Thursday, July 06 2006
For years, the rage has been big-ring cigars. Maybe maduros are next?
Within a one-day span, both Habanos S.A. and General Cigar Holdings announced new Cohiba lines featuring maduro wrappers!
The Cubans revealed that a third line of Cohibas, to go along with the existing "Linea Classica" and "Linea 1492" (better known as the Siglo series) will debut in 2007, featuring maduro wrappers. Habanos went to some trouble in its statement to note that "Unlike other Maduro wrappers from other origins, that include artificial processes to force the color of the wrappers, the process for obtaining Cuban Maduro Wrappers is 100% natural." All of the wrapper leaf used in the new Cohiba line will be five years old.
General Cigar, fresh off its victory in the U.S. Supreme Court over use of the Cohiba trademark in the U.S., announced its new Cohiba Black line. Expected to be in retail stores late this summer, the new line will also feature a Connecticut Broadleaf wrapper, the most popular maduro wrapper in the U.S.
Combined with a three-year-aged Dominican Piloto Cubano binder and filler leaves from three-year-aged Dominican and Mexican leaf, this will be a full-bodied "espresso of a cigar" according to General's announcement. There will be four sizes, ranging in price from $10.50 to $16.55 each before local tobacco taxes.
A brilliant rebuttal to the U.S. Surgeon General's report condemning secondhand smoke by Hudson Institute senior fellow Michael Fumento appeared on the Op-Ed page of the conservative newspaper The Washington Times on July 3. Excerpts:
"'Secondhand smoke debate over.' That's the message from the Surgeon General's office, delivered by a syncophantic media. The claim is that the science has now overwhelmingly proved that smoke from others' cigarettes can kill you. Actually, 'debate over' simple means: 'If you have your doubts, shut up.'
And later: "The reason active tobacco smoking could be such a terrible killer while passive smoke may cause no deaths lies in the dictum the dose makes the poison.' We are constantly bombarded by carcinogens, but in tiny amounts the body usually fends off easily. . . .
"But none of this has the least impact on the various federal, state and city agencies and organizations like the American Lung Association for a very good reason. They already know they're scientifically wrong. The purpose of the passive smoking campaign has never been to protect non-smokers, but rather to cow smokers into giving up the habit."
Short fillers: Former baseball great Luis Tiant, born in Cuba, is now marketing his own cigar, the "El Tiante 23 Series" in honor of his usual uniform number while with six teams between 1964-1982. It's made in Nicaragua with either natural or maduro wrappers and is offered of course with 23 cigars to the box! So far, it's only being sold in shops in New England, but since Tiant pitched in Cleveland, Minnesota, Boston, New York, Pittsburgh and California, maybe he'll go national . . . the National Association of Tobacco Outlets Expo (NATO) has changed its name to the Tobacco Plus Expo, indicating its expansion into gift and sundry items for 2007. It will still be held in Las Vegas, from April 26-27.
- Rich Perelman in Los Angeles
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Heard in the Humidor is a publication of Perelman, Pioneer & Company.
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