The Prime Time Awards are voted on by members of the Cigar Coop team. The awards look at the impact on the cigar industry. Today, we unveil our choice for 2022 Person of the Year. This award looks at the individual who for better or worse had the most significant contributions to the cigar industry during the year.
Back to back. For the second year in a row, Pete Johnson is the winner of the 2022 Prime Time Award for Person of the Year.
While 2023 will be a very special year for Pete as he will celebrate 20 years of Tatuaje Cigars, but certainly 2022 was a banner year for Tatuaje Cigars, and for Pete Johnson. For his efforts with the Premium Cigar Association and Cigar Rights of America, Pete has firmly established himself as an industry later. At the same time, while at the helm of Tatuaje Cigars he has kept a keen focus on innovation and quality of his products.
From a product innovation standpoint, Pete delivered an exciting array of products that would satisfy the everyday smoker, the connoisseur, and the limited edition chaser. These products included, but were not limited to
- Tatuaje Havana VI Verocou
- Tatuaje Tuxtla Series
- Tatuaje Cohete Series
- Tatuaje Cojonu 2015
- Tatuaje The Drac Redux
- L’Atalier ERB
- Surrogates Big TR
- Cabaiguan Line Extensions
- Tatuaje Cojonu 2015
Each panelist uses and weighs many different attributes when nominating and voting on this award. This includes leadership, commitment to innovation and quality, and brand development. In the end, 2022 proved to be the perfect storm and Pete would win what was quite a competitive field for this award.
For more details on our selection process, click here.
The full vote results appear here.
The complete list of awards winners is below:
2014 Hans-Kristian Hoejsgaard and Jim Young
2015 AJ Fernandez
2016 Carlos Fuente Sr.
2017 AJ Fernandez
2018 Terence Reilly
2019 Alan Rubin
2020 Michael Herklots
2021 Pete Johnson
2022 Pete Johnson
Photo Credit: Tatuaje Cigars
