NEWS & GOSSIP
Habanos Festival Update
The 2015 closed last week with the Gala Dinner on the Saturday night.
The format of the festival was slightly different this year with the Gran
Reserva a Romeo y Julieta Gran Reserva Cosecha 2009 Wide Churchill
announced and sampled on the Monday evening’s welcome dinner.
The midweek event saw the celebration of the 25th
anniversary of the La Casa Del Habanos franchise
and to mark this milestone a special La Gloria
Cubana humidor containing 30 Robusto Extra and
30 Piramides was launched.
The Gala Dinner commemorated the 80th
anniversary of Montecristo with guests sampling
two new cigars, including the new Montecristo
80th Aniversario cigars. The cigar which will
measure 165mm x 55 ring gauge, slightly larger
than a Sublime. 30,000 boxes of 20
Filthy Hooligan arrives in time for St Patrick’s Day
The Alec Bradley Black Market Filthy Hooligan
2015 has arrived in the UK. This is a
Limited Edition, released in time for
St Patrick’s Day with only 150 boxes
available in the UK.
The cigar is made in the same
way as the Alec Bradley Black
Market but the cigars come
dressed in a vibrant grassgreen Candela wrapper.
The wrapper colour is
achieved by a 72 hour heat curing
which fixes the chlorophyll content of the wrapper.
The cigar is available as a 6 x 50 ring gauge Toro.
cigars will be produced. The second
cigar introduced was the new Montecristo
Medias Coronas, a half corona measuring
90mm x 44 ring gauge.
The evening was rounded off with the traditional
Humidor auction. The six lots sold raised a total of
740,000 dollars for the Cuban Health Service.
To see a gallery of the new cigars from the festival
and the humidors please follow this link to the
Gallery.
New Rum to perfectly match the
Cohiba Siglo VI
Havana Club has launched a new premium
rum brand in collaboration with Cuban
cigar producer Cohiba. Havana Club
Union is designed to be the "perfect
match" with a Cohiba Siglo VI cigar.
The brand's Master Ronero Asbel
Morales said its name represented "the
two icons of Cuban culture, rum and
cigars." Morales worked with renowned
cigar sommelier Fernando Fernandez on
the launch.
Davidoff announces major acquisitions in Nicaragua and Honduras
Davidoff has announced that it has acquired over 150 hectares of land in Condega, Nicaragua, and in
Jamastran, Honduras. The company also announced that it has acquired almost 450’000 square feet
(41’000 m2) of land near its box factory to build a new cigar factory in Danlí, Honduras. This comes as a
result of the 60% growth in production output and the growth of Camacho and other Honduran brands
which has outgrown the capacity of the current factory
New C.gars store in Norfolk
The C.Gars expansion continues this month with
the opening of the new Turmeaus Tobacconist
Norfolk store on Tuesday 24th March. The opening
evening will feature a guest of honour Brian
Shapiro of Oliva Cigars. For full details see the link
on our diary page.
3
Hamlet
There is news from Cuba that a Cuban friend to
many Hamlet, who many will have met when he
travelled as a roller in the UK. He has left Cuba to
join Rocky Patel in Florida and we look forward
more news of that venture.