We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Nathan Currin a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Nathan, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. Before we get into specifics, let’s talk about success more generally. What do you think it takes to be successful?

Hard work for sure… But also smart work. Working hard at the wrong thing is as unproductive as not working hard at all. I’ve learned that hard work coupled with smart work, intuition, and a great business idea is the key to success. Waking up every day determined to put in the work to drive the business, promote it in the right ways, and work strategically is so valuable often overlooked in a world that prizes “simply hard work” – work hard, but work smart and be truly productive.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

In late 2019, I sat down for lunch with one of my best friends… we had thrown around the idea of opening a cigar lounge for years, but I had the idea for a “mobile” cigar lounge… and we were both excited at the thought and opportunity. We did not want to skimp on the aesthetic look of the lounge or the customer-experience, so we hand built the trailer to look like a 1960’s vintage travel trailer, and though it took over a year to complete, it was so worth it.

With the country shutting down for Covid in 2020, it was the perfect time to complete our mobile lounge and coffee bar, and we opened in the summer of 2021. We’re proud to have built something from the ground up, and the results have been amazing already with us just planning our first franchise in Miami for later this year.

Fuego Mobile Cigar Lounge is Tampa Bay’s finest mobile cigar shop, humidor, coffee bar and trailer. Our goal is to create a unique and memorable experience for our guests and patrons – whether that be at our public, popup events or the many private bookings that we do (weddings, corporate parties, golf tournaments, etc).

How did you put together the initial capital you needed to start your business?

We funded our mobile business strictly by working hard and saving the money ourselves. Both of us (myself and my business partner) were already small business owners, and did not have much capital to begin with. Couple that with the fact that we absolutely did not want to borrow money to get the new business started, we saved what we could month to month and then did so much of the build, ascetic, design, and more ourselves we were able to save thousands of dollars over many months by being strategic and working hard.

We’d love to hear about how you keep in touch with clients.

We really work hard at keeping our customers loyal and happy. Both through social media, an email list, frequent discounts and give-aways, and more, we’re trying to build a brand that communicates professionalism, trust, and high quality. In just under a year, we’ve managed to build quite a social media following and have many return guests at all of our public events.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://fuegomobilecigars.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/fuegomobilecigars/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/fuegomobilecigars
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/fuegomobilecigars/
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3hdbJzbp7gE

Image Credits
Jeff Singer