What makes a Limitada, a Limitada?

[Turrbo]

I'm going to sound stupid asking this but the goal is to not feel stupid anymore. I have a few Limitadas, but what makes them Limitadas? What is so special about them? I would love to get some clarification on this.

[Ken Gargett]

I'm going to sound stupid asking this but the goal is to not feel stupid anymore. I have a few Limitadas, but what makes them Limitadas? What is so special about them? I would love to get some clarification on this.

may i suggest you ask piggy. but don't let him sit on the fence like usual!

[cigcars]

*FYI; PigFish's recurring mantra is "Friends Don't Let Friends Smoke EL's!" They are supposed to be extra aged or special specialty tobaccoed Cuban smokes...Limited Editions. I'm sure one of habanos.com or habanos.net websites will have the more on-target explanation. Supposedly in the opinion of the seasoned havana cigar smoker(s) on this forum, the LE's are no more flavorful than the regulars. It's a matter of your own conjecture. I have had Limited Editions that were wonderful...and some that were like empty air. It's a matter of price too. 'Hope this was some help!

[Colt45]

Here's an explanation from Trevor's site:

Link

This should give you an idea of what technically makes an EL an EL. In my opinion, other than the novelty of a size not normally produced in the

line, there is nothing special about them.

[brian1]

Yes nothing special about them Except for the fact the program has produced some of the most superb cigars(and now virtually impossible to find) of the last decade:

Highlight of the EL series for me:

Partagas Piramides

RyJ Robustos 2001

Partagas Serie D #3 2001

Hoyo Piramide 2003

Cohiba Double Corona 2003

Partagas Serie D #2 2003

RyJ Hermoso #2 2004

Partagas Serid D #1 2004

Cohiba Sublime 2004

People love to crap on the ELs but there have been plenty of gems released over the years. I think alot of the dislike comes from the fact that with the leaf used these take alot of time before they mature and start to show well.

I stopped buying the ELs after the 2007 release as I feel quality has gone down significantly and they no longer are worth it to me.

[bassman]

Yes nothing special about them Except for the fact the program has produced some of the most superb cigars(and now virtually impossible to find) of the last decade:

Highlight of the EL series for me:

Partagas Piramides

RyJ Robustos 2001

Partagas Serie D #3 2001

Hoyo Piramide 2003

Cohiba Double Corona 2003

Partagas Serie D #2 2003

RyJ Hermoso #2 2004

Partagas Serid D #1 2004

Cohiba Sublime 2004

People love to crap on the ELs but there have been plenty of gems released over the years. I think alot of the dislike comes from the fact that with the leaf used these take alot of time before they mature and start to show well.

I stopped buying the ELs after the 2007 release as I feel quality has gone down significantly and they no longer are worth it to me.

I agree almost 100%. Didn't care for the Party D#3s, but in general the early LEs were excellent and now pretty rare. I haven't bought any LEs in several year. Now seem "limited" to as many as they can sell!

[Colt45]

People love to crap on the ELs but there have been plenty of gems released over the years.

Personally, I've no problem with ELs or the program. Purely for the sake of conversation, your list is roughly a quarter of the ELs produced since the

program's inception. How (if at all) do you feel that reflects on the program on the whole? Do you feel the cigars on your list are great because they

are ELs, or more simply because they got these right?

I once again humbly submit that in my personal opinion, at the core, ELs are simply sizes not normally produced in their respective lines. I don't

feel that being an EL is any guarantee of superior or exceptional quality over properly executed regular production cigars.

[brian1]

I think the cigars on my list are special cigars in their own right that just happen to be ELs. I think the program was very significant when it started in 2000. At that point if was very innovative to create new cigars blends and offer them out to collectors as a Limited Edition. In the early years say 00-04, the annual EL release was eagerly anticipated and was actually limited in terms of production.

As the EL program matured I think the suits in HSA decided to get greedy and milk this cash cow for all its worth. The best raw materials, quality control and quantity control became less important. I think the decision to saturate the marketplace with all kinds of other "limited" release and recurring "one offs" over the last 5 years or so hurt the EL program. I also think there is a correlation between the Regional Releases gaining momentum and massive popularity and the fall off in EL quality.

As I alluded to in my earlier post, I think the EL program was great for what it was at the time but has reached and passed its sell by date and should cease at this point.

Not sure if I answered your questions but those are some of my thoughts.

Interesting discussion for sure.

Best Wishes

Brian

Personally, I've no problem with ELs or the program. Purely for the sake of conversation, your list is roughly a quarter of the ELs produced since the

program's inception. How (if at all) do you feel that reflects on the program on the whole? Do you feel the cigars on your list are great because they

are ELs, or more simply because they got these right?

I once again humbly submit that in my personal opinion, at the core, ELs are simply sizes not normally produced in their respective lines. I don't

feel that being an EL is any guarantee of superior or exceptional quality over properly executed regular production cigars.

[PigFish]

From one of my many diatribes! Read it and weep...

THE TRUE STORY OF EL'S AND OTHER MATTERS AS SEEN BY MR. PIGGY

Recently a member inquired as to what I had against EL and RE cigars. How could one not know I asked myself? As I did not want the member's world to tilt off its axis, nor did I want the member to continue to lose sleep over the query; I wrote the following reply. Thanks for reading.

My belief about EL’s goes way back. It is not only about EL’s, it is about cigars in general and CC’s expressly. It is pretty difficult to go into too much detail in one email, a diatribe if you will, about all that I think and believe about Cuban limited cigars but I can give you a summery.

They are a rip off!

Rip off of course is a relative term. If you like them and if you are willing to pony up for them, then by definition they are not a rip off to you and we simply see things differently.

So it is about my tastes. It is also about my values and my valuation of a cigar and in turn, the smoking experience. The smoking experience after all is what cigar smoking is about to me. How good my smoking experience will be, how long it will be, what I pay for it, how much of what I pay for is wasted; I can go on and on rhetorically speaking about what a smoking experience means to me, ad nauseam, but that is not what you asked me about. The cigar experience is however the foundation of my set of beliefs. What is a smoking experience to you; to any one of us? If you like a certain cigar, then beyond curiosity what I have to say about any cigar should be of no consequence. Rhetorically speaking, why do you give a **** about what I think about a certain cigar? I don’t smoke to please you and you should not be smoking to please me; right? It is okay if we like different cigars. While it is been my pleasure to mentor many a novice on the topic of the CC, I don’t believe in smoking gurus. I am not one! Neither are any of my friends that smoke... nor MRN, Zino Davidoff, or anyone else for that matter. They are all people like you and I; all liking what they like regardless of us. My theory states that YOU matter! What YOU like matters!!! Where we will come together or diverge will be if we agree on what we like or don’t like. If I like something or not is no reason to expect another to. But similarities in tastes, well, that is another matter. When two or more smokers have a feel for the tastes of another, they can sometimes gauge their own tastes by that of another.

The smoking experience is what it is all about. What do you define as a quality smoking experience? For me it matters little what I smoke as long as what I smoke is good or better yet, excellent! I don’t care about the bands, the boxes, any image associated with a specific cigar, what I care about is how the cigar tastes and if it satisfies my desire. I tailor my cigars to my mood and my timeframe. It is not that I can look at a cigar and say, “this one is going to taste like pear blossoms and Brandywine and I am in the mood for both,” because I can’t do that. I am looking for one that will fit the time that I can allot to smoking (I am not a wasteful person) and one that could deliver the aspects, roughly, of the last one that I smoked from the same litter. This would imply that cigars have a profile. I am not really a believer in this theory, but there are some similarities between cigars in the same box at least some of the time and I am willing to work with that. I want a good cigar however, all the time. It matters not to me if the cigar is different or the same as the last one out of the box. What matters is, will it be an excellent cigar?

I am about getting the best smoking experience then. A smoking experience goes beyond the cigar itself of course but that is not an aspect of the conversation that you inquired about. A smoking experience does however have many factors that contribute to, or detract from the event. One aspect is time. One other aspect is money. I don’t worry about the money I burn up... it is not the trepidation of spending money on a consumable that represents the money aspect. The money aspect is value and I will get to that next.

I posted a reply to a new member not long ago about how that member valuates objects outside of the smoking world in terms of cigars. I added to that by saying that the smoking experience, when being viewed quantitatively is a function of money and time as well as enjoyment. I mean if I like to smoke, and if I smoke often, I have historically been a 1000 stick a year smoker (lesser so now), I must spend a handsome amount on my cigars. My time is also worth something to me, therefore I want to spend it wisely. Although a bit off topic, money is also a factor of time. I spend my life force earning it. When it is spent on a cigar I expect the experience to be a good one. Getting the best experience for the money then is important to me. If two cigars that take the same time to smoke, and provide the same pleasure, have different costs then the one with the lowest cost is of greater value to me! This is counterintuitive I understand, and perhaps not easy to explain outside of a function. I see many aspects of life mathematically so for me it is easy. If I can get more quality smoking time/dollar spent, then my value for those cigars is greater. Value is not money. It is a function of time, money and enjoyment.

So why then do you think I have something against EL cigars? Frankly they are no better than, and often less appealing to me than carefully selected regular production cigars. What’s more, they are a hell of a lot more expensive. That is what I have against them; they are no better than regular production cigars. They are simply trendy, expensive cigars designed to get me to spend more money per gram of tobacco. They are a marketing gimmick! Because they have historically underperformed for me and they have also historically cost me more per stick, they have devalued my experience/value model.

Rob and I go head to head about marketing. Why, because it is wasted on me? I don’t want to be convinced to buy anything. While product awareness is fine, the packaging and hype associated with the EL/RE is simply money wasted on me. I have little or no interest in the packaging. I don’t smoke the packaging! I know what a good cigar is and it is not defined by a certain package, price or marketing plan. Do you think the package affects the smoking experience? Well if you do, we disagree again!

What do you know of the way CC’s are made? Many rollers are clueless about what they are rolling. Why? So they don’t steal them and sell them on the street. With that in mind the roller uses a certain amount of tobacco to produce a certain number of cigars of the same quality of any other cigars he/she rolls on a given day. Where is the rational for a higher price on these cigars based on this practice? It does not exist. Pulling special rollers together for a limited Cohiba is a nice idea. I think it ads speculative value, but of course my value is a function of many things and a specific roller is not one of them. The damn idiots at H SA et al can’t even keep that honest! Read Rob’s thread about Behikes.

History; what about it? Is a car such as a Porsche worth the money because of its reputation? It certainly is a factor. While I think that analogies regarding cigars are often poor ones, the point is about the value of a reputation. Why is a petit Bolivar EL worth more than a BBF? This is a quiz! It isn't!!! While I understand curiosity and knowledge based on experience, why would someone buy an untested cigar, some of lesser sizes than a well known sibling with a proven track record and pay twice the price? My answer. You have to be a damn fool to do so! I have been that damn fool more times than I care to mention. Being a “damn fool” has been experienced by me personally so I speak of the experience empirically and not theoretically.

We have covered a lot and I have to get to feeding my horses. I have likely left out a lot. The poor performance that I have experienced with EL’s/RE’s, the poor construction I have experienced, the inconsistencies in the final products and I am sure other issues that make them not only not worth the money, but not as good as regular production cigars.

Lastly I am going to leave you with this. I will give you the short idea of a topic that I have been meaning to post about for sometime now. Does limited production... real limited production cigars as a concept have merit? You will be surprised by my answer. The answer is yes! Real limited production is not attempting to construct 100k cigars for a deadline to meet the super expensive boxes that you just produced. Limited production is the need for 5 or 10k cigars where the cigars are not all that common or popular, yet produced in small batches to satisfy the niche. Take Rafeal Gonzalez cigars for example. The truth is I have been enjoying limited production cigars, like the RG line for years. I have been getting a bargain on them (relative to more common cigars) because they are not marketed, hyped and little known. What is more, because these cigars are only made occasionally and because there is not a great demand for them, they are produced at leisure (without a dated band for a deadline) when the materials and the manpower is available. While they might produce more cigars than the current demand, the cigars are not over produced to meet an excess demand. I believe the overproduction and the deadlines lead to sketchy results and I see EL’s as the prime example of such folly. Well made and outside of the high demand for the more popular smokes is where the true Limited Production cigars live. These are the real EL’s. These: the Cohiba CE, the Monte Especial, the LGC line, the RG line are the best EL’s. These are the best value in Cuban cigars, some with and some without the high price tag.

Ultimately, to see the best cigars that are made on Isla Cuba replaced by lesser cigars, ones without reputation, ones at a higher cost, ones with a lesser value... these are the reasons I hate EL’s.

[Dbone]

I have a few Limitadas, but what makes them Limitadas?

They are not regular production and wont be on the shelves forever... some seem to though oddly enough. Usually the not so popular.

[Colt45]

Not sure if I answered your questions but those are some of my thoughts.

Interesting discussion for sure.

Yes, thanks - it's always good to get some insight from those with more experience. I think one thing I may have missed in previous discussions on the

topic is the feeling that the early releases were considered (by some) to be of a higher standard of quality.

Now that you no longer partake, is there anything you (and anybody else, of course) do look forward to in the way of specialty releases?

(books, GRs, etc)

[Puros Y Vino]

Piggy's explanation put a tear in my eye. And I agree, underneath the fancy bands lies a cigar. And it's that naked cigar that should be the basis for judgement. Marketing just clouds things up. However, when manufacturers take a look at their creations, they see that not all are created equal. Some are just "better" and henceforth, they can possibly bring more profit to the organization. For example. Those who are a bit tech savvy will understand. When a company like Intel or AMD creates a CPU the design does not change for different speeds or frequencies. What has happened is that in their testing of the final products, some CPU's fail at lower frequencies and others do very well at higher ones. Therefore Intel charges more for the same CPU that performs better and less for the baseline ones. they are the exact same design, just labelled differently.

So if some tobacco at harvest tends to be "better" then some will be spread throughout the regular lines at smaller quantities. While the majority of it will be used to make lower yield higher profit product. And the same can be said for the wine industry. Great growths will find their way into more expensive bottles. Decent growths will be blended to create something a little more mainstream and affordable.

[brian1]

My spending has tailed off alot in the last couple of years as I have already alot of regular production cigars(Cohiba/Boli/Monte etc) tucked away and aging for the future. One of the few regular production cigars I have been buying lately are the H Upmann Mag 50s which I think are superb and offer amazing QPR. My last purchase was a couple of the Partagas Jars and beofre that a box of Behike 56 and before that a few boxes of Sig VI Grand Reserva. I guess I am more focussed focused on either backfilling stuff I missed first time around like Festival Marevas 2000, Millennium Jars from 1999 that sort of thing or truly limited/great current release like the Reserva series. Also I look to backfill the better Regionals from the past, but I see the RE program now starting to mirror the EL slippery slope to mediocrity and have largely stopped following ever tom,**** and harry RE they puke out these days.

Now that you no longer partake, is there anything you (and anybody else, of course) do look forward to in the way of specialty releases?

(books, GRs, etc)

[Ken Gargett]

i must say i really liked a number of the early LE releases, not least because the very early ones were actually great buying - i think that they did the toe in the water thing (hence why a gap of a year as no idea whether it would work or not and not prepared for a second release). some of those mentioned are terrific cigars by any standards. partagas and hoyo pyramides, the 2006 cohiba pyramides, the cohiba DC's and sublimes and the monte sublimes and several others. then there have been a number of disasters - the dire monte C's in particular. but more recent releases hardly qualify as value. and now we have the regional releases, the whole thing a bit blurred and less relevant. shame as it was a good concept but they have flogged it too much.

[#2 man]

Piggy, Great reply!!!!

[CanuckSARTech]

I like steak!!!! Mmmmm!

[anacostiakat]

"....

Courage! What makes a King out of a slave?

Courage! What makes the flag on the mast to wave?

Courage! What makes the elephant charge his tusk, in the misty mist or the dusky dusk?

What makes the muskrat guard his musk?

Courage! What makes the sphinx the seventh wonder?

Courage! What makes the dawn come up like thunder?

Courage! What makes the Hottentot so hot? What puts the "ape" in apricot?

What have they got that I ain't got?

....

Courage!

..."

:lol3:

[android]

I agree with KG that many of the early LE's are quite special to me (Cohiba Millenium, Cohiba Sublimes, RyJ DC and a few others) and that is another facet of the world of CC that we as individuals can only deceide for ourselves....

[El Presidente]

Yes nothing special about them Except for the fact the program has produced some of the most superb cigars(and now virtually impossible to find) of the last decade:

Highlight of the EL series for me:

Partagas Piramides

RyJ Robustos 2001

Partagas Serie D #3 2001

Hoyo Piramide 2003

Cohiba Double Corona 2003

Partagas Serie D #2 2003

RyJ Hermoso #2 2004

Partagas Serid D #1 2004

Cohiba Sublime 2004

People love to crap on the ELs but there have been plenty of gems released over the years. I think alot of the dislike comes from the fact that with the leaf used these take alot of time before they mature and start to show well.

I stopped buying the ELs after the 2007 release as I feel quality has gone down significantly and they no longer are worth it to me.

I love the list of dates which emphasises what a great program it once was. In the end they became greedy and have killed the goose that laid the Golden egg.