News About Cuban Cigars: Coming Soon, 2012 Edición Limitadas

David Savona - Cigar Aficionado Magazine

Posted: March 5, 2012

The Cuban cigar industry typically unveils its trio of Edición Limitada cigars at the annual Habanos Festival. This year, however, it only released one, and with little information. We spoke with executives from Habanos S.A. to get details about the cigars, which we estimate will reach retail shops around the world beginning in late September.

Once again there will be three Edición Limitadas for 2012: the Partagás Serie C No. 3 EL, H. Upmann Robusto EL and Montecristo 520 EL. All three sizes are parejos, or straight-sided cigars, and each is rather thick, showing the trend for fatter cigars has spread out of the non-Cuban cigar world and into Cuba proper.

The H. Upmann is a standard Cuban robusto, measuring 4 7/8 inches long by 50 ring gauge. The Partagás is a reincarnation of an old size known as the C No. 3. It measures 5 1/2 inches long by 48 ring gauge. The Montecristo 520—named for the 520th anniversary of the discovery of tobacco in Cuba—is a vitola called Maravillas No. 3. It has a 55 ring gauge (the only straight-sided cigar in the current Cuban portfolio with a 55 ring, save for the Romeo y Julieta Wide Churchill) and measures 6 1/8 inches long. We smoked a sample of the cigar during the Wednesday night dinner, and found it big and robust, and exceptionally bold, but young. It’s a cigar that should benefit from aging.

Cuba has put quite a bit of emphasis on fat versions of the Montecristo brand for recent Edición Limitadas—in 2008 it released the 54 ring gauge Montecristo Sublimes EL, and in 2010 there was the 52 ring Montecristo Grand Edmundo EL.

Expect the cigars to be on the market later in 2012. You’ll read the first blind tastings on the cigars in Cigar Insider.

Cuban Cigar Sales Increased to $401 Million in 2011

By Rosa Tania Valdes

HAVANA, Feb 27 (Reuters) - Cuban cigar sales jumped 9 percent to $401 million in 2011 as spending on luxury items increased in countries with stronger economies, Cuban cigar executives said on Monday.

They said smokers in China, the Middle East, Russia and Brazil helped overcome declining sales in economically troubled Spain and Greece. Still, Spain held on to its position as the top consumer of what are generally considered the world's best cigars.

"We are selling our products in 150 countries, which allows us to compensate to a certain degree for sales declines in some countries with increases in others," said Javier Terres, vice president of Habanos S.A., the worldwide distributor of Cuban cigars.

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Update About Fake Cohiba Cigars

According to information published in the February 2012 issue of the knowledgeable and respected Cigar Aficionado Magazine, the fake Cohibas that Thompson is peddling out of a Post Office Box, are manufactured in the Dominican Republic. If you go to pages 122 and 123 you will find the coronas cigars.

The real Cohiba, from Cuba, scores at the top of the rating chart with an incredible score of 94. Anything with a 90 or above rating is excellent. (If a cigar ever achieves a rating of 100, it will probably be rolled, by hand, in Cuba).

The price for a real Cuban Cohiba in the United Kingdom is £14.27 British Pounds. At Friday's exchange rate of $1.5489 per £ (as published in the Wall Street Journal), the price in U.S. dollars for a real Cohiba is $22.10.

In contrast, the fake and lower quality Cohibas counterfeited in the Dominican Republic, are given a rating of only 88, and you can buy one for $14.79 U.S. Dollars.

In the corona gordas section (page 124), a real Cuban Cohiba 1966 Edición Limitada 2011 will cost you £38.70 in the United Kingdom, or $59.95 in U.S. Dollars, based on the same exchange rate. This Cuban cigar also rates a 94.

The cigar bands for the real and counterfeit Cohibas are noticeably very different. Artistically, the Cuban made cigar bands for the Cohibas are far superior.

Because of the continued hatred toward Cuba by the American imperialists, under the leadership of both George W. Bush and Barack H. Obama, if you want to purchase a real Cohiba cigar, you will have to travel to a civilized nation that does not have a failed embargo against quality Cuban products. You can't smoke a U.S.-made drone aircraft.

USA Capitalist Company Is Peddling Fake Cohibas

An extremely dishonest U.S. company named Thompson & Co. Inc. is offering fake Cohiba cigars in the printed January 16, 2012, issue of Fortune Magazine. Their quarter-page display advertising (see above) appears in the next-to-the-last page of that issue.

We already have one dishonest capitalist company, Bacardi, selling fake Havana Club rum. Now, a second dishonest capitalist company has joined the peddling of fake Cuban products.

Making money is the most important thing for capitalists. It does not matter to them if what they are doing is immoral, illegal, unethical or criminal. The end justifies the means.

World-wide connoisseurs of rum and cigars know that the REAL Havana Club rum and Cohiba cigars are made only in the Republic of Cuba.

Thank to the efforts of George W. Bush and Barack H. Obama, who have continued the failed economic embargo/blockade of Cuban products, dishonest companies like Thompson and Bacardi peddle counterfeit products to those who belong to the “There is a sucker born every minute” crowd.

I feel very sorry for the honest Americans who continue to be screwed by the capitalist marketers of fake products.