It’s been way too long since my last written post! This damn Corona Virus caused my attention to sway away from the basics! But ahhhh… There is now inspiration once again flowing through my veins and now have a few things that I want to say! And I promise, I will not stay away this long again. 

Week(s) in Review

As usual, the recap of what’s been happening in the StickMen world since my last written post.

• First off…. The elephant in the corner is the Corona Virus and its impact on our society. It’s changed the way we live, the way we work, the way we play and for those of us in the lifestyle it has changed the way we Puff as many of our favorite places to congregate with other StickMen and Women have had to close due to the Social Distancing guidelines that we should all be following.
• There’s literally no sports on TV right now. I’m in serious withdrawal after missing March Madness, the Masters, the start of baseball, insert whatever your kid’s spring sport is and my beloved NBA Playoffs are in serious jeopardy!
• We released our final pre-Corona Chat Session back on March 30th with Havana Cigars. Nice conversation with Heather and Rafa, the husband and wife duo that own and operate the lounge. 
• We released a cool video on the “Can We Talk?” event by the Phat Ash Collection at the Leaf Life Lounge. Great event and look for the event’s Host, Sedrck Dunson and I to chop it up soon about it on the Virtual Puff Podcast.
• Speak of the “Virtual Puff” podcast… guess what? StickMen now has a podcast!! It’s available on Apple Podcasts and Spotify as well as the StickMen Blog itself of course. Episode two coming soon! Once we hit our groove, look for this to be a weekly podcast.
• We learned that we can still simulate that Cigar Lounge by leveraging some cool tech and that’s the basis for this article, the Virtual Cigar Lounge!

Our New World

Ok, unless you’ve been living under a rock, you’ve definitely heard the hoopla surrounding people using video conferencing services for much more than just work. Many of these services have become a popular tool for staying connected with Friends and Family, when the situation calls for more than two people to connect. Of course, you can always use Facetime, WhatsApp, Skype and Facebook Messenger but those services have traditionally focused on two-way conversations and although some now support multiple users, they can be a bit clunky. 

Due to Covid-19 you’re probably really missing hanging out with ‘the boys” or “the girls”, your various book clubs, hobby groups and did I say Sporting Events? In the beginning, for a brief moment we were all paralyzed with the sudden elimination of the things we enjoy so much. But alas, we quickly discovered that there are OPTIONS when it comes to hanging out with Friends and Family…. Virtually!

Here’s my very short, to the point list of what has been a hit with people all around the globe:

1. Zoom – This is currently the big boy in the virtual world. It’s been popular for some time in the business community but due to its ease of use, coupled with the fact that it offers a free plan supporting up to 100 participants has made them the platform of choice during these times of social distancing. 
2. House Party – While I personally have less experience with this, it is a social networking app that allows up to eight people to video chat at once in a “room.” Users can have infinite rooms and easily float between rooms. Like Zoom, you don’t need to call anyone. Users receive a notification when friends open the app and can join chats with friends (and friends of friends). The ease of use is pretty high with this one as well and has a big emphasis on “Social”.
3. Google Meet (formerly Hangouts) – Google Meets has been making BIG strides in the business world for some time now as more and more companies adopt the G Suite platform. A big plus with G Suite is that it has built in conferencing support that is not only available to business users but also available for personal users. Until Covid-19, I would say this service was underutilized given the fact that I don’t know too many people who DO NOT have a Gmail account. With this service, you can facilitate video and voice conferencing for up to 250 participants per call. It’s sometimes not as easy to facilitate as others but still a good service. 

With any of three of the services mentioned above, I know that you can have a good time catching up with your friends and/or family members for social purposes. So far, I’ve participated in a virtual birthday party, a happy hour and many general “shoot the shit” sessions and all turned out to be really good events once you get past helping out the one or two technically challenged participants! The good news there is that once they have it, they HAVE IT. Subsequent meetups tend to go really smooth.

What is a Virtual Cigar Lounge?

Finally, I’m about to talk about the Cigar Lounge. It’s really what StickMen is all about. Cigar and Whiskey Lifestyle lovers coming together for good conversation. Unfortunately, we have been unable to do the usual in-person visit to your local cigar lounge but luckily in comes Zoom to the rescue (my preferred platform)!

I was skeptical at first that;

1. I would be the only cigar geek that wanted to do this… NOT.
2. If we did it, it would be sort of … .well….lame?….. NOT.
3. The slight delay that you often get when video conferencing would kill the vibe…. NOT

Well low and behold it was fantastic! Now don’t get me wrong, being at the lounge is absolutely the preferred way but the virtual lounge was surprisingly pretty fun! Before we had the fun however, there were some lessons learned.

Lessons in Virtual Cigar Lounging

Our first virtual event was just me and a couple of buddies and it went as expected but you could tell we all needed a little time to adjust. The conversation didn’t necessarily flow as it does in person but we eventually got the hang of it and had a great time. 

In our second event, I swung for the fences and invited the general cigar smoking public to join and quickly learned a few MAJOR lessons:

1. Never do a public smoker! Always privatize it by vetting out participants and asking them to message you privately for details. At StickMen, because being social is our business, we do plan to reach out to followers and subscribers to host Virtual Events with prizes and giveaways. vetting each participant. I do think it would be cool for a few strangers to come together for some PSC and leave as friends! Look out for details on FB and IG. Space will be limited!
2. Password protect your lounge! We got invaded by some assholes who thought it would be cute to ruin what was starting off as a cool event. 
3. Less is more! Limit the number of participants. At first it sounded really cool to smoke with 100 of your closest instagram and facebook friends. In reality, only a handful of people talk and the rest are just kind of sitting there. The magic number that I feel leads to great conversation with everyone participating is 10 or less. Anything more is unruly and when you think about being at your local cigar lounge, are you ever sitting there smoking with 100 other folks? No, you’re not. So make it real… a few StickMen kicking back for a little Puff, Sip, Chat!
4. Tablets and PC’s are best. Yeah, sure you can use your phone but to do this right and for maximum enjoyment the large screen that a PC and/or Tablet gives you is the way to go! You can put things in gallery mode and see all of your participants at once vs. only seeing who is talking. Do you really want to miss that moment someone forgets that everyone can see them?

Now, let me bring you up to where we are today. We’ve settled into a weekly groove with a few local cigar buddies to get together for a Virtual cigar lounge experience. Once everyone got past the initial awkwardness of being on video, it quickly evolved (or maybe devolved) into the same banter we have in the lounge and honestly I think we forgot we were not at the lounge. It felt like old times! So here’s the summary of my recommendation; 

• Just do it.. yeah, like Nike. Take some initiative and create a Zoom account (or your preferred service)
• Keep it Small– Reach out to your local StickMen that you are usually chopping it up with. 10 or less is recommended but if you have a close knit group of 15 buddies, why not.
• No Democracy – Pick a date and time you will be smoking. Don’t ask for opinions or it will never get done.
• Watch out for the jerks – Share the details via text message to that group (remember to password protect just in case)
• Voila… you’re ready to go! 

You have just created your own Virtual Cigar Lounge with only one thing left to do and that is Puff, Sip, Chat, Repeat and PLEASE send us a photo of your group! We’d love to see it!