32
TOBACCO OUTLET BUSINESS
SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2012
food,” Lustig explains. “Some of the
restaurants serve more food in here
in a night than in their own restaurant
because I’ll have a 150-person party in
here, and then two hours later, another
250
will come in.” He does not charge
the neighboring restaurants nor the
customers a service fee for ordering
food. It’s merely a way to attract more
business.
Lustig took a big expansion chance
and it paid off. He is proud to be “the
only tobacco store in four counties
in southern Maryland where you can
drink and smoke. The reason is that
there is a state law that you cannot sell
more than 15 percent of your total sales
in alcohol, so a typical store could only
sell about $100 a week or so, obviously
“
It’s so fun in here, sometimes the
hardest thing is getting the sponsoring
manufacturers to go out and sell cigars.”
