Originally published in February 2010 issue.

A Legend Turns 40
Cigarette Racing has defined performance boats for the past 40 years—and just might define them for the next 40 years.

Story by Matt Trulio • Photos courtesy Cigarette Racing

A performance boat from Cigarette Racing Team is hardly a subtle product. From its sheer size—the smallest model in the Cigarette line is 38 feet—to its generally flamboyant paint job, everything about a Cigarette demands attention. Between its brawny bolsters and billet hinges, everything inside a Cigarette seems extra-large, even muscular.

If Superman owned a go-fast boat, surely it would have been a Cigarette. Of course, it’s unlikely that mild-mannered Clark Kent could afford the decidedly high-end, custom-built product on a reporter’s salary. Although, as Superman, Kent certainly had the sex appeal of the typical, playboy-image Cigarette customer.

The well-respected brand celebrated its 40th anniversary in 2009. And despite the current economic recession, Cigarette is healthy. With models from 38 to 50 feet—including a 39-foot center-console fishing boat—the line has never been stronger. What’s more, Cigarette has reestablished the global presence it had under founder Don Aronow.

“When I first started, we had our dealer Marcel Biales in France and that was it,” says Skip Braver, who bought Cigarette Racing Team in 2002. “Hector (Rodriguez) and I have built an international business, and we have a partnership we’re announcing (at the 2010 Miami International Boat Show) that will blow everyone away. I was in Ibiza, Spain, (in September) and there were 19 Cigarettes in the harbor. That would make Don Aronow proud—he did a tremendous amount of business overseas. We are truly a global company today.”

Aronow, a New Jersey businessman who made his fortune in the construction business, started Cigarette in 1969 after becoming enchanted with offshore powerboat racing.

His first models, conventional V-bottoms of course, were 28- and 32-footers—small by today’s standards—and they soon established their dominance on the offshore racing circuit. As significant as Aronow’s personal racing accomplishments were, they paled when compared to those who raced in his boats. The list, which reads like a “Who’s Who” of offshore racing legends, includes Rocky Aoki, Carlo Bonomi, Betty Cook, Tom Gentry, Bill Martin and Bob Nordskog.

It’s uncertain why Aronow chose the name Cigarette, but the brand soon became the performance boat of choice for royalty and world leaders from Princess Caroline of Monaco to then-Ambassador to China George H. W. Bush. (Yes, Bush later owned a Fountain, but before that he owned a Cigarette 28 SS). Smoking success on the racecourse along with a high-profile customer base gave Cigarette an appeal and mystique that has yet to be recaptured in the high-performance powerboat world, and likely never will.

And then there was the sexual allure of Cigarette boats. From the beginning, they were, quite simply, sexy products. Cigarette capitalized on this attribute in its marketing and advertising campaigns and—much to the chagrin of some of its more-modest competitors—still does.

An era came to an end in 1987 when Aronow was shot and killed in front of his plant on 188th Street in Miami, commonly known as “Thunderboat Row” for the Donzi, Formula and Magnum boat companies he also established there. Former Cigarette customer and famed offshore racer Ben Kramer, who reportedly had ties to organized crime, pleaded no contest to hiring Robert “Bobby” Young to murder Aronow. (To this day, Kramer, who is in federal prison, denies any involvement in the crime.)

Despite Cigarette’s deteriorating facility and a string of owners who did little or nothing to improve it, much less improve the Cigarette identity, the brand continued to survive during the next 15 years.

What’s more, the quality of the products remained high and even as other builders with less-expensive offerings such as Baja, Donzi, Formula and Fountain gained market share, Cigarette remained an icon. To the general public, those brands and others were simply “Cigarette boats.”

That, said Braver, was due entirely to the dedication of the people at the plant such as longtime production manager Neill Hernandez. (Hernandez currently works as a consultant for Cigarette.)

“It’s always been about the dedication of the people who work here,” Braver says. “I saw that when I bought the company. That they could build the product they did in that kind of environment—where things were falling apart and the tooling was in horrible shape and there was no room to move—that was just amazing. It’s one of the big reasons I bought the company.”

Braver’s close friend and partner in special projects such as the 49 Grand Sport, Peter Hledin, owner of Douglas Marine, agrees with Braver on the role Cigarette’s employees have played in the company’s success, especially when ownership and leadership quality were in short supply. But Hledin, who worked on several projects for Cigarette before Braver bought it, says he’s seen a fundamental shift in the way the company operates.

“The atmosphere has totally changed,” Hledin says. “When I first met Neill (Hernandez) at the old shop, it was like a ‘den’—filthy, disgusting, unbelievably bad. You couldn’t believe they were getting the kind of product they were out of there. Skip is the first owner who has invested in Cigarette. Everyone else tried to take as much out of it as possible. There were many shortcomings at Cigarette when he took over, and he’s done everything he can to correct them.”

Among those corrections was a new facility for Cigarette Racing Team in Opa-locka, Fla. From the ragged and cluttered 30,000 square feet at the 188th Street plant, Cigarette expanded to 150,000 square feet, which includes a state-of-the-art paint booth and a computer-cutter-equipped upholstery shop. Should Cigarette need to expand, the plant sits on 11 open acres.

Along with Cigarette’s success under Braver’s ownership, there have been a few failures. Most notable among them were a 30-footer that proved as difficult to sell—meaning very—as it was to produce and a 55-foot-long yacht that hit the market at precisely the wrong time. (“We also found out that we really can’t build it in Turkey—we have to do it here,” Braver acknowledges.) But overall, the company has recaptured its greatness under Braver’s ownership.

That notion makes him uncomfortable.

“It’s not ‘Skip gets all the glory and all the criticism,’” he says. “We have 70 people here who work their tails off. We have a great group. The people here did it. They gave us—the new guys—a shot. These people have proven that we could increase the brand and increase the quality of the products. It all goes back to the commitment of the people building the boats, and it’s contagious. I have to say that in all my jobs, I’ve worked harder at Cigarette than any other.

“In the short time we’ve had the company, we’ve brought out new models and done new things,” Braver continues. “Now they weren’t all successful. The Cigarette yacht, for example, was something I found we couldn’t build out of the country. We haven’t always made the right decisions, but then a lot of our decisions have been right. We made a fish boat rather than a catamaran. That one turned out to be right.”

Braver says Cigarette will display new products including the 49 Grand Sport II with 715-horsepower Cummins MerCruiser diesel engines and Arneson drives, and make several important announcements on its new “marketing partnerships” at the Miami International Boat Show in February. Beyond that, he won’t reveal any details about his company’s upcoming plans.

“We are bullish on the marine industry—it’s been a tough year but we’re still selling boats,” Braver says. “We build custom products and sell them through a handful of dealers, and we keep very close tabs on the market.

“This was the first 40 years,” he adds. “We plan on being around for the next 40 years.”

– Matt Trulio is a freelance writer for Powerboat.

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