Sunday, February 22 2009
When you're the J.C. Newman Cigar Company, it's hard to keep a secret. But their newest brand won't be a secret much longer.
Made in a small Nicaraguan factory dedicated to the production of this line, El Baton is a Nicaraguan
puro and is offered in a single size: a monstrous 6½-inch by 56-ring
Belicoso. It features a Corojo
wrapper with a medium-to-full body and some notes of spice.
It continues the company's expansion beyond its famous Cuesta-Rey, Diamond Crown and La Unica lines made at the Tabacalera A. Fuente in the Dominican Republic and into Nicaraguan-made cigars. Its first Nicaraguan line, Alcazar, debuted in 1998 and is offered in five shapes, all with maduro wrappers, but the brand hasn't made much of an impact on the U.S. market to date. However, J.C. Newman has scored big with its inexpensive Quorum bundled cigar, a mixed-fill blend offered in six sizes since 2002 and one of the best-selling value bundles on the U.S. market.
The El Baton is a long-fill cigar offered in boxes of 40 – with two bundles of 20 inside each box – with a suggested retail price of $5.50 per cigar or $220.00 per box, not including local tobacco and sales taxes. The brand actually debuted very quietly last August, but has been slowing (but surely) making its way into larger and larger retail shops.
>> California is the nation's largest cigar market, but up until now, it's never had a cigar that recognized its importance in the national sales picture. Ernesto Padilla changed that with the release of his long-planned Padilla "Golden Bear" series. He wrote in an electronic mail message that the 6-inch by 60-ring cigars, made in Honduras, are offered in 50-count boxes and "made for California in a limited release." The blend is similar to the Padilla Series ‘68 line and the big box retails for $350.00 or $7 per cigar, not including local sales and tobacco taxes.
The "Golden Bear" name refers to the California state mascot, the Brown Bear (a.k.a.Grizzly) and "Golden Bears" is the nickname of the University of California (Berkeley) athletic teams. Padilla made the box specially for this size and included the California state flag on each box. That flag was created when California was short-lived Republic prior to statehood in 1850 and pictures a Brown Bear; California is still referred to in historical circles today as the "Bear Flag Republic."
>> Ernesto Perez-Carrillo, who will leave General Cigar in the coming weeks to begin a new cigar venture with his family, gave a rare public tour of the El Credito factory in Santiago during the second ProCigar Festival held in the Dominican Republic.
This facility was originally opened by Perez-Carrillo to handle the explosion of demand for his La Gloria Cubana brand during the Cigar Boom of the late 1990s, too large for his Miami factory to manage. Today, the factory makes the La Gloria Cubana, El Rico Habano, El Credito and Don Sebastian lines, among others.
Unlike many other cigar makers, Perez-Carrillo said that the cigars made in this factory are not draw tested. "I don't believe in it," he noted, preferring to trust the work done by his rollers and especially in the supervision of his experienced supervisors and managers. The factory aims to produce 34-36,000 cigars a day; the production scoreboard showed that 25,600 (82% of the daily goal) were made on the Monday prior to the Wednesday tour, with 27,750 (89%) manufactured on Tuesday.
The factory also houses a machine-made manufacturing operation for General, with each of the machines churning out about 5,000 cigars per day.
Short fillers: The seemingly-endless battle by seven cigar lounges in Long Beach, California to obtain an exemption from the city's stiff anti-smoking ban ended in success on February 17 as the Long Beach City Council voted 6-2 to adopt the measure. After lengthy public discussion and comments from Council members during each of the last two meetings on this topic, the entire item was disposed of with only a single public comment and one Council comment. Approval took all of two minutes. The new law in Long Beach exempts "smoking lounges" which are defined as "a business establishment which is devoted to and designated specifically for the sole purpose smoking tobacco products, including but not limited to establishments known variously as cigar lounges, hookah lounges, or tobacco clubs." Conditions which apply to this designation include a ban on admitting minors, a requirement on ventilation to the outside air and a ban on the sales or consumption of food and beverages in the lounge. It's a victory for common sense and for cigar smokers in a popular seaside city in Southern California.
- Rich Perelman in Los Angeles
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Reprinted by permission. "Heard in the Humidor" is a publication of Perelman, Pioneer & Company. Copyright 2009; All rights reserved.
