Our first ad in the cigar industry was not designed to win everyone over. It did not try to follow category norms or check familiar boxes. We did not lead with the product. We did not talk about the blend, the craftsmanship, or the pedigree. What we chose to focus on instead was the moment a cigar creates and what can happen inside that space when you slow down, and pay attention.
At the time, our company was called Faduchi Group. We had just moved into a new space with boxes still stacked, walls barely dry, and all of us filled with the urgency that comes with beginnings. In that first week in the space, we did not ease into ideas. We went straight into something that felt honest and risky and very much aligned with how we saw the world.
Our newly renovated office 2012 | Rony posing as we painted our mural.
I have always believed that cigars create a window, roughly forty-five minutes to an hour where conversations slow down and memorable moments are created. Spend that time with the wrong person and it can weigh on you for the rest of the day. Spend it with the right person and it can change your year. Cigars do not force conversation, but rather invite it.
That belief was not something I invented for the campaign. It was something I had said for years, and others had said while smoking with me. The cigar itself is not the point. The time is. And the smoker understands that.
I was working closely with my art director at the time, Rony Mikhael (now of Studiomined). One afternoon, the two of us were sitting together smoking and talking through ideas the way we always did. I remember saying that if this campaign was going to work, we really only had two options: we either went funny or we went serious.
Alec Bradley Cigars had already done “cool” before our time, and they had done it well. Repeating that tone did not interest us, and it would not move anything forward. We could not be another variation of what already existed. We had to choose a direction that felt different and commit to it fully.
That is when Rony mentioned going serious. Something heavier, something that mattered, deep and heavy (kind of like Rony’s thought process). Funny was familiar territory for me. I come from an entertainment background and my father is a comedian, so humor has always been a natural entry point. But serious carried a different kind of weight and a different kind of responsibility.
Once we landed there, the path narrowed in a productive way.
We wrote and rewrote the story several times, exchanging drafts and stripping away anything that felt unnecessary. What we settled on was simple: a father and son smoking together. Over the course of that hour, the son learns something he had never known, that without him being born, his parents might never have stayed together.
I recently went out to the country for a quick visit with my parents to congratulate them on 40 years of marriage. I wasn’t planning on staying long, but since my dad offered me a cigar I decided to stick around a little longer. Within that time he unveiled some pretty deep history.
It turns out he had left my mother when she was pregnant with me, saying he didn’t really love her. He admitted to me that he was being a coward in doing so, but eventually made the decision to come back when he realized that I needed him; a father figure, someone to look up to and emulate… which I did. He began to fall in love with my mother again, and for the first time came to understand what love really is, what true family really looks like. He told me they wouldn’t be celebrating 40 years if it wasn’t for me.
I’m thankful for the conversation that sparked from the time spent over this cigar. It was one of the most significant moments for me; the cigar that changed my life.
The idea was not about cigars. It was about what happens when time is shared without distraction. The line that anchored everything was “The Cigar That Changed My Life.” Instead of focusing on the product, the quality, or the brand story, we focused on the impact of the moment itself.
When we presented the idea to the client, they hesitated, and they should have. It was their money, their brand, and their reputation on the line. Questions were asked, but beneath the hesitation was something more important, understanding and trust. Alan Rubin knew we were onto something. He also knew we were a little nuts and had seen our work before. He understood how we thought and how far we were willing to push, and he appreciated what we had done in the past.
Alan was not alone. Sammy Phillips, head of sales, also had a clear read on what the company needed and how the market moved. Together they didn’t just approve the idea, they made space for it. That is rare. Most clients hire you to do what you do and then tell you what to do. Alan and Sammy stepped back and let the work play out, aware it could go either way. They trusted the process, trusted the thinking, and trusted us to see it through good or bad.
That trust changed everything.
The trust wasn’t just in the creative, but the idea behind it. Could we drive people from the ad to the website? Could we measure clicks and engagement? Could we prove the ad was doing more than looking good in a magazine? That was compelling for the client, and that was what the ad was anchored in. So it was a go!
To bring the idea to life, we worked with photographer Alex Albojer and our talented friend Dan Wood on lighting. Every decision on set supported the emotional core. Nothing existed simply to decorate the frame.
Rony lighting the actors cigars | Todd, Dan and Alex lining up the shot.
Now, the ad did not win everyone over, but it did what we hoped it would do. It made people stop. It made them think. It made them click, engage, and reach out, and those engagements still happen to this day. More campaigns followed, some bigger and more refined, but this was the first one. The one that proved our instincts were worth trusting and that our ideas had value beyond execution.
The line read “The Cigar That Changed My Life.” And in a very real way, it was the ad that changed ours.
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