Alan Rubin
Founder of Alec Bradley Cigar Co. in 1996, named for his two sons, who sold the company to Scandinavian Tobacco Group in 2023.
Rubin came into cigars from a family door-hardware business, founding Alec Bradley in 1996 and naming it after his sons Alec and Bradley. The timing was poor: the cigar boom was ending and the market was about to contract sharply. The company spent its first decade building retail relationships rather than volume, and Rubin became known in the trade primarily as a distributor's operator rather than a blender.
The commercial breakthrough came with Tempus and then Prensado, a Honduran-made blend that took Cigar Aficionado's top annual ranking and moved the company into the front rank of American brands. Alec Bradley never owned a factory, working instead through established Honduran and Nicaraguan manufacturers, and built a wide catalogue across several price points. Not owning production kept capital requirements low but left the company dependent on its manufacturing partners.
Scandinavian Tobacco Group agreed to acquire the company in 2023 in a transaction valued at 72.5 million dollars, and it was placed within STG's Forged Cigar Company division. Rubin and his sons joined the acquiring group at the time of the sale. The sale was among the larger transactions in the premium cigar industry during a decade of consolidation, and it removed one of the last sizeable independent American brand owners.