New, hip cigars take on
more traditional smokes.

By Sam Grothe
Business Report Correspondent

"Go ahead, let's experiment," I thought to myself. "Light this botanical Roman candle-shaped cocktail, lick that essential oil-laden wrapper, and take a fat hit off this wicked ACID.

"Emmm nasty!"

I just scored a couple of these bad daddies ­- a 4x38 ACID Blondie and 4x42 ACID Nasty ­- from Scott Bruckman, owner of Havana's Fine Cigars at 16th and Glennarm in Denver.

"They're pretty tasty," Bruckman warned me. "To be real honest I was real leery about carrying them."

The first ACID cigar Bruckman said he ever tried was a Blondie: "I couldn't put the darn thing down."

That did it -- being a cigar buff myself, naturally I had to find out more about these mouth-watering gems. As a new convert, I soon learned that the wizardlike Owsley behind the curtain of these mystical, aromatic brands of both ACID and Natural cigar lines is none other than Drew Estate.

Drew Estate founders and college buddies Jonathan Sann, a.k.a. Jonathan Drew, and Marvin Samel began selling cigars in 1995 from a modest kiosk in the World Trade Center Mall in New York with a secret intention: Create a modern-day renaissance of the cigar industry.

Running the 10-by-10-foot cigar stand was only a temporary stint for these two, who both gave up high-powered careers to blend flavored and scented stogies.

Drew was attending Brooklyn Law School, and Samel was a vice president of a mortgage company before they decided to set up headquarters in 1996 in a New York neighborhood that had previously been thought of as a crack den. Today the area is a bustling artist colony known as DUMBO, short for Down Under Manhattan Bridge Overpass, and with its waterfront vista and cobblestone streets it is ascending to the realm of a SOHO, NOHO or The Village.

In the spring of 1999, Drew journeyed to Esteli, Nicaragua to open his own 35-acre farm. Today, a few hundred workers prune and cultivate the fertile canvas and transform hearty green leaf into about 30 types of cigars. All of the cigars are rolled into the cured wrappers at the 20,000-square-foot factory.

First fruits have proven that these two paragons of perfumed stogies have created a hallucinogeniclike craze that is quickly captivating even the most traditional of cigar connoisseurs.

"It's not just the young guys smoking them either," Bruckman said. "It's some of our regulars' (some of whom) come in here and buy Davidoff, Montecristos and Avo Uvezian cigars by the box."

"It's more popular with professionals in their middle 40s," says Barry Blonder, owner and general manager of Barlow's Premium Cigars and Pipes in Lafayette, adding, "They’re well made and very flawless."

Although Drew Estates' cigars don't elicit the Timothy Leary-type trip the name ACID sometimes implies, they are every bit as explosive in terms of sensation to the discerning palate.

It wasn't until this April that Drew Estate finally started receiving national recognition after they launched a massive advertising campaign with full-page ads in alternative publications like Penthouse and Gear magazines.

The April 16th issue of Forbes magazine also put Drew Estate in the spotlight in their cover story on "Cult Brands," alongside the likes Vinter Jean Phillips, who makes only 500 cases of her waiting-list only brand of Screaming Eagle wine a year in Napa Valley; Krispy Kreme; Harley Davidson; Linux PC operating system; and Apple Computers.

Currently, Drew Estate distributes to about 500 select stores all over the United States and in Germany. "We do plan on increasing production at a rate of about 5 percent per month, which will allow more people to be able to enjoy our cigars while keeping quality at the highest levels which our supporters demand," Samel added.

Still, I wondered aloud, "There must be more behind the cigar besides aromatherapy and Jimmy Buffet ambiance to make it so popular."

"There is and his name Scott 'ACID' Chester," a strange sage working in the humidor murmured to me.

ACID, partly named after his daughter (Arielle Chester Industrial Design), has been a friend of Samel and Drew's for over five years and has an art studio in the same building as Drew Estate's headquarters. ACID, who grew up in Brooklyn, received his degree in automotive design from the College of Art Design. Besides being a motorcycle daredevil, perhaps his greatest claim to fame is becoming the Andy Warhol of motorcycle design.

For instance, his "soda series" includes motorcycles painted like Welch's Grape soda, Mountain Dew, Sprite and Dr. Pepper, not to mention Coors Light designs. "We appreciated his talents and became close friends, bringing him into our world as he brought us into his. When we began experimenting with applying essential oils, herbs and botanicals to cigars, (ACID) was extremely intrigued. One day he came up to our studio in Brooklyn to tell us of a near-death experience he had while surfing in Brazil, and it was during this story that Jonathan and I looked at each other and just started laughing, both of us realizing that our friend "ACID" was about to become ACID Cigars," Samel said.

If you think this surreal cat ACID is fictitious, perhaps you sure find out for yourself because he'll be in Denver at Havana's Fine Cigars on June 29 at 3 p.m. to do some painting and trick motorcycle riding.

As far as the competition goes, Lars Teton appears to be the only brand close, and they cost a whole lot more. "From what I hear, they're phasing out," said Blonder, adding he had only heard of one upscale restaurant in Denver that had carried them.

There is also a rigid, traditionalist camp of cigar emporium owners that won't be caught dead with these revolutionary stogies in their humidors. To them it appears to be the equivalent of trying to distribute some of the colorfully named and crafted microbrews born here in Colorado to some of the centuries old Belgium cafés that specialize in serving up the regional Lambic, Kriek, Saison or sparkling Gueuze beers.

Ken Rogers, who owns Eads News and Smoke Shop at 1715 28th St. in Boulder, says he's considered bringing ACID and Lars Teton cigars to his store about two years ago but decided against it. "We didn't have room," he said. "There's so many cigars."

The first thing that amazed me about these ACID cigars is that, although they have a distinct smell to their burn, the tobacco used is as good as any I've smoked.

"People who smoke our cigars know that we have the most independent tasting cigars in the world. You can detect if one person is smoking an ACID or a Natural out of hundreds of people smoking cigars, and that is all due to the unique blending of the tobaccos," Samel said.

In fact, the ACID line contains 16 types of cigars -­ including names like One, Liquid, MKV, Atom, Freedom Flight, Cold Infusion Tea, Kuba Kuba ­ in which Drew Estate combines more than 100 elements extracted from plants, fruits and vegetables, and blends them with Nicaraguan tobacco. Some of the ingredients come from as far away as China, India, Egypt, Syria and Israel. "It's a seven-step process that takes up to nine months," says Samel of creating an ACID.

Natural, on the other hand ­- such as the Egg (lasts two full hours), Mixed Elements, Dirt, White Rabbit, Green Hero, Root and Tao of Drew ­- utilizes tobaccos from up to 12 different countries and blends them with all Nicaraguan Tobacco.

"Imagine smoking tobaccos from countries such as Syria, Turkey, West Africa, Haiti and others in one cigar!" Samel said. "The taste is complex and incredible, which is why we call it a gourmet blended cigar."

Single ACID and Natural cigars start at $3 and go to about $10 on the high end, whereas a box of 24 range in price from $90 to $200.

My own ACID trip wouldn't have been complete without a visit to Barlow's humidor, which sports the largest collection of Natural and ACID cigars in the region. "We brought in the line because we knew the guys and thought the cigars were good," Blonder said.

I made straight for the ACID display, which takes up a good portion of the back wall in the humidor. No way! They carry the new C Notes and Limited Dinasty. But my eyes fell to the peach colored box full of fat Limited California.

After lighting up this exquisite and rare stogie, I go out into the common area and notice someone else smoking an ACID 1400 CC. "How often do you smoke ACID cigars," I asked him.

"It's all I smoke," said Andii Jursich, a 23-year-old product engineer at PicoLight in Gunbarrel.

"It was the logo on the box that turned me on," Jursich said. "I was a drifter and it wasn't until I started smoking ACID's that I got stuck on one brand. Then I met Scott (ACID) -­ cigars and motorcycles, he's got it all figured out."