Where the Smoke Meets the Water: Major League Fishing and Cigars International Lock In an Expanded 2027 Deal
There are few rituals in sport as universally understood as the victory cigar. From the locker rooms of championship-winning football teams to the decks of boats that just boated the winning bass, a lit cigar has always said something that a trophy alone cannot — that the hard work is done, and this moment belongs to you. It is that shared cultural language between competition and celebration that sits at the heart of one of professional fishing's most compelling sponsorship stories.
On October 14, 2026, Major League Fishing announced an expanded partnership with Cigars International for the 2027 season, extending the relationship between the two brands and increasing Cigars International's presence across MLF's premier tournament and media platforms. The deal is not a simple renewal — it deepens an alignment that has been quietly building momentum through the professional bass fishing circuit for multiple seasons, and it signals just how seriously the sport's biggest organizational power is thinking about brand integration, lifestyle marketing, and the changing profile of the American angler.
The Terms: More Than Just a Title on a Banner
Under the expanded agreement, Cigars International will continue as an Official Sponsor of Major League Fishing while serving as the Exclusive Cigar Retailer of MLF. The exclusive designation encompasses cigars, humidors, pipes, pipe tobacco, and cigar and pipe accessories. That breadth is notable. This is not a narrow co-branding arrangement that ends at the tournament grounds. It covers the full lifestyle spectrum of tobacco enjoyment — from the stogie a weekend angler lights up on a Saturday afternoon to the premium humidor a Bass Pro Tour champion keeps in his living room as a monument to his greatest win.
To commemorate those victories, Cigars International will continue to present Bass Pro Tour champions with a custom humidor and celebratory cigars, giving winners a distinctive keepsake and a chance to celebrate their accomplishments with family, friends, and fellow competitors. The tradition will culminate at REDCREST, where the season's biggest victory will be marked with a signature Cigars International championship celebration. It is a detail that speaks to how thoughtfully both organizations have crafted the partnership. Rather than slapping a logo on a leaderboard, Cigars International has woven itself into the emotional architecture of winning — the moment when a professional angler exhales after months of competition, looks out over the water, and lets the gravity of what he's accomplished settle in.
The Media Footprint: Reaching Anglers Wherever They Are
As part of the expanded partnership, Cigars International will receive year-round exposure through MLF's extensive media ecosystem, connecting the brand with fishing and outdoor enthusiasts through tournament coverage, livestream broadcasts, digital and social media, MLF communications, and additional integrated marketing opportunities. That ecosystem is not insignificant. Major League Fishing has spent years building one of the most robust digital and broadcast presences in outdoor sports, and getting embedded across all of those touchpoints means Cigars International is not just sponsoring events — it is sponsoring conversations, the kind that happen between fishing fans on Tuesday morning after they watched the weekend's tournament unfold.
The partnership includes brand integration across Major League Fishing's media platforms, including livestream broadcasts, digital coverage, email communications and social media. For a brand like Cigars International, whose business model was built on direct marketing and online retail, that kind of multi-channel reach within a passionate, self-identified community of outdoorsmen is precisely the audience it has been cultivating for nearly three decades. The synergy is not accidental — it reflects a long-term strategic bet that the American fishing audience and the American cigar buyer are, in large part, the same person.
The Players Behind the Deal
Michael Mulone, MLF Vice President of Sponsorship and Business Development
"Cigars International has embraced the spirit of competition and celebration that surrounds Major League Fishing, and we're excited to expand our relationship with them in 2027," said Michael Mulone, MLF Vice President of Sponsorship and Business Development. Mulone's framing is telling. He does not lead with reach numbers or impression counts — he leads with spirit and authenticity. That is a deliberate choice that reflects how MLF approaches its sponsor relationships, and it mirrors the language the organization uses consistently when describing what makes a partnership work at the highest levels of the sport.
"Cigars have long been symbolic of success, and this continued partnership gives us a unique and authentic way to celebrate winning moments at the REDCREST Championship and throughout the Bass Pro Tour. The expanded relationship also creates additional opportunities to connect Cigars International with MLF fans across our events, broadcasts and digital platforms throughout the season." The emphasis on authenticity is deliberate — in an era when sports sponsorships can feel transactional and disconnected from the actual texture of a sport, the cigar-and-fishing connection has a genuineness that both parties clearly want to protect and amplify.
Kim Shay, Marketing Director for North America at Cigars International
Kim Shay, Marketing Director, North America at Cigars International, put it directly: "Winning on the water is the result of countless hours of preparation, sacrifice and focus. We're proud to continue our partnership with Major League Fishing and to give those champions something special that helps them celebrate hard-earned moments and enjoy the accomplishment, long after the final cast."
"There's something special about celebrating a win after all the preparation, persistence and focus it takes to get there," Shay added in comments surrounding the expanded agreement. The language Shay uses is consistent — preparation, persistence, focus. These are not just marketing talking points; they are the genuine currency of professional fishing, a sport where success is measured in fractions of a pound and where a single wrong decision about what lure to throw or which pocket of water to work can cost a pro angler tens of thousands of dollars in prize money and tournament standing.
Who Is Cigars International, and Why Does This Partnership Make Sense?
Established in 1996, Cigars International has become the fastest growing retailer in its category and today is an industry leader in online and direct marketing of premium to value segmented handmade cigars and tobacco accessories, headquartered in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. The company's origin story — built on catalog and internet-era direct marketing at a time when most cigar retailers were neighborhood walk-in shops — speaks to a brand that has always understood how to reach a customer where he actually lives rather than where a retailer wishes he would go. That DNA transfers naturally to the world of competitive bass fishing, where fans consume the sport primarily through streaming platforms, mobile apps, and social media rather than at a tackle shop counter.
The company has spent years cultivating the identity of a retailer that makes premium cigar culture accessible — not exclusive or intimidating, but something any guy who appreciates a quality smoke after a long day on the lake can engage with. That democratization of the cigar experience mirrors, in a meaningful way, what Major League Fishing has done for competitive angling: stripping away some of the old-guard gatekeeping and making the sport's elite level feel genuinely watchable and accessible to a mainstream American male audience.
A Partnership With History Behind It
The 2027 partnership builds on Cigars International's growing involvement with MLF and its connection to some of the sport's biggest moments. Before the expanded 2027 deal, the 2026 season already represented a significant deepening of the relationship. As part of that renewed agreement, Cigars International served as an Official Sponsor of the Bass Pro Tour, MLF Team Series, Tackle Warehouse Pro Circuit, Toyota Series and Phoenix Bass Fishing League. That is effectively every major competitive tier within the MLF structure — top to bottom coverage that gave Cigars International visibility at every rung of the professional ladder, from the development circuits where up-and-coming anglers are grinding for a Tour card to the pinnacle events where the sport's biggest names compete for life-changing prize money.
That partnership built on a successful 2025 season with an increased focus on recognizing tournament champions throughout the year. The pattern is clear: each successive agreement has been wider, deeper, and more integrated than the one before it. The 2027 deal, with its exclusive designation across the full tobacco accessories category, represents the most comprehensive version of this partnership to date — and it would be surprising if the trajectory did not continue upward from here.
The Broader Tournament Landscape
Throughout the season, the brand will continue to help MLF recognize the accomplishments of anglers at the highest levels of professional bass fishing, including championship moments on the Bass Pro Tour and at REDCREST. REDCREST, MLF's season-ending championship event, is the crown jewel of the Bass Pro Tour calendar — the moment toward which an entire season of fishing points. Having Cigars International planted at that celebration is not incidental branding; it is a permanent association between the brand and the sport's most emotionally resonant moment.
For context on just how embedded Cigars International has become in the MLF world, look no further than the sponsor rolls for the organization's various 2026 events. Proud sponsors of the 2026 MLF Tackle Warehouse Pro Circuit included Cigars International alongside a who's-who of outdoor and lifestyle brands. The 2026 Phoenix Bass Fishing League similarly listed Cigars International among its proud sponsors, alongside tackle, marine, and outdoor lifestyle companies that collectively define the ecosystem in which serious American anglers live. This is not a brand appearing in a single sponsored segment at the end of a broadcast — it is a presence that runs through the entire competitive calendar.
What This Means for the American Angler and the Future of Lifestyle Sponsorships
The Cigars International and MLF partnership is interesting not just as a business transaction, but as a cultural statement. Professional fishing's audience has always skewed toward men who hold a particular set of values: self-reliance, patience, respect for craft, and an appreciation for the payoff that comes after sustained effort. Those are exactly the values that premium cigar culture, at its best, embodies. The guy who learns to properly cut and light a cigar, who takes the time to understand ring gauge and fermentation and the difference between a Maduro and a Claro wrapper, is exercising the same kind of deliberate attention to craft that makes a great tournament angler.
As Chris Bork, Vice President of Sponsorship and Sales Development for Major League Fishing, put it: "Cigars International has been a terrific partner, and their focus on celebrating champions fits perfectly with who we are as an organization. They understand the meaning of winning at this level and bring a fun and authentic element to those moments when anglers finally get to exhale and enjoy what they've accomplished." That phrase — "finally get to exhale" — is loaded with meaning in this context. Tournament fishing is a sport of sustained, grinding tension. Across days of competition, an angler is constantly calculating, adjusting, making decisions under pressure. The cigar at the end is not just a prop; it is a genuine ritual of release.
From a broader industry perspective, this deal represents something worth paying attention to for anyone who follows how lifestyle brands reach male consumers. Traditional advertising channels — television spots, magazine placements, digital banner ads — have seen diminishing returns with American men who have largely tuned out anything that feels like a generic sales pitch. What works is authentic integration into the experiences those men already care about. Sponsorships that feel earned and natural. Brands that show up consistently, season after season, rather than dipping in and out based on quarterly marketing budgets.
The partnership's year-round brand integration across Major League Fishing's media ecosystem — including livestream broadcasts, digital coverage, email communications, and social platforms — creates authentic touchpoints with anglers and fans across the sport. That is the playbook for reaching men who have become increasingly resistant to traditional advertising: be present in their actual passion points, add something genuine to the experience, and let the relationship build organically over time. Cigars International has been executing that playbook inside the MLF ecosystem season by season, and the expanded 2027 agreement suggests the strategy is producing returns that justify continued investment.
Looking Ahead to 2027
As the 2026 competitive season moves toward its conclusion and the Bass Pro Tour's best begin preparing for what promises to be another fiercely contested campaign, the backdrop for that competition now includes an even more robust Cigars International presence than anglers and fans have grown accustomed to. The custom humidors will be waiting for champions. The REDCREST celebration will carry the Cigars International signature. And across every broadcast, livestream, and social post that MLF pushes into the world, the brand will be part of the conversation.
The expanded agreement continues to align Cigars International with the moments that define an MLF season — from the intensity of competition to the celebration that follows a hard-earned victory. That is the partnership in miniature: intensity, then celebration. The grind, then the reward. It is a rhythm that professional anglers understand in their bones, and it is a rhythm that Cigars International has built its entire brand identity around. In that sense, this is not just a sponsorship agreement — it is two organizations that found each other's frequency and decided to turn up the volume.
For the American man who watches the Bass Pro Tour on a Sunday morning with a coffee in hand, or who trailers his boat to the lake every chance he gets, or who simply appreciates the idea that a great achievement deserves a great celebration, the Cigars International and MLF partnership is a natural extension of values he already holds. Smoke 'em if you've earned 'em. And these days, if you've earned one on the Bass Pro Tour, Cigars International will make sure it is worth savoring.
