More than 3,000 smokers will gather tonight at the Marriott Marquis in Times Square to puff top-of-the-line cigars – and it’s all legal.
The “Big Smoke” – Cigar Aficionado magazine’s semi-annual cigar-tasting event – will go on as planned, despite the city’s smoking ban.
That’s because Mayor Bloomberg created a loophole that allows smoking in hotels and catering halls “for the . . . purpose of promoting and sampling tobacco products” five times a year in each venue.
Tonight’s event is sold out, even at $175 a ticket.
The city Health Department has given permission for three “tobacco promotion” events.
Cigar Aficionado publisher Marvin Shanken told the crowd at the Four Seasons Restaurant last month that “tonight is extra special because yesterday they changed the law and banned smoking in New York,” according to an account of the event on Cigar Aficionado’s Web site.
Sponsors of promotional smoking events can apply for an exemption with the Health Department two weeks prior to the event. City law allows five such exemptions a year at each venue. However, the new state anti-smoking law, which goes into effect on July 25, only allows two.