The Purveyor of Enjoyment

What can people as different as Danny de Vito, ex-US President Bill Clinton and King Hussein of Jordan have in common? They are all customers of the London shop, Davidoff, where Edward Saakyan has been the owner for 27 years. He talked to Cigar Clan magazine about his family's wanderings, the advice of the legendary Zino and his expensive customers.

How long have you been a smoker?

I will celebrate my 50th anniversary three years from now. I began when I was 16, but smoked a pipe until I was 23. My first cigar, if I remember correctly, was a Partagas robusto.

You must have had a strong constitution to start with such a strong cigar.

I knew nothing about cigars at the time. A friend gave me a box of Partagas and said that I would like them. I innocently lit a cigar one morning, after a cup of coffee and realised half way through that something was wrong. I felt so bad that I didn't touch another cigar for two weeks.

Weren't you worried that it would be the same all over again?

A little. But there was no problem. I smoked it after lunch, and liked it. After that I started enjoying cigars more or less regularly. Half a year later I was travelling to Geneva and people told me that I must visit the Davidoff shop.

Were you in Geneva on business?

Yes. I lived in Iran at the time and our family was in the brewing and cold drinks business. When I entered the Davidoff shop I felt like a little boy in a toy shop. I made a long study of the display cases and ended up choosing a case of Davidoff Chateau Yquem cigars.

Had someone recommended them to you?

Zino himself wasn't in the shop at that moment, so I had to make the choice myself. I got to know Zino half a year later, when I was back in Geneva. He shook his head when I told him what I had chosen last time. He told me that as a beginner I should smoke less strong cigars, and I bought a box of Davidoff No. 2. They were light, but with a rich taste, which is what I wanted.

How was your life working out at the time?

Everything was fine until 1978. I enjoyed cigars and worked in the family business. But when the Islamic Revolution brought Ayatollah Khomeini to power several strict prohibitions were introduced in Iran: no drinking, no smoking, no Western music, and women had to wear the veil. You can imagine what it meant for brewers.

Was the impact serious?

The revolutionaries smashed cafes, restaurants, and cinemas. Our brewery was smashed and set fire to, and then confiscated. Our house was turned into a school. Our family lost all its property and had to leave Iran. My brothers and sisters left for London in December 1978 and I followed them a little later.

What did you manage to take with you?

I left with one suitcase. The most valuable thing in it was five kilos of caviar.

Did you plan to start a new business with the caviar?

No, the caviar wasn't for that. Nobody thought that the disturbances in our country would last long, so we expected to celebrate New Year in London and go back to Iran shortly afterwards. I left on December 28 and I wanted the caviar to put on the table at New Year. But history turned out differently.

After your means of production – the brewery – were confiscated, were you left poor?

My father told me: never put all your eggs in one basket. And he knew what he was talking about. He had been in some tough situations.

Is that a long story?
I can tell it if you have the time. In 1914 my father lived in Iran near the Turkish border, which was guarded by Russian troops. When the Turks attacked Iran, Russia pulled its troops back and the women and children in my family went north with the Russians. The men, including my great grandfathers and my grandfather, stayed and were killed by the Turks. Fortunately, my grandfather left my grandmother some gold coins, which he had saved up and we used the money to open a baker's shop in Tiflis. My father married my mother (they were from the same village) and they started selling carpets and dried fruit as well as bread. The whole family helped – brothers and sisters. Trouble came from an unexpected direction. Georgia was very loyal to Russia and was one of the first countries to enter the USSR, so the Bolshevik government hardly interfered at all with what went on in the Georgian Republic in the first few years after the October Revolution. But in 1924 the Bolsheviks in Moscow remembered about Georgia. My father was arrested and sent to Siberia, but his Iranian passport saved him, and he was released. He got to Baku with great difficulty, found a boat and went to Iran. He wrote from there to the rest of the family in Tiflis, and they soon came and joined him.

So you suffered at the hands of the Turks and the Bolsheviks?
And that's not the end of the story. In a couple of years my father set up a business with Germany: importing furniture and sending back carpets and dried fruit. In 1926 we moved to Hamburg, thinking that life there would be better and safer. But in 1933 my father was arrested by the Gestapo.

You aren't going to tell me that he was saved by his Iranian passport again?

Believe it or not, he was. My father was released, but he sensed the danger of remaining in Germany. We lived in a house, which belonged to a Jew, who owned a brewery. He felt the danger too, but he didn't have enough money to leave. My father offered to buy the brewery. Fortunately for both of them, they struck a deal. The Jew explained to my father how to brew beer and left for America with his family, and my father took the brewing equipment back to Iran. Of course, he couldn't take the actual brewery building with him. In 1940 my father started brewing beer in Iran.

Did he return to his native village as a brewery magnate?

We settled two hundred kilometres from his native village in the city of Abriz, which is the provincial capital. The city was well placed, because it was on the main road from Russia. A lot of Armenian refugees on the run from the Bolsheviks in Georgia and Armenia settled there. The brewing business developed well and our family moved to the capital, Tehran, in 1945 and opened a new brewery there.

But things couldn't go on as well as that for long?

Indeed. We were forced to emigrate again. In 1950 the Prime Minister Mohammed Mossadeq led a coup, which overthrew the Shah, and we left for the US. We came back four years later, when the legitimate government was restored. It was the fourth time that my family had returned home after a forced emigration, which had stripped their property and left them guessing what tomorrow would bring. My father often told these stories to persuade me not to put all my eggs in one basket, so when I left Iran for London in 1978, escaping from the Islamists, I had a spare egg in my pocket as well as the caviar in my suitcase. When it became clear that I would be in London for longer than I had expected, I rang the first barrister I came across to ask for advice on how to behave in this unfamiliar country. The first thing he asked when I met him was what my problems were. I said that I didn't have any problems, but I just wanted to know what I could do in his country and what I couldn't do. He said that I was his first ever customer with no problems, and he took no money for the consultation, despite my protests. So I had no choice but to invite him to lunch.

To a posh restaurant?

No, I invited him to lunch at my home. We ate Armenian food, drank good wine and I told him about my life. My guest said that if I couldn't return home I would have to find something to do in England. That set me thinking. I felt like a little boy who is asked what he wants to become: a fireman, a policeman or an astronaut... I gave my fantasy free rein and said that I would like to open a shop and sell cigars, like Zino Davidoff in Geneva. The barrister wrote down "Davidoff, Geneva" in his notebook and said that the thing to do was to write a letter. I shrugged it off: it was just a dream. But he insisted that he wouldn't expect to be paid.

I don't suppose the kind barrister was called Doctor Schneider?

Not at all. The barrister was called William. Doctor Schneider hasn't come into the story yet, though he soon will. William sent a letter to Geneva, and received a refusal: they weren't interested in opening a shop in London. That wasn't unexpected, so I wasn't particularly upset. But William found out, without telling me, who owned the company and wrote a second letter, this time personally to Doctor Schneider. The answer came quickly: he would be in London in two weeks and could meet me and my barrister at eight in the morning at the Inter Continental Hotel. Of course, we were there at eight in the morning, waiting in armchairs in the Hotel foyer, opposite the lift. The lift door opened at eight o'clock exactly and two men came out.

Isn't eight in the morning a bit early for business negotiations?

I asked Dr Schneider about that 25 years later. He said that if I hadn't agreed to come at that early time, it would have meant that I wasn't particularly interested in the business. So we talked for two and a half hours, and Schneider even missed a ten o'clock appointment. There was a feeling that we had found a common language, that we had found each other.

Did Schneider test your ability to do business or your knowledge of cigars?

We talked about life, not about business. He didn't even ask how much money I had, and how much I intended to put into the project, although I was expecting to hear those questions. Then I visited the Davidoff headquarters in Basel to discuss the details. The conditions were few in number: the company should approve the location and appearance of the new London shop. Most of all, though, the shop must be my life's work. Those were basically the conditions that I wanted. So I agreed immediately and we signed the contract. I have never looked at it again in 27 years and I wouldn't even know where to find it now.

How did the opening go?

It was on May 29, 1980. Zino Davidoff was there. He stood in front of the shop for a long while, and I was biting my lips with anxiety. Then he smiled and embraced me. At that moment I remembered my first Partagas cigar and what it had done to my body and I wanted to rescue all my future customers from a similar mistake. I wanted at least to teach them what I knew myself.

Did Dino give you any advice?

Of course. He told me that his customers included the King of Egypt, the King of Jordan and the King of Greece, but that for him every customer was a king.

That is figurative. Was that the most important thing he told you?

It is hard to know what is important and what isn't. He gave some other advice. I asked him what to do if a customer comes back and says that I sold him a bad cigar. Should I give him another cigar, give him a refund or turn him out of the shop? Zino told me to treat the customer the same way I would want to be treated myself. People do sometimes come to me with a half-smoked cigar and say, "I didn't much enjoy this."

And what do you do?

I say, "No problem, I will give you another. Simply tell me what it was about the one you bought that you didn't like. Perhaps you just picked the wrong cigar for you. Maybe it was too strong or two mild – tell me your preferences and I will chose you a cigar, which you will definitely like."

Won't you end up bankrupt if you go handing out free cigars?

My aim isn't to save money on one cigar, but to keep the customer. After you have smoked a cigar, it leaves only memories. I want at least some of those memories to be associated with me. I like to feel that I sell enjoyment.

Do people stand in line for that enjoyment?

Only at Christmas. Then I have to stand by the door of the humidor and manage the traffic.

Can you measure volume of enjoyment?

Three hundred thousand cigars a year. About a quarter of them are Davidoff branded cigars and the rest are Havanas. Cigars from other countries are only a very small percent.

Doesn't sale of non-Davidoff cigars conflict with the concept of the shop?

The concept of the shop is to offer the smoker a choice of good and varied cigars to match any taste. It is like a wine shop. You can't sell French wine and nothing else: you need to offer wine from Spain, Italy, Australia, Chile and other countries. Different wine for different occasions. It is the same for us: different cigars for different customers.

OK, tell me about your customers.

Danny de Vito. He is a very nice chap, not at all a snob. He is not a tall man, as you know, so he can't reach cigars from the top shelves, and he always has to jump in order to see what's up there. I always offer to get them down and show him, but he says he doesn't need help and carries on jumping.

You should get him a personal stool.

I'll think about it. King Hussein of Jordan was one of my favourite customers and a real gentleman. He had half a dozen bodyguards, including specialists from Scotland Yard, but he always came into my shop unaccompanied, saying that he felt safe there. He shook hands with everyone who worked in the shop and never agreed to be served out of turn, even if the other customers suggested it.

That's an interesting idea: a king standing in line like a mere mortal.

When he had made his purchase he would shake hands again with everyone in the shop, and he wouldn't let his bodyguards or his driver carry his cigars for him.

I suppose he was breaking with kingly etiquette.

When you are a king you can do what you want. I had another VIP customer. Bill Clinton same in to see me a few times, three or four years ago. He usually bought Davidoff, though he probably wanted to buy Cuban cigars, but couldn't because of the US embargo.

He was the President.

But not the King.

So even presidents have to put limits on what cigars they smoke. What about the difficulties faced by ordinary smokers? The campaign against smoking is gathering pace.

There is a ban on smoking in public places in Great Britain from July 1, 2007, including restaurants and pubs. There are only a few places left in London, such as specialised cigar clubs and shops, including the Davidoff boutique, where you can smoke cigars.

Time to close ranks and present a united front...

No need for revolutions. However things turn out, I don't doubt that cigar lovers will find a time and a place for enjoyment. My theory is that smoking a cigar relaxes you, and when you are relaxed you are putting less pressure on your heart. So you live long and die happy.

How does your theory square with practice?

Think of the many great smokers who have lived nearly 100 years. But let's talk about this again thirty years from now. I hope that my life will be the best proof of my theory.

Cigar Clan 5'2001, vol.1.Sergey Drozdov