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Freudian Flip: Maraya Replaces Pickles with Cigars on Orchard Street

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Krieger, 11/22/10

87 Orchard Street, which for years housed Lower East Side mainstay Guss's Pickles, has a new tenant: Upscale smoke shop Maraya Cigars. Owners Joy Florentz and Kevin Joyce gut renovated the old-school pickle shop, adding hardwood floors and stripping away the white tiling to reveal the brick underneath. Right now, the store sells just two house blends, prompting Thrillist to call it "a McSorley's of smoking." Piano is gentler and Tango is more hardcore, but they're both made of Dominican/Nicaragua tobacco in the Dominican Republic by a third-generation Cuban plantation owner.

As for Guss's, it has re-established itself in Borough Park under the name Ess-a-Pickle. Florentz and Joyce sold off its iconic signage after the move in order to help fund their store.
· Maraya Cigars Now Open at 87 Orchard Street [Bowery Boogie]
· Maraya Cigars [Thrillist]
· Maraya Cigars Selling Guss’ Pickles Signage [Bowery Boogie]