Cigar Article: IPCPR 2012 A New Bloggers Journal

Posted by WillyStyl on Aug 13, 2012 in Articles | 4 comments

IPCPR 2012
A New Bloggers Journal

 Prologue

For those of you who have been reading ToastedFoot.com for some time now you are probably aware by now that the site has been reviewing Cigars and covering Cigar news for a few years, but it was only a few months ago that your trusted scribe took charge of the website.

The first few months have been both incredibly challenging, and incredibly rewarding.  It was only a few weeks before IPCPR that I was able to confirm the necessary opening in my schedule and the credentials required to attend as a member of the new media.  As a new member of a fairly established group of aficionados who cover the industry out of their own passion, I was not entirely sure what I was walking into when I was planning for the show.

With that in mind I took the following ideas as the cornerstone to my trip:

1)  The show is for manufacturers to do business with retailers, so stay out of the way of business and be mindful of the agendas of other. Be respectful of everyone’s time

2)  Be a “guest”.  The role of the blogger, or new media member, is one that is still up for some discussion within the industry so with that in mind I treated IPCPR, the manufacturer, and the retailers, as the people who were “home”.   I was grateful for the opportunity to be there.  I wasn’t there to pass judgments or pick winners and losers, besides, that would have been nothing more than my opinion anyway.

3)  Bring value to the readers.  This was why we asked you, our readers, to submit questions to the manufacturers.  I wanted to bring a little connectivity between the manufacturer and our reader, their consumer.  I think the manufacturers realized we were trying to do something unique and they were all incredibly receptive.  A special thank you to our readers for providing us with tools to get a great interactive experience.  If you haven’t read our Q&A’s you can see them here

4) Don’t weasel.  In other words don’t ask for cigars, they are there for the retailers to try the new lines and to help the manufacturers sell.  Amazingly this “Don’t ask” approach yielded me more sticks than I care to count.  I guess there’s something to e said for having manners.

5)  Do something different.  There were a number of other new media members who covering the show that can focused strictly on brands, new releases, etc, and while we’ll discuss that and review a lot of the new releases, I decided that for IPCPR 2012 I will be publishing my experience as a series of journal entries.

It was really a wonderful experience attending the show.  I met manufacturers big and small, new and old, familiar and unknown.  I also got to meet a lot of the “Blogger” world, and the industry really has some great people doing their best to share the industry through this new medium.    I hope you, our readers, enjoy the entries to follow.

Truly,

@WillyStyl