas catalog (we won't mention who the catalogs were from), etc. Then my morning show partner had a baby, and her husband arrived at the station with a fist full of Punch Churchills, and I was a goner.

Then, like everybody else it seems, I went through every grocery store brand I could find, much to the chagrin of my then-wife. I'd buy a pack of Garcia Vegas, smoke one or two, and then move on to something else. I remember I smoked White Owl New Yorkers for awhile because they were cheap and - even though they were crap - consistent.

Bought my first 'dor, a plexiglass Zino, in a shop in Pittsburgh, and the rest is history. I'm fortunate in several areas; I have a wife who occasionally fires up a stogie herself, but in addition, she's smell-dumb, has no sense of smell, so I don't get the griping about my clothes, etc. smelling of smoke.

Life be pretty darn good.

egg

No smoke had passed these lips for over ten years......I was scared to death to try anything after having quit a 15 year 2 pack a day cigarette habit......my brother-in-law caught me at a weak moment in St. Thomas under the Milky Way on the roof of a friends house.......it was a slow start at first....then my brother Kevin told me about C-bid......so you see it really isn't my fault at all!!

Smoked those swischer POS for a while when i was in high school (i looked 18 early 😉 ) and every now and then would have one or two since then. (im 22 in a couple weeks) I started thinknig about getting some stoges a couple years back but never had the money. This year ive got a loan for tuition, so i decided to start a new hobby. Once i found this place it all went to hell, same story as the rest of you from there on out.

Started smoking swisher sweets while working in the yard - found it kept the gnats away. I slowly got to like doing it just to do it. Once I had my first Acid Nasty I was hooked - flavored and then some.