A good time to visit a cigar factory located in the Caribbean or Central America is when you're on a cruise and your ship happens to dock at a port near the factory. Some cigar enthusiasts actually take cigar vacations and fly to a hotel near a factory at significant personal expense, but you can save some big bucks if you plan your visit when your ship comes in. In November 2011, I was on a Carnival cruise that stopped at La Romana in the Dominican Republic, home of Tabacalera de Garcia. So why not check out the place where Montecristo, H. Upmann, Romeo y Julieta, Don Diego, Onyx, Henry Clay, Jose Seijas, and a number of other Altadis USA's brands are made?
There was one caveat on this particular cruise. It was my luck that the ship docked in La Romana on a Sunday, when the factory is not usually in operation. The same thing happened to me several years ago in the Bahamas, where the Graycliff Cigar factory is located. Although Graycliff's hotel and cigar shop were open, the factory was not open on Sunday, even for tours. However, Tabacalera de Garcia brought in a skeleton crew just for us cruisers. The regular price for a tour is only $10, but we paid a few dollars more and toured the factory as part of a larger Carnival shore excursion, which encompassed other must-see attractions such as Altos de Chavon. By the way, there is a Montecristo Lounge located there, but it was not open on Sunday. To book just the factory tour on your own, visit tabacaleradegarcia.com.
Tabacalera de Garcia in La Romana is not the only cigar factory in the Dominican Republic, but it just happens to be the largest cigar factory for handmade cigars in the entire world. La Romana is located on the southeast part of the island. If you ever stay at Casa de Campo, one of the Caribbean's premier luxury resorts, a visit to Tabacalera de Garcia is a must, being only a short drive away. Santo Domingo, the nation's capital, is about a 90-minute drive from the factory. In fact, our Carnival tour guide came from his home in Santo Domingo to take us on the tour.
Once we arrived at the factory, our tour group was joined by a TdeG representative, who walked us through the factory. Both our Carnival guide and the TdeG Rep explained how cigars are made, and gave us a little bit of history about Tabacelera de Garcia. The factory was established in 1971, and employs just under 5,000 people. The factory operates six days a week to keep up with the demand for its cigars. The factory mostly works with Dominican tobacco, but approximately 25% of the total tobacco used in the cigars made at Tabacalera de Garcia comes from other countries such as the United States, Indonesia, Cameroon, Ecuador, and several others.
We had plenty of time at the factory to observe cigars being bunched, rolled, and draw tested. We also toured other areas of the factory that were not operating on Sunday, such as where finished cigars were boxed and packaged. There was also a cigar and gift shop where you could buy cigars that were made at the factory. This was a nice convenience for tourists looking to take home a few name-brand Dominican cigars as souvenirs, but cigar connoisseurs can find similar or better prices back in the states.
Although viewing pictures and video are no substitutes for taking the factory tour yourself, we have posted some pictures on Facebook and published a video on Youtube to give you a better idea of what you can expect. We hope that you find our virtual tours to be both informative and enjoyable.
