After twenty years in the cigar biz, Rocky Patel has earned the right to celebrate. His blends regularly appear on Cigar Aficionado’s Top 25 lists (e.g. the 94-rated Rocky Patel Sun Grown, the Royale, the Decade, and the 15th Anniversary blend, which has hit the list a bunch of times).
Now, some might say, big whoop – a rich lawyer threw his resources around and built a great company – where’s the feel good story in all that? Well, let’s remember that Rocky the cigar magnate used to be called Rakesh, the name his parents gave him in 1961 when he was born in India. If you think the path from there to the top of the world is smooth and easy, you need to put down the Super Ligero and take a few breaths of fresh air. Just because you’re a career man of decent means, the cigar world doesn’t simply open its doors and roll out the Maduro carpet for you, especially if you’re not a Latino. Rocky was an outsider, and he had to put in the sweat equity to get where he is.
Aside from traveling to factories and farms to learn the business literally from the ground up, getting his product placed in stores meant visiting smoke shops, one by one. 600 locations in 700 days! Rocky must have an absolute shit-ton of frequent flyer miles, even now! He pounded the pavement and built his company in the tried and true old school way.
He started in 1995 as a silent partner in Indian Tabac without a single connection in the industry. He was just a dude who occasionally enjoyed a cigar down at the Grand Havana Room in Los Angeles. By 2015, 20 years later, the world had to give it up to Rocky Patel, a man who clearly knows his leaf.
To that, we take off our hats.
Now, let’s get to the smoke.
The Rocky Patel 20th Anniversary cigar is a 90-rated, box-pressed stick that comes in natural and Maduro Honduran wrappers, lovingly curled around a Honduran binder, painstakingly bunched up with a Nicaraguan and Honduran filler blend. Light it up for flavors of oak and hickory, spicy cinnamon, and a graham cracker finish. It’s a fine way to celebrate milestones like 20th anniversaries, 20th birthdays, or even 20 days without losing your shit and strangling someone on the roadside.
You gotta find your victories where you can. Ol’ Rocky sure did!
Please browse our selection of Rocky Patel 20th Anniversary cigars at your leisure.
