Background
Avo Uvezian was born to a family of musicians. His mother was a singer, while his father was a composer and conductor for a symphony orchestra.
Avo Uvezian was born to a family of musicians. His mother was a singer, while his father was a composer and conductor for a symphony orchestra.
They received a contract to perform at a hotel in Baghdad where they stayed for one year. After this, they signed a contract to perform at a hotel in Iran. While there, Avo received an invitation from Shah Reza Pahlavi to perform at his palace.
In an interview with Cigar Aficionado, Avo described this point in his career.
After a year of performing in Iran, the Shah arranged for Avo to travel to the United States of America in 1947. While living in New York, Avo played for multiple bands while studying classical piano and composition at the Juilliard School.
They had three children. Jeffrey, Robert & Ronny.
Uvezian was drafted during the Korean War and sent to Fort Dix in New Jersey where he was put through infantry training.
After impressing his officers with his musical talents, Uvezian was taken out of the Infantry and put into band training. When he arrived in of Korea, the band would play at an Officers Club where they got paid twenty dollars a night. Uvezian was honorably discharged in 1952.
After being discharged, Uvezian spent the next few years working with his father-in-law designing jewelry.
This eventually brought him to Puerto Rico where he was paid to perform at the Palmas Delegate March resort. Uvezian is the author of the melody for Franc Sinatra"s ‘Strangers in the Night.’
“I usually count in Armenian in my head,” he told Cigar Journal in an interview this year.
In 1983, when Avo’s daughter Karyn was born, he went to Switzerland for her christening. Avo had a Cuban cigar after the meal and was not happy with the price.
His friend mentioned that they should make their own.
Uvezian travelled to the Dominican Republic, where he searched for two years for a satisfactory production facility. Avo finally met Hendrik Kelner, and after smoking samples, Avo offered Kelner twenty-five percent more than he had originally offered. His presumption was that paying Kelner more would ensure that Avo cigars would receive the best tobacco.
Michael Roux advised Avo to use attractive packaging.
In the first year, 120,000 Avo cigars were sold. By the third year, Avo sold over 750,000 cigars.
In 1995, Davidoff paid Avo Uvezian an estimated $10 million for the rights to distribute his cigars. In 1996, more than two million Avo cigars were sold.