Putting Habanos into perspective.

[zeedubbya]

I don’t think these numbers are surprising. Habanos wouldn’t threaten any of the premium cigar brands with major footholds here in the USA.  Padrón, Fuente, Davidoff. Rocky Patel, Drew Estate, Perdomo, My Father/Tat, EPC the list goes on—none of these companies are even remotely concerned about the Habanos effect on the US market.  Even if the embargo was lifted tomorrow, I don’t believe there’d be a mass exodus from these brands. The mass of cigar buyers aren’t looking to wait in line for boxes of $600 D4s, and those who have the ability have already “been there, done that, and have the forbidden fruit tattoo.”  

We will never, in our lifetime, see meaningful competition from Cuba. Maybe in 25 years they could somehow scale production to carve a small niche in the market, but even 25 years might not be able to fix what they’ve created. As much as I’d like to hope I could walk into a humidor here in the States and pick out a QDO52 it is just a dream, and one I doubt I will even care to fulfill when/if the time comes, and I am even in a likely to consume group…

[Çnote]

21 hours ago, zeedubbya said:

As much as I’d like to hope I could walk into a humidor here in the States and pick out a QDO52

I see this as a distinct possibility in a major metro on certain weekends of the year, much like today a nice shop will have Davidoff LE and the upper crust of FFOX, but I don't think there will be more than 10 or 20 stores nationwide that are getting mastercases and selling singles to walk-ins at MSRP. There's lots of demand for cigars and lots of disposable income to mop up, even today.

I personally think that the average USA cigar smoker that 'has only had bad CC' hasn't had a real one and once they are easier to get with providence, a more clear picture of tobacco quality country by country will be codified by the market.

HSA hopefully will have a great opportunity to get onto a better brand identity where the terror of the fields and the delicacy of vitola are shown to be superior in someway in Cuba, as opposed to Nicaragua and the Dominican Republic, much as French, Italian, and Spanish wine are marketed, or American vs Scotch vs Irish whiskey etc. Cuba won't have to compete on the shelf to sell through a relatively small amount of taxed cigars with providence.

Price of the brick going up. $100 short toros if it happened today.