THE TOBACCO TITAN

Fifth-generation tobacco man Nestor Andrés Plasencia follows in his father's footsteps as the largest grower of cigar tobacco in Central America

- GREGORY MOTTOLA

With its trickling fountain and cloistered courtyard, Plasencia Cigars S.A. in Nicaragua seems more like a monastery than a factory. Workers holding tobacco quietly walk from one end of the covered quadrangle to the other, sometimes in pairs, then disappear through a doorway. Somehow, all the noise of Estelí outside of these four walls has been neutralized.

It’s equally tranquil in the rolling gallery, where cigarmakers toil at every table as though they’ve taken a vow of silence. When Nestor Andrés Plasencia Jr. walks into the room, one roller notices, then another, and then another until the rustling of tobacco stops and suddenly, everyone is banging their metal chavetas against the table tops. It isn’t a form of protest or discord. It’s applause and one of the most endearing sounds anyone in the cigar industry can hope to hear.

Wearing a woven Panama hat and close-cropped beard, Plasencia smiles and nods in appreciation before circulating around the room to inspect some cigars. Every boss wants to be loved and respected, and maybe even a little feared. Now 49 years old, Plasencia seems to have all three in the perfect amounts. His walk is far from menacing, but it’s certainly confident. This isn’t just Nestor Plasencia Sr.’s kid anymore, skipping around the factory like a carefree heir apparent. This is the man in charge.

“When I first started working, I had to earn the respect of the workers, so I had to wake up earlier than everyone,” Plasencia says after his inspections are over. He’s smoking a thick robusto and sipping a cafecito in a small lounge he built on the other side of the courtyard. “I didn’t want to impose my authority. It’s a moral authority. It was a process.”