Tampa, Florida, 5-7-2012 – Who can forget their first trip into the cigar shop at the local shopping mall as a youngster? For me the smell was just amazing but all too soon it seemed my scowling mother would show up to pull me out.

I suppose they were something akin to a forbidden candy shop of sorts, where I could listen in while well dressed men browsing the selection and discussed aspects like pricing and flavors.

That was then and this is now though, because connoisseurs in increasing numbers are now going online for their cigars and other tobacco products. It turns out that they're not just doing it to save money, either.

To find out more about this growing trend what better place to start out at than one of the leading topic related sites on the net today? The site I'm referring to is CigarInspector.com headed up by CEO Denis Kay.

In a recent phone interview he had quite a bit to say including, “We have been in existence for 5 years now, so that has given us plenty of time to accumulate the reams of information that we have to offer to our visitors. Information such as our massive list of reviews and up to date price comparisons by way of a direct linkup to cigarstash.com. Now I couldn't give you an exact number as far as our reviews go right now because they're growing on a day by day basis but after five years it's big. Also while your local cigar shop beats online stores hands down on quaint ambiance and aroma there's no way they could beat them on product range.”

Another service option that you'll find with his site, one that you for sure won't find at a local community-based vendor is a cigar shop directory. It allows visitors to go directly to the source for greater savings and even bulk orders.

So then does this mean it's the end for the quaint little aromatic cigar shop down at the local mall? The answer here it turns out is not at all because there are certain elements of the business that can never be duplicated online.

In fact one one of Denis's bigger surprises was that local community based cigar tobacco shop owners account for a lot of his visitor traffic. Folks who are visiting his site to learn more about what they're selling.

CigarInspector.com was founded in 2007 and since then has grown to be a premier source of reviews for cigar aficionados.