The PCA Goes All-In on Honduras: Inside the Association's Deepening Commitment to Central America's Most Exciting Cigar Country
Honduras has never been a footnote in the premium cigar world — but for years, it occupied a kind of second-tier status in the popular imagination, overshadowed by the megabrands and marketing muscle of Nicaragua and the Dominican Republic. That perception is changing fast, and the Premium Cigar Association is putting real institutional weight behind the shift. Through a series of high-level government meetings, an industry panel at a historic cultural venue, a formal festival partnership, and a boots-on-the-ground delegation at the 2026 Festival del Puro y el Café, the PCA has made its position unmistakable: Honduras is no longer an afterthought in the association's global strategy. It is a priority.
Tegucigalpa, August 2026: A Meeting at the Top
The clearest signal of the PCA's elevated engagement came in late August, when the organization sent its Director of International Affairs and Education, Ricardo Carioni, to the Honduran capital for two days of intensive meetings and public programming. The PCA continued its active international engagement in Honduras on August 19–20, participating in a series of high-level meetings and industry events in Tegucigalpa focused on strengthening one of the world's most important premium cigar-producing nations.
The crown jewel of the trip was a sit-down at the highest level of Honduran government. The PCA was represented by Carioni at a meeting at Casa Presidencial with President Nasry Asfura and leaders of the Honduran cigar industry. It is not every day that a trade association — even a powerful one — gets face time at a nation's executive mansion. The fact that the PCA secured it underscores both the economic weight of Honduras's tobacco sector and the association's growing credibility as an international institution, not simply a domestic lobbying group.
Discussions centered on investment, production, exports, regulation, and the continued international development of the sector. These are not abstract talking points. Honduran cigar manufacturing employs tens of thousands of workers, generates significant export revenue, and anchors entire regional economies in departments like El Paraíso. Any conversation about regulatory frameworks or export strategy directly affects the livelihoods of the people rolling leaves in factories across Danlí. The PCA's presence at that table — speaking on behalf of manufacturers, retailers, and suppliers connected to the Honduran supply chain — matters in a tangible way.
A Festival Is Born: The Honduran Cigar Festival Announcement
The Casa Presidencial meeting also produced a headline of its own, one with long-term implications for how Honduras positions itself on the global stage. During the meeting, President Asfura announced plans for a Honduran Cigar Festival, beginning in Tegucigalpa and continuing with visits to tobacco farms and cigar factories in Danlí and El Paraíso. The format — starting in the capital and then moving outward into the production heartland — is deliberately structured to combine political prestige with ground-level authenticity. It's a smart blueprint, one that draws from the successful models established in Nicaragua, where cigar tourism has become a meaningful part of the national economy.
The Association will continue supporting efforts surrounding the development and international promotion of the festival, alongside new education and professional-development initiatives through the PCA and The Cigar Academy. That last piece — the mention of The Cigar Academy — deserves attention. It signals that the PCA's involvement goes beyond ribbon-cutting and photo opportunities. Education has become a core pillar of the association's international strategy, meaning that events tied to the Honduran festival could include training programs for retailers, sommelier-style certification tracks for enthusiasts, and professional development for the manufacturers themselves. That's the kind of infrastructure that turns a festival into something durable.
Fuego and Barrica: Industry Voices in a Historic Room
Later on the same day as the presidential meeting, Carioni stepped into a different kind of room — one that placed the tobacco industry's challenges and opportunities in front of an audience that included government ministers, major manufacturers, and the broader public. Carioni moderated the High-Level Panel "The Honduran Tobacco Industry: Challenges and Opportunities" at the historic Centro Cultural Nave Carías as part of the Fuego & Barrica VIII Edición promotional and experiential event.
The Fuego & Barrica event — now in its eighth edition — has established itself as Honduras's most important domestic showcase for premium tobacco and spirits culture. Hosting a high-level panel there, inside a cultural institution with historical resonance, was a deliberate statement: this industry belongs to Honduran civic life, not just to the export ledgers. Opened by Tegucigalda Mayor Juan Diego Zelaya, the discussion brought together Minister Epaminondas Marinakys, Christian Eiroa, Leonel Rivas, Carlos Castillo and Ismael Rodríguez Oliván, connecting perspectives from government, cigar manufacturing, and the broader industry ecosystem.
Christian Eiroa's presence on that panel is itself a statement. Eiroa is one of the most respected names in Honduran tobacco — his family's legacy runs through some of the most critically lauded cigars to come out of the country over the past three decades. Having him sit alongside a government minister and a PCA representative in a formal policy discussion rather than simply a trade show booth reflects the seriousness with which Honduras is approaching this moment. The industry's elder statesmen and its political champions are aligned, and the PCA is facilitating that conversation at the institutional level.
The Festival del Puro y el Café: From Seed to Celebration
What Danlí Means to the Cigar World
Long before the PCA formalized its relationship with the Festival del Puro y el Café in early 2026, the event had already been quietly building a reputation that outpaced its young age. Held annually in Danlí, El Paraíso — widely regarded as the heart of Honduran tobacco production — the Festival del Puro y el Café celebrates two of the nation's most iconic exports: premium cigars and specialty coffee. The pairing is inspired. Coffee and tobacco share not just geography in Honduras but also terroir — the volcanic soils, elevation, and moisture patterns that define the El Paraíso region create conditions equally hospitable to shade-grown wrapper leaves and high-altitude arabica beans. Bringing them together under one festival banner reflects a sophisticated understanding of experiential marketing and regional identity.
Launched in 2021, the festival has grown quickly into a key destination for manufacturers, retailers, and enthusiasts, and the PCA partnership agreement is designed to expand engagement, shared programming, and visibility for PCA members, Honduran festival stakeholders, retailers, and premium cigar enthusiasts. Growth from a standing start in 2021 to a festival commanding a formal partnership with North America's most powerful premium cigar trade association in just a few years is not accidental. It reflects both the quality of execution by the organizers and the genuine appetite — from American retailers especially — for immersive experiences in producing countries.
Inside the 2026 Festival Experience
The PCA was proud to participate in the 2026 Festival del Puro y el Café in Danlí, Honduras, an extraordinary celebration of craftsmanship, culture, heritage, and community that continues to solidify Honduras' position as one of the world's premier producers of premium cigars. For American cigar enthusiasts who have made pilgrimages to Nicaragua's festivals or attended the trade shows in Las Vegas, the Honduran festival offers something distinct: a country still in the active process of claiming its rightful place in the global conversation, with all the energy and authenticity that entails.
Day One provided attendees with an immersive journey into the heart of Honduran cigar production through factory and farm visits. Guests experienced firsthand the artistry, precision, and passion behind some of the finest cigars in the world, gaining a deeper appreciation for the people and traditions that define Honduran tobacco. There is no substitute for standing in a factory and watching a torcedor work — the speed, the consistency, the tactile intelligence in the way an experienced roller reads a leaf. For retail shop owners and their staff, those visits translate directly into better customer conversations back home. When a retailer in, say, Denver or Atlanta can describe the specific valley where a wrapper was grown and the face of the person who rolled the cigar, that's a sales tool no advertising campaign can replicate.
Particularly meaningful was the PCA's first engagement at the Honduras Cigar Festival, where the association received distinguished recognition for its growing international educational and advocacy efforts. Recognition from a host country is never just ceremonial. It formalizes a relationship and creates accountability on both sides — the PCA is expected to continue delivering, and the Honduran industry now has a credible international partner with genuine membership reach.
Tourism, Diplomacy, and the Bigger Picture
The PCA delegation was also honored to meet with Honduras' Minister of Tourism, Andrés Ehrler Martínez, as well as Congressman Jorge Morazán, in meaningful conversations about the importance of cigar tourism, cultural promotion, and international collaboration. The involvement of Honduras's tourism ministry is significant and reflects a broader trend across Latin American cigar-producing nations: the recognition that premium tobacco is not merely an agricultural export but a cultural product capable of driving high-value tourism. A visitor attending the Festival del Puro y el Café is not spending budget-traveler dollars — they are staying in local hotels, eating in local restaurants, hiring guides for factory tours, and purchasing locally made products. The economic multiplier from that kind of visitor is substantially higher than mass tourism.
Meetings with Honduran tourism authorities further highlighted the increasing recognition of premium cigars not simply as products, but as cultural and economic ambassadors capable of elevating luxury tourism, hospitality and international commerce. For American cigar aficionados who take their hobby seriously, this framing matters. It means that the Honduran government is creating the conditions — infrastructure, official support, international marketing — for the kind of travel experience that makes a trip to Danlí worth planning around a festival date rather than a coincidence.
The PCA's Global Strategy: Honduras in Context
Following the Nicaragua and Dominican Republic Playbook
The PCA's move into Honduras did not happen in a vacuum. The association spent years developing its international partnerships before adding a Central American country to its formal network. "Honduras represents one of the most dynamic stories in premium cigars today," said Joshua Habursky, CEO of the Premium Cigar Association. "The association is proud to expand our international partnership to include Honduras after years of collaboration with the festivals in Nicaragua and the Dominican Republic."
Those prior collaborations created a template. Nicaragua's cigar festival — held in Estelí, the country's tobacco capital — evolved into one of the cigar world's most anticipated annual events, drawing American retailers and enthusiasts who return year after year. The Dominican Republic's festival developed along similar lines, building bridges between production-side artisans and the retail community that ultimately sells their products. PCA CEO Joshua Habursky said the agreement expands the association's international partnerships following similar collaborations in Nicaragua and the Dominican Republic, reflecting Honduras' growing influence in the global premium cigar sector. Honduras now enters that established rotation, but with its own distinct identity — and, arguably, with more momentum behind it than either of its predecessors had at a comparable stage.
What the Partnership Actually Delivers
It is worth being precise about the mechanics of the PCA-Festival del Puro y el Café partnership, because the details reveal how seriously both parties are treating the arrangement. As part of the agreement, the PCA will assist with festival branding and registration awareness among its membership, while the festival will provide registration access for PCA staff to attend the event. On the surface, that sounds like a straightforward promotional exchange. But the real value flows through the PCA's membership network — thousands of premium cigar retailers across the United States who receive the association's communications, attend its events, and look to it for guidance on where to travel, what to stock, and which producers to trust.
When the PCA puts the Festival del Puro y el Café in front of that audience, it is not just selling festival tickets. It is legitimizing Honduras as a destination worth the trip, an investment worth the airfare. "Our mission has always been to showcase the excellence of Honduran tobacco, coffee, and culture to the world. Working alongside the PCA allows us to open new doors for retailers, producers, and enthusiasts, while honoring the tradition that makes this industry so extraordinary," said festival organizer Héctor Valladares. For a festival still in its early years, that kind of institutional endorsement compresses what might otherwise take a decade of slow reputation-building into a much shorter runway.
Education as the Long Game
Perhaps the most underreported aspect of the PCA's Honduras engagement is the educational dimension. The PCA will continue working alongside its members and partners in Honduras — and throughout the world's premium cigar-producing nations — to strengthen education, market access, institutional relationships and the long-term vitality of the premium cigar industry. The Cigar Academy, the PCA's educational arm, represents the association's most direct investment in the human capital of the industry. Training programs that reach Honduran producers and local retailers do not just improve individual careers — they raise the floor of the entire market, improving quality consistency, customer experience, and the long-term reputation of Honduran cigars globally.
From the volcanic valleys of Nicaragua to the rolling tobacco regions of Honduras and the Dominican Republic, premium cigars are born through generations of craftsmanship, agricultural mastery and cultural tradition. That is why the PCA's expanding international engagement matters so profoundly. While America remains the unquestioned priority of the Premium Cigar Association, supporting PCA members increasingly requires a global vision. The logic is straightforward: American retailers cannot sell Honduran cigars effectively without understanding them, and they cannot understand them without connection to the people and places that produce them. The PCA's international work, including its Honduras engagement, creates the conditions for that understanding.
Honduras's Cigar Identity: Why This Country, Why Now
It would be easy to attribute the PCA's Honduras push entirely to association strategy, but the honest explanation is simpler: Honduras earned this attention by producing exceptional cigars. The country's tobacco-growing regions — particularly the El Paraíso department centered on Danlí — offer a combination of soil composition, altitude, and climate that rivals anything in the Caribbean Basin. The wrapper leaves grown in this region are prized for their elasticity, their color consistency, and the complexity of flavor they contribute to a finished blend.
Honduras has become a cornerstone of the premium cigar world, and initiatives such as this festival are instrumental in promoting the country's exceptional craftsmanship, agricultural excellence, tourism, and entrepreneurial spirit on an international stage. The entrepreneurial angle is real and underappreciated. Honduras is not simply a country where American or Cuban-heritage manufacturers set up operations — it has produced homegrown cigar entrepreneurs and blenders who have built internationally respected brands from the ground up. The presence of figures like Christian Eiroa at a policy panel alongside government ministers reflects that entrepreneurial energy finding its way into civic life.
Major manufacturers have taken notice in concrete ways. My Father Cigars celebrated two significant milestones at the 2025 PCA Trade Show, including introducing its first Honduran-made cigar, the My Father Blue, to be produced at the Garcias' new factory in Honduras and featuring tobacco grown on the Garcia family farms in the country. When a brand of My Father's caliber — one built on Nicaraguan tobacco and revered across the American market — makes a strategic move into Honduran production, it signals something important about where the industry sees quality and opportunity converging. The My Father Blue, named in part for the color in the Honduran flag, is more than a new SKU; it is an endorsement from one of the most credible families in the business.
What It Means for American Retailers and Enthusiasts
For the American cigar smoker, all of this institutional activity has practical implications. The PCA's deepening presence in Honduras means more Honduran tobacco will make its way into the educational content, trade show programming, and retailer training that shapes what ends up behind the counter at your local cigar shop. Festival partnerships generate media coverage, social content, and word-of-mouth that collectively raise the profile of a producing region among consumers who may not follow trade news but absolutely notice when their favorite shop starts stocking something new and compelling.
For the enthusiast who wants to go further — who is thinking about a destination trip built around cigars — the Honduran festival is becoming a genuinely viable option. From the moment the PCA delegation arrived, they were received with exceptional warmth, generosity, and hospitality by the festival organizers, the Honduran Ministry of Tourism, local officials, industry leaders, artisans, and the people of Danlí. The spirit of welcome extended throughout every aspect of the festival and reflected the pride Honduras holds for its tobacco heritage and cultural traditions. That hospitality, structured around factory visits, panel discussions, and sensory experiences combining premium cigars with specialty coffee, is exactly the kind of immersive travel that serious aficionados plan months in advance.
For American retailers specifically, the PCA's work in Honduras creates access to relationships that simply do not develop over a trade show floor. A retailer who attends the Festival del Puro y el Café, walks tobacco fields, sits through a panel moderated by the PCA's international affairs director, and has dinner with a Honduran manufacturer is not operating on the same level as one who places orders from a catalog. That depth of knowledge flows into better buying decisions, better customer education, and ultimately better businesses.
Looking Ahead: A Relationship Still in Its Early Chapters
The PCA looks forward to continuing to strengthen and expand its partnership with Festival del Puro y el Café and with the Honduran cigar industry as a whole, remaining committed to supporting members, elevating premium tobacco traditions, and ensuring that the remarkable legacy of Honduran cigars continues to thrive for generations to come. That language — "for generations to come" — reflects the time horizon the association is working on. This is not a one-year promotional arrangement. It is an attempt to institutionalize a relationship between the world's largest premium cigar retail marketplace and one of the most important tobacco-producing nations on earth.
The trajectory is clear. The PCA began its international festival strategy in Nicaragua, extended it to the Dominican Republic, and has now formally brought Honduras into the fold — not just through a festival partnership but through presidential meetings, policy panels, ministerial conversations, and on-the-ground educational programming. Each layer adds depth and durability to the relationship. The partnership between the PCA and Festival del Puro y el Café represents a shared commitment to supporting PCA members while advancing the growth, visibility, and preservation of the rich Honduran cigar industry and culture.
Honduras's cigar story is, in many ways, still being written. The Festival del Puro y el Café is young. The planned national Honduran Cigar Festival announced by President Asfura is younger still. The PCA's formal engagement with both puts the association in a position to help shape that story rather than simply observe it from a distance. For anyone who smokes, sells, or simply loves premium cigars, what happens in the mountains and valleys of El Paraíso over the next several years is worth paying close attention to. The country has the tobacco. The organizers have the vision. And now, the most powerful trade association in the business has put its name behind the effort.
