Premium Cigar Imports Down
15 Mar, 2009- The number of premium cigars imported into the United States dove in January thanks to a strange crash in Honduran imports, but machine-made cigars continued to rise. Figures provided by the Cigar Association of America, based on U.S. Customs Service data, showed that just 7.83 million premium cigars came into the U.S. in January, down 31.9% over the 2008 total of 11.49 million.
- Nicaraguan imports were strong, however, continuing that country’s rise as one of the most important premium cigar suppliers. Its total of 4.51 million cigars exported to the U.S. was up a solid 17.9% over the 2008 figure for January, which the Dominican Republic and Honduras were both down.
- Dominican imports were down by 39.3% against January for 2008 to 3.16 million, compared to 5.20 million. But that’s not as bad as the 93.4% drop for Honduran imports in January: just 154,000, compared to 2.32 million in January 2008! This figure is clearly wrong and is being investigated.
- The totals for February and March will likely be much higher due to the pressure placed on manufacturers to advance their production in order to get cigars to retailers before the imposition of the new SCHIP taxes on all cigars sold on April 1 or later.
- Machine-made cigars, however, are still on a roll. Last year was a record-setter for imports of machine-made and little cigars and 2009 is starting off much better! Imports of machine-made large cigars totaled 70.57 million in January, more than double the 2008 January total of 31.99 million and little-cigar imports zoomed to 36.47 million compared to 27.69 million in 2008. All together, all cigar imports in January rose by 61.4% to 114.87 million as against 71.17 million in the same month in 2008.
- The popularity of low-priced, machine-made cigars would appear to confirm the concerns of manufacturers of premium cigars that the rough economy, coupled with smoking bans and tax increases at every level of government has been driving smokers to less expensive brands, and even from hand-made to machine-made cigars.
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La Gloria Cubana Artesanos Retro Especiale has a Connecticut seed wrapper. The Mexican and Nicaraguan binder is enhanced by Nicaraguan and Dominican ligero and an additional peppering of proprietary Nicaraguan and Dominican leaf. 
