ProCigar Closes 18th Festival With Record-Breaking Auction
It was a night of extraordinary energy and generosity, as the ProCigar Festival concluded in the Dominican Republic. After three days of field trips and factory tours, the Festival wrapped up with a grand gala dinner and auction that raised more than $600,000 for charity, a record number for the organization.
Nearly 1,000 international guests from more than 40 countries attended the multi-day Festival, joining some of the biggest players in the premium cigar industry. Even the president of the Dominican Republic attended one of the evening events.
Now in its 18th year, The ProCigar Festival is an immersive celebration of Dominican handmade cigars. This year, it began in Santiago (the country’s epicenter of cigar manufacturing), and it brought together cigar lovers from all over the world. If you’ve never smoked a cigar in its country of origin, then your cigar education is not yet complete. It’s an integral part of the hobby and every fan of premium cigars should have this elemental experience at least once—cigars actually taste different when smoked in their homeland.
The format of the festival is simple, and the set-up is quite convenient. Cigar country is a mere 25-minute car ride from the Santiago airport, and you’re immediately handed a box of cigars once you register at the hotel. This year, the official hotel for ProCigar guests was the Marriot Residence Inn, but the Hotel Santiago Curio Collection By Hilton was an option as well. The four-night, three-day affair includes factory and tobacco field tours during the mornings and afternoons, followed by evening celebrations at night where everyone is presented a specially-made box of cigars. The tours often include instructional seminars and hands-on classes that teach blending and rolling, but the tone is always casual, striking the right balance between education and leisure.
The members include Arnold Andre, Arturo Fuente, Casa Carrillo, De Los Reyes, General Cigar, La Aurora, La Flor Dominicana, PDR Cigars, Quesada Cigars, Tabacalera de Garcia (Altadis U.S.A.), Tabadom (Davidoff) and Tabacalera Palma. The festival was first held in 2008 and has since grown. Litto Gomez of La Flor Dominicana is the organization’s current president.
On the final night, more than a dozen lots went up for auction, which was led by Michael Herklots of Ferio Tego Cigars. The line-up included one-of-a-kind humidors from all the ProCigar members, but one lot in particular helped ProCigar to break its auction record: “Les Chaînes de L’Amour,” from Tabacalera Fuente, which closed for $150,000, the highest-earning humidor of the evening. That particular lot was purchased by cigarmaker A.J. Fernandez, who was visiting from Nicaragua. Other individual lots included:
- “Espejo de Litto” by La Flor Dominicana ($51,000)
- “Marı́a Victoria Palma (MVP)” by Tabacalera Palma ($46,000)
- “Horses and Tobacco” by De Los Reyes ($45,000)
- “Family Creed: Fuerte Sol” by La Aurora ($44,000)
- “Adventure Around The World” by Casa Carrillo ($42,000)
- “CAO Selection Luxury” by General Cigar Dominicana ($35,000)
- “ProCigar Official Humidor 2026” by Humidif Group/ProCigar ($30,000)
- “The Year of The Horse Masterpiece” by Tabadom Holding (Davidoff) ($28,000)
The auction raised a total of $618,188, and its proceeds will benefit a variety of charities in the Dominican Republic, including Voluntariado Jesús con Los Niños and Hospicio San Vicente de Paúl.
“This extraordinary week has allowed us to celebrate not only exceptional premium cigars, but also the friendship, culture, tradition, and shared passion that unite us,” says Gomez, emphasizing that the spirit of this year’s Festival is reflected in its slogan: “Our Soil and Soul.”
“We are competitors, but we are also friends,” Gomez adds. “We help each other out when we have to. There’s no other industry like that in the world.”
Founded in 1992, ProCigar is an organization of Dominican premium cigar manufacturers dedicated to maintaining high-quality standards of agriculture and industry, as well as upholding the international reputation of the Dominican Republic.
