Recently went to Toronto and visited these places. Here's my reviews:
First: Casablanca Tobacconist; 4 King St W (though the entrance is on Bay St I believe)
Nice little shop, there seemed to be a fair selection in the walk in humi and a ok amount of accessories in the shop. The shop keeper seemed very uninterested with even being there and quite antisocial. We were there for about five minutes without a hello or offer of help even with us peering intently into the humi. Being the first stop of the day and both hungry for lunch we didn't ask to go in; so it is partially our fault we didn't get much service but he could have asked us. All in all not a bad experience, just uneventful.
Second: Metro Cigar; 712 Yonge St
A smaller shop with no walk in humi, but about 6 large cabinets with a fairly good selection for the space they had. There was a decent selections of desktop humi's and some other accessories. As we are looking through the glass of the various cabinets we pulled out my sheet of suggested cigars to see what we could find. The owner/employee, a middle aged east Indian man, came over to ask what we were doing with the sheet of paper. I told him we were looking for some cigars that had been suggested to us and he seemed quite content with the answer and told us if we needed any help to ask. Once the one other customer in the store left a couple minutes later he became quite angry, said we should have asked permission to look at the cabinets (they were closed and I assume locked, we hadn't tried to open them as we were only looking through the glass doors) and that he did not want us in the store. After some back and forth resulting in me showing him my shopping list we left completely unhappy with the service. I don't know if we violated some taboo but the owner/employee was a complete jackass and should not have acted that way to customers that had every intention of dropping some money there. Will NEVER return and advise others to avoid as well.
Third: Tabac; 526 Yonge St
Quite discouraged by this point we walked into a gem. Very uncluttered and very friendly staff. The walk in humi was nicely organized and had a decent selection, though not the largest of the day. Asking to go in the humi was no problem with the staff, even letting us in there alone to take our time. Once we had found a few we liked, some brands from the shopping lists though not the actual cigars of each brand on the list. The staff was knowledgeable of the brands and even recommended a couple cheaper ones for everyday smoking. Quite enjoyed the experience, decent prices and would recommend the place to everyone! :chk
Forth: Tobacco Haven; 595 Bay St
Kind of a variety shop, but with a main focus on the smoking culture and quite a large shop at that. The humi at the back is long and thin with full glass walls making it easy to see what's in there without actually going in. Since we had picked up some stogies already at Tabac the selection while fairly decent did have anything that really jumped out at us. The staff was nice enough and quickly helped me when I asked about some items for the travel humi I'm going to be putting together. All in all a good place, worth a check out. Being across the street from the bus station makes it a quick trip before catching a bus.
Fifth: Sleuth & Statesman; 130 King St W
A smaller shop with a smaller walk in humi. They have quite a good selection of some certain cigars, the best we had seen all day but seemed to be lacking somewhat in overall brands. The staff member was quite helpful and seemed to have a good knowledge of the cigars they carried. While we only picked up one stogie I would say this place is more then worth a stop, the prices seemed to be better then most places.
Hope someone finds these useful!
