The Cigar Hut located on Old San Carlos on Fort Myers Beach will celebrate its 25th anniversary this Sunday. Originally opening as a small hut in Times Square in 2000, The Cigar Hut has been serving customers from all over the world.
For this special event The Cigar Hut will be featuring 25-year anniversary cigars which include three blends of the finest hand rolled cigars available anywhere. There will also be food, specials and raffle giveaways.
The Sunday celebration runs from noon to 7 PM.
Original founder Stephen Light recalls, “I had been wholesaling Cigars throughout the area from Tampa Bay to Key West for several years, but lived on Fort Myers Beach and came up with the idea to open a Cigar store. The town of Fort Myers Beach had just been
incorporated. I was told by the property owner not to bother with the permit because things happened pretty freely back then. But I decided I needed to do it properly just in case the venture turned out to be successful. So I spoke to the town’s single and only employee Marsha Siegel George, who was Town Attorney and Town Manager. There were also five council people elected who were unpaid volunteers. When I spoke with Marsha about the idea, I was a little concerned she might have a notion that a cigar store might not fit, but she indicated to me our town‘s original concept was to be like a mini Key West. Of course a cigar store was a perfect match and I was given the green light to proceed. At that point I had to go downtown Fort Myers to get the actual permit as none of that was done at the Town level yet.”
The Cigar Hut had 16-year run on Estero Boulevard in the building that is now the Margaritaville poolside shower area. Fortunately the business had already moved to the current location before Hurricane Ian destroyed that building.
Light says he’s seen his share of storms. “We weren’t open one year when Tropical Storm Gabriel came through in 2001 and devastated the Times Square and North Beach area with wind and flooding. We were wiped out as were many other places. Of course in the end it was nothing like Ian but at the time it was the worst disaster the beach had seen since Hurricane Donna in 1960 and there weren’t many people around who had seen that including me.”
The Cigar Hut’s third location is 440 Old San Carlos Blvd, across from Wahoo Willies. They’ve been there for 7 1/2 years.