Dark Fired tobacco is grown almost exclusively on family farms. The dark-fired process consists of hanging the green tobacco leaves in barns and smoking them over select hickory logs to cure. Including wrapper and filler, Avanti currently buys well over half a million pounds of the crop annually. The bulk of the 38 to 42-million-pound annual crop goes to U.S. snuff manufacturers and European cigarette companies.Suraci Sr. makes at least 10 trips annually to the 11-county tobacco growing region. There, he attends auctions and grades the leaf purchased. Tony Jr., his brother Marc, and cousin Dominic Keating also make regular trips to the region. This hands-on approach allows the family to produce a product with consistent taste and quality.
"We're able to buy that tobacco at a reasonable price and still keep the blend that makes these cigars taste the same as the ones made by the original Suraci brothers," says Keating.
Suraci Sr.'s father and his uncle started out rolling and selling cigars on these shores in the early years of this century. By 1925, they were able to purchase the Parodi Cigar Company of New York, which became their primary brand name. "The Paroti Ammezzati is still our leading-selling brand," says Tony Jr.
After the Second World War, the family bought out the DeNobili Cigar Company. By 1952, the Suraci family had cornered 75%, of the market for Italian-style cigars. The Petri brand, a family-owned wine and cigar concern on the West Coast, was their only competitor.
In 1954, Suraci Sr., an Annapolis graduate and Korean War veteran, joined the family business. At that time, all their cigars were still hand- rolled. Growing product demand, and an attempt by the Petri company to grab a larger market share through mass production, led the Suraci family away from handrolling.
Handrolled Parodi cigars were last available in 1962, yet the consumers did not seem to mind the move to machine manufacturing. In fact, demand increased. By 1963 - the year I snuck my first DeNobili Popular from my grandfather's pack and smoked it out behind his barn the Petri group was ready to throw in the towel. They sold their cigar making assets to the Suraci family. Total market dominance had been achieved. The Avanti company flourished.
But then the negative factors that affected all cigar sales throughout the country began to take their toll at Avanti. Sales began to dwindle, then plummet. "There were a lot more family members who were part of the company then," recounts Tony Jr. "We began to diversify and buy companies that had nothing to do with tobacco. There was a plastic playing card company, an imported giftware company, and a company that made handpainted trays and wastebaskets. Meanwhile, the cigar business continued its downward spiral, and something had to be done."
By 1982, the company was producing and selling no more than 15 million cigars annually. They faced a choice: either downsize or close up shop. Suraci Sr. and Dominic Keating removed themselves from the non-cigar businesses. They down-sized the cigar operation and moved to their present facility, with a smaller work force. In 1983, fresh from college, Tony Jr. joined the company to help out with marketing and sales.
Throughout the 1980s, the company struggled to rebuild their market share. Gradually, sales began to achieve their present levels. Chain drugstores and retail tobacco shops became their main retail outlets, with sales divided about equally between the two. "It was a weird time. It seemed like the only bumps up in sales we got were when one chain of drug stores would acquire another," says Tony Jr.
Then, a few years later, the cigar boom was in full swing. "The rage for premium cigars has been a help to us," says Tony Jr. "But so far, it hasn't created the interest in our products that I believe it should."
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