Hello everyone! I hope you are excited for the bank holiday weekend! At C.Gars we always look forward to a bank holiday as the orders really do challenge us.

I decided this week to treat myself to a three day weekend and so my week started on Tuesday. Lisa had done a fantastic job the day prior to keep on top of our stock as well as pick the orders and send our stock sheet to the managers. It is a big job which keeps me very busy, but I usually have Lisa’s help with the orders, so to do it all alone was fantastic. 

On Tuesday, I picked a lot of orders and checked everyone else’s. The process we do here before a parcel gets sent out is a time consuming process, but it is needed to ensure our customers get the correct products in a fantastic condition. Later on I completed all of the shop newsletters. Liam, our marketing manager, brought my attention to a new whisky that needed to be advertised! The brand new Glenallachie C.Gars Malt 10 Year Old Ruby Port Dominique London Exclusive. This was top secret until recently and I was also told that Glenallachie don’t normally do exclusive releases and so for us to get the exclusive bottling is a true testament to the work Dominique London are doing. Each newsletter got a little advert to mention this new release. 

On Wednesday, after picking online orders, I created a news article and article for the C.Gars cigar library all about the new Glenallachie. You can read it here. Later on in the day I received an order for a box of Alec Bradley Black Market Torpedo – I found it interesting as the singles aren’t a great seller but then when I researched the sale it turns out this customer orders a box every couple of weeks! You know you love a cigar when you order a box so often. It made me think, what other cigars sell better as a box over singles and another one popped up – The Blackbird Crow Corona, again we sell more boxes than we do singles. We do offer a box for cheaper than we do buying them individually, so maybe if there’s a cigar you really like, buy the box.

Thursday was stock count day, due to Ben and Sarah having a lovely trip to the Gawith Hoggarth factory, we were short staffed last week and didn’t have the chance to do it. So this week Lisa and I completed it with a good amount of time to spare. I also noticed a customer had purchased two boxes of Chateau Diadem Petit Belicoso. We had these as a try something new cigar towards the end of last year, this gave many customers a great opportunity to try it and love it. This customer must have loved them to buy two boxes! 

On Friday, we picked a lot of a very special sampler – The “A Burst of Flavour Sampler” . We offered them for slightly cheaper and lots of people bought them. I mean 11 cigars for £60.00 is a great offer! Afterwards, It was time to look through my sales of underperforming cigars to see if lowering the price has helped them sell. It’s a large list and but I got it completed! I can certainly say the public love a bargain. I also helped pack some orders, we received a delivery of Germains Pipe tobacco and as it is so hard to get, a lot of orders flood in and it goes out of stock immediately! And so I was helping the team pack them so we had a nice and empty packing room ready for the busy bank holiday.

I hope you have enjoyed this weeks goings on.

So long for now.

Oliver

Hello everyone! I hope you had a fantastic long bank holiday weekend! Just because it’s a bank holiday doesn’t mean life at C.Gars stops. If anything it means we are even busier!

On the bank holiday Monday, it was Robyn, Sharon and myself. Together we picked all of the priority orders which were placed over the weekend. As my loyal readers will know, Mondays are our busiest day and so to just have three members of staff it was tough. Once we picked the priority orders – Sharon and Robyn packed them whilst I carried on picking the regular orders. At the end of the day all of the orders were picked and I was shattered to say the least, but I knew the rest of the team would appreciate it.

On Tuesday, I was being a jack of all trades. I started by checking over all of the orders which was picked by the team on Tuesday and then I started packing orders that was left over from Monday. At one point everyone was either packing or booking the parcels on. By the end of the day we had everything sent out! We were all tired and relieved. Meanwhile, I also had the privilege of putting more cigars on special offer! My favourite ones to lower the price on was the Drew Estate Undercrown 10 All Dekk’d Out Corona Viva – This has been reduced from £25.49 to £17.99! A brilliant saving of £7.50! Which for a Drew Estate is fantastic. Have a look at our sale page to see what else has been lowered.

On Wednesday, I focused on the C.Gars cigar library. I created two articles – The first one is called Why Boveda Humidifiers Are Essential for Cigar Storage – You can read it here. The second is called Short Smoke Cigars – The Best Small Formats UK Smokers Are Buying – You can read it here. I also gave some feedback on cigar sales to Chris, next up will be what we do with these cigars next – this means they will either get more marketing, a drop in price or potentially we may discontinue them. I also received delivery of the latest My Father cigars to enter the UK market – The La Opulencia and El Centurion H-2K-CT. The La Opulencia is available as a Robusto and a Toro and uses Criollo and Corojo binders, Corojo, Criollo and Habano filler and wrapped in a beautiful Mexico Rosado Oscuro wrapper. The El Centurion H-2K-CT is available as a Corona or a Toro and features a hybrid H-2K-CT wrapper from the United States, the binders and fillers are 100% Nicaraguan grown. Get yours now!

On Thursday, I would normally be doing a stock count of all of our cigars but this time I got the week off! Lisa has done it with Sarah, who is usually in the packing department and so I started the day with picking and then worked through our out of stock cigars to see if there was any I could put back online, I was pleased to see us receive a box of the Alec Bradley Black Market Punk as they disappeared for a little while but they are back with the Torpedo, which was nice to see. Afterwards, I started working on my June cigar subscriptions. I have never been able to get so far ahead before but it is vital as Cuban cigars seem to be getting harder to source. So I need to make sure I get my Cuban cigars on order. 

On Friday, I started my day with order picking. Both Josh and I noticed a lot more orders for larger cigars, with the sun coming out it is the obvious thing to do. One order I noticed had a lot of Lancero cigars – Lancero cigars are one of my favourites as you get a lot of flavour from the wrapper compared to the filler. Afterwards, I had the joys of lowering even more cigars! Make sure you have a look at our sales page to see what I have done.

I hope you have enjoyed this weeks blog.

So long for now.

Oliver.

Hello everyone, I hope you are enjoying the beautiful British weather? I has been all over the place recently!

Monday was slightly different for me. First, the team and I got through all of the online orders – The team work has been second to none and everyone has been helping everywhere! Afterwards,  I became a teacher again – I am going to be away from Monday next week and so I need Lisa to take care of our cigar stock. She is fantastic at everything she does but this is something completely new to her but the bits she has been doing has been correct. So I taught Lisa how to gather the information of all of our out of stock Cuban cigars. Then I showed her what to do with that information. Hopefully we will be able to get your favourite Cuban cigars back, but Cuban cigars have been more difficult to get ahold of but we always try! Afterwards I showed her what we do with cigars that we can no longer get from our suppliers, again she perfected it. 

I also received another press release from the Dominique London Pall Mall store. Dominique London today announces the launch of its stunning S.T. Dupont Le Grand Dupont lighter, you can read it here. I uploaded it immediately as the opening was very soon!

On Tuesday, I focused on uploading articles for the C.Gars cigar library. I’m working through a list of article titles that is designed to be seen on Google searches. This week I wrote two! The first is called Why Robusto Cigars Dominate UK Sales – You can read it here. The second is called Romeo y Julieta Cigars – A Buyer’s Guide to One of Cuba’s Most Famous Brands – You can read it here. As much as I am given these titles, it takes a lot of time to research and then write the article. But I do enjoy it! Afterwards, I completed the finishing touches to the shop newsletters. 

On Wednesday, I started my day with order picking. I noticed a lot of people took advantage of our flash sale, it was a 5+1 on the Oliva Serie G Belicoso Aged Cameroon. It was a fantastic deal, sign up to our newsletters if you want to receive all of our incredible deals. Afterwards I focused on creating the leaflet that goes in my cigar subscriptions. Each subscription gets its own double sided leaflet, this means I have 6 sides to edit, but I have mastered them now. I also worked with my assistant manager Chris on lowering the price of some cigars. It always excites me to lower the price of cigars as usually nothing gets cheaper these days. Keep a look on our website as your favourite cigar may get a price drop.

On Thursday, It was a big day for Dominique London! The Pall Mall Store was finally open! You will find the most amazing cigars, accessories and spirits. I can’t wait to visit there myself. It really is the place to be in London! Here in Norfolk, I was back to being a teacher for Lisa, She practised what she had to do on a Monday. She nailed it perfectly and I am confident that she will stay on top of it whilst I am away. Afterwards, I completed my list of cigars to put on special offer – One the surprised me that I was lowering the price of was the La Galera Maduro Chaveta Robusto, this cigar is surprisingly good if you like a Maduro.

On Friday, it was our quarterly stock count. This is where everyone in our building stops and counts every product in our building. As always Lisa and I were counting cigars, this time though we had the help of 4 other people. Together we counted all of the cigars with plenty of time to pick the whole day’s worth of orders. 

I hope you have enjoyed this weeks goings on. I will be off next week so you will have to wait until the week after. 

So long for now.

Oliver.

Hello C.Gars! I hope you have all had a great week! 

On Monday, we were incredibly busy with online orders. As a team we all got together and picked them all very fast. Afterwards I became a teacher – As my loyal readers will know, I have been doing a lot more computer work since the Norfolk shop closed and I have been loving it. However , I am not going to be working every day and so I need to train someone else to be able to do it whilst I am away on holiday. So I spent time with Lisa, she already knew how to do some of it but there are bits that she finds intimidating and so I walked her through it all – how to create stock reports, how to contact suppliers about products and more. She did a very good job and I am confident she will be able to do it while I’m not around.

On Tuesday, I spent a lot of time creating not one but two articles for the C.Gars cigar library. The first one is called Everyday Cigars Explained – Popular Options UK Smokers Buy Regularly – I feel like this is a great article for those who want to smoke cigars everyday but are afraid of the price tag – You can read it here. The second one is called Cigar Shops in the UK – How to Find Trusted Retailers Near You – This one is a nice generic article about how to find a trusted cigar shop – You can read it here. The brilliant team here took care of online orders but I always like to help where I can. I noticed an interesting order from a customer who purchased some rather special Cuban cigars. He ordered three of each too, which either means he is a great friend to his friends or he knows what he likes and took advantage of our low prices. Either way I’m happy for him.

Wednesday seemed to be a very busy day for me. I started the day by helping the team pick online orders and then afterwards I was making sure all of our stock was online. A few weeks ago I reviewed some cigars that had been out of stock on our website for a while. After speaking with my Yoda Chris, it was decided we must take action, so I contacted all of our suppliers to see if we could get the stock and I also contacted our London Office to see if they had stock of some of the products. I was pleasantly surprised to see that London had some Davidoff Discovery Limited Edition 2022 Gran Toro – This cigar sold very well and to see they had some was very surprising indeed – Get them whilst you can as they have very limited stock! Afterwards I received a very good press release from Dominique London! They have confirmed that our new La Casa del Habano boutique on Pall Mall, in the heart of St James’s, will officially open at 10am on 26 March 2026! This is incredibly exciting as it is the UK’s first Dominique London store! You can read more about it here.

Thursday was stock count day. Lisa and I worked tirelessly to count all of our stock and we did it with plenty of time to spare. Afterwards I received some unfortunate news – Drew Estate have discontinued their Acid range in the UK! This is a massive shame as the Acid Blondie was incredibly popular and in some cases a lot of customers first ever cigar. So if you do enjoy the Acid range from Drew Estate get yours whilst you can! My personal favourite is the Green Candela – I can’t describe the flavour other than sweet, but it was lovely! Maybe I’ll get a few before they all go.

On Friday, After completing all of the online orders I was given a task to consolidate one month’s worth of Cuban out of stock into one handy spreadsheet. This meant going through all my old reports and combining them together, it was tough but I did it in a very good time. Afterwards I re-listed some Chevron cigars. We have always sold the bundles so I thought I would put the singles online to see if they were always wanted as singles. As the singles hadn’t been sold for a while, I had to re-do the pricing on them as the bundles had gone up unfortunately.  

I hope you have enjoyed this weeks going on in Norfolk.

So long for now.

Oliver.