Habanos Price Increase Confirmed - January 1/23

[SCgarman]

Those here attempting to justify or rationalize the price increases must be masochists. All I can say is must be nice to have so much disposable income that no price for a box of Habanos will price your budget out of the game. You do realize all the rules are out the window. There may be several price increases throughout 2023, as been said they usually rolled in around May or so. You know a $300 box of Padron 1964 is looking to be more of a bargain nowadays than any other time in history. I have enough Cuban boxes bought at once normal pricing to last a good while, supplemented by Nudies and other NC's. I'll just sit back and watch this sh**show with cigar and drink in hand.

[Lamboinee]

On 12/1/2022 at 5:09 AM, Fugu said:

Point of the matter - a 2-5 (-15) percent annual adjustment has been the normal for long

Spot on. Been smoking CCs seriously for about 2ish years. I think it's great that I can find tasty cuban cigars at around $20/cigar. Sometimes a little less. Sometimes a little more. Granted, the best ones I've been smoking are smaller vitolas, but I don't mind paying the same for a GREAT marevas as an NC toro. I would prefer mareva anyway. When you consider that the NCs I would smoke are all in the $12-20 range, AND the fact that I am enjoying the CCs more, that's not too bad (cohiba and trinidads and the like excluded) Now.... I'm curious to see how these nudies taste...cause they were only about $10/stick!

 

[Tstew75]

This train wreck has become quite the spectacle. 

I haven't stopped buying, nor will I....but I absolutely can't wait til the day that the bottom drops out on this thang. Maybe it'll be after the deep worldwide recession that's coming in 2023.

[JohnS]

12 hours ago, Corylax18 said:

 I've heard from two different sources now that they're running out of room to stack cigars at El Laguito. They have 10s of thousands of sticks, but no bands, no boxes, no stickers. The communist government doesn't even have enough money to keep the power on at the factories all day, let alone to buy and ship in all the packaging they need. My point is, its not a raw material issue. Despite all the "world is falling" news we've heard from PdR.

Yes, this was confirmed via one of our members that visited the factory recently on Thursday afternoon (Wednesday night NY time) on FoH ZOOM.

11 hours ago, asudevil08 said:

One of the things I hear a lot here and on other boards is the NC portfolio is too big to know where to start so lets just keep locked into the CC's we all know and love - which isnt necessarily a bad thing - but i'd say its hard to go wrong with lots of the NCs that are currently out there because of how many great options exist (flavor, body, etc).  FWIW. 

Hope thats helpful. 

Of course, we completely agree and are sympathetic to the changes that have been forced upon us in 2022. Hence why this thread below was started to assist our members...

[dominattorney]

You guys are taking this personally, when it's not personal whatsoever. Remember the godfather? It's only business. No one here is "defending" price increases. Please. 

The situation is dire down there and HSA is trying to save a sinking ship. Who among us would not do likewise if forced into like circumstances? 

[Duxnutz]

On 11/30/2022 at 10:42 AM, TygaWoods said:

I guess this makes me really want to sit down with myself and think about my fav 3 cigars and just I guess stockpile them for the next 5, 10, 15+ years

This is what those of us that live(d) in the Australian province of taxation did. Taxes were going up so quick it was a good excuse to buy, buy, buy. 

[ha_banos]

I just don't have space to stock pile the cigars that I was leaving till later as they were still cheap. Now they are getting not cheap and I don't have room to stockpile! 😭

 

Oh woe is me and my first world problems.

[Fugu]

17 hours ago, dominattorney said:

You guys are taking this personally, when it's not personal whatsoever. Remember the godfather? It's only business. No one here is "defending" price increases. Please.

Absolutely. Honestly, and I really don’t want to come over as provocative, but it amuses me to see folks getting heated up about HSA’s new price finding attempts, while at the same time CORO or Reyes are being snapped up in 24:24 at new pricing in no time ....

Thank your “neighbour” for spoiling prices, but don’t blame the provider. Supply and demand, folks, supply and demand. If you consider CORO to be such a glorious cigar that you don’t want to miss out, then shell out the 60 bucks. If that is not worth it to you, then put your money elsewhere and don’t be a pawn in their game, as Cory put it. Easy as that.

If CORO or BHK won’t move, prices will come down. It all depends on the clientele. Cmon guys, cigars are an absolute nonessential, it’s not as if it was about gas for your daily commuter. And there’s still cheap diesel to be had in he HSA lineup.

The only folks I truly feel with are the local B&Ms in Europe who don’t get decent supply and sit on Cohiba and Trini they can hardly move. The distribution decisions by HSA are what could really get my goat.

[PigFish]

Gu. @Fugu

My buying behavior is governed by your example. It has been for well over a decade now. You are right on the money there. Where I differ is in your analysis about the emotions.

Pretend for a moment that his place is a gathering of passionate lovers of the Cuban cigar. It is not about poker night, or football scores betting, but a place where people discuss cigars.

What is Cuban cigar smoking to you? You, meaning any one of you? Cheaper than a shrink? Escape from the wife and kids? Time to contemplate, indulge, escape, join up, be selfish, be generous….???

How has the current path of ‘cigars as a luxury product’ affected your ability to interact with cigars the way you did last year? How about 5 years ago? How about 39 years ago, the number of years that I have been smoking cigars?

People have been complaining about how the private property rights of others have affected them since the institution of private property. I have to laugh about the concept of a communist owned (private property) company, whose charter is based on equality and equity here for a moment. Is this not the same place where those that make the cigars cannot afford to smoke the product they produce? For another time…!

Did you joint this forum to dissect the making of markets of the cigar. I would think that most of us joined up to discuss the enjoyment of them. Most of us are not industry insiders discussing the cigar business. Far from it I would wager. We came to discuss our enjoyment. While I discuss the cigar industry often now; why exactly is that the case? Is it mainly due to what a bunch of incompetent hacks have done to my interest? Why yes it is. Would I be complaining if I was well serviced and satisfied? No… I would not.

Take me back two decades and I was excited, enthusiastic, perhaps sometimes critical, but I was not complaining… Cuban cigars were a value. The failure rate was constant with the cost I payed. The enjoyment I received was commensurate with the costs.

When you gather to discuss your favorite team, your favorite restaurant, the fees they charge to park at the beach or a host of other things that one may perceive as affecting one’s life, does one have the right, perhaps even the need to share the emotions felt? I think so.

If your answer is no, you just wiped out the concept of the entire “counseling” industry! 

Even in the most austere corner of the communist run island of Cuba, to the lavish palace of some oligarch, you have people wanting something that they buy that they perceive that has some effect of changing their life, if only for a few moments, for the better. I would say the less you have, the more it hurts.

Stop petting your dog or letting him lounge with you on the couch for a day. See how it affects him! When something is taken from you, even if that something that was never your ‘right’ to own control of in the first place, it can be a significant loss.

You don’t own your spouse. Think about the range of emotions that may be experienced to see him/her pack a bag and hit the road. I dream about it sometimes… -LOL

 

Complain to your hearts content. Or don’t. While you have no actual right to bat around those that have taken a simple pleasure from you, you certainly do have the right to make you emotions known.

It is personal. Cigar smoking is personal. Sharing this personal experience with others is the whole point, or at least most of it, of joining a cigar board.

-the Pig

[Hammer Smokin']

The Pig has spoketh. 

And well said.

[vladdraq]

wondering what would be the sentiment if Habanos would have lowered the price 50% and all people stashing "life time" worth of stuff, would see their stash just lose half of it's value. Would they be happy for the new BOTL's having the great opportunity to enjoy CC's or would they blame the communist formake them  losing money and how badly they run the business, scamming etc.? 

 

 

[Blakes]

27 minutes ago, vladdraq said:

wondering what would be the sentiment if Habanos would have lowered the price 50% and all people stashing "life time" worth of stuff, would see their stash just lose half of it's value. Would they be happy for the new BOTL's having the great opportunity to enjoy CC's or would they blame the communist formake them  losing money and how badly they run the business, scamming etc.? 

 

 

Buy and smoke more, reduce the overall cost. Be happy. 😁

[Bijan]

1 hour ago, vladdraq said:

wondering what would be the sentiment if Habanos would have lowered the price 50% and all people stashing "life time" worth of stuff, would see their stash just lose half of it's value. Would they be happy for the new BOTL's having the great opportunity to enjoy CC's or would they blame the communist formake them  losing money and how badly they run the business, scamming etc.? 

Good question, but likely we'd have just doubled down. Especially if quality was not affected (which it probably would be sooner or later).

I myself am thankful for supply and demand, the communists or whoever or whatever is responsible for curing my CC buying addiction, if only temporarily.

I am sad for those who'll miss out. But hopefully they'll be able to find another source of pleasure to pursue with all that money that is burning a hole in their wallets.

But that's the game. I got in when a lot of legendary/classic cigars and vitolas which I would have loved, were long gone, and I could only get the occasional one at auction or from trades.

In another decade or two there may be no CCs produced at all. Who knows. Carpe Diem and whatnot.

[Fugu]

2 hours ago, PigFish said:

Where I differ is in your analysis about the emotions.

Oh, you know, Ray, I am sharing the very same sentiments, don’t get me wrong here. We’re not in disagreement in that regard. Not happy with it at all. And I‘ve been voicing my emotions as well, as you will know. Even unhappier - and we debated, no, lamented it here ad nauseam - about past discontinuations (we, you and me, are sharing the same fate of suffering a diminished range of our preferred vitolas over the years). It’s not the lamenting or the sharing of emotions, it is the unilateral targeting that finds me confused. All lamenting is in vain when the market is as it is. And the market is us. Sure, that market is heterogeneous, no doubt, different strokes for different folks. But is it really HSA alone to be being blamed for it? It is us, the consumer - be it now smoker, collector, ‘flipper’ or even your odd IG-poser - generating the demand. HSA, like other producers, is just one part of the equation, the supply part. Takes two at least. One seducing, one letting him/herself being seduced. They do the marketing - we “fall” for it. So, we like to point a finger towards them, when in fact we should look in the mirror and point at least as much at ourselves. That and only that was my point here.

[MrBirdman]

4 hours ago, vladdraq said:

wondering what would be the sentiment if Habanos would have lowered the price 50% and all people stashing "life time" worth of stuff, would see their stash just lose half of it's value. Would they be happy for the new BOTL's having the great opportunity to enjoy CC's or would they blame the communist formake them  losing money and how badly they run the business, scamming etc.?

I, for one, would be thrilled. I don’t buy cigars as an investment. I suspect few here really do. 

[PigFish]

4 hours ago, vladdraq said:

wondering what would be the sentiment if Habanos would have lowered the price 50% and all people stashing "life time" worth of stuff, would see their stash just lose half of it's value. Would they be happy for the new BOTL's having the great opportunity to enjoy CC's or would they blame the communist formake them  losing money and how badly they run the business, scamming etc.?

This depends on if you are a smoker or speculator.

 I double dog dare Tabacuba to bring back the RAPC, the Partagas Lonsdale, the Diiplo 1, 3 & 4. Make what I have valueless to the speculator. I dare you, I defy you… Please, have at it.

I have posted this sentiment many a time here. Look it up. Only been here since ‘05,,,

[Bijan]

13 minutes ago, Fugu said:

So, we like to point a finger towards them, when in fact we should look in the mirror and point at least as much at ourselves.

If you mean myself as an individual that is fine.

But I don't like the "other CC buyers are (insert expletive) for buying CCs at the new prices. If we all went on a CC buying strike things would go back to normal", sentiment any more than the "the greedy communists are betraying their sacred duty to supply us with reasonably priced cigars while Cuba is burning" sentiment.

The market and supply and demand are realities that are no one's fault, neither consumers, nor producers.

We have to: suck it up. Or point the finger at ourselves for our inability to suck it up.

[dowjr1]

9 minutes ago, PigFish said:

This depends on if you are a smoker or speculator.

 I double dog dare Tabacuba to bring back the RAPC, the Partagas Lonsdale, the Diiplo 1, 3 & 4. Make what I have valueless to the speculator. I dare you, I defy you… Please, have at it.

I have posted this sentiment many a time here. Look it up. Only been here since ‘05,,,

I'd be pretty excited to see some Double Coronas come back as well.

[PigFish]

Speculator rant Chapter 2:

... Piggy back at it!

Crush the f-ing speculator! That's the risk they take. This is not providing liquidity in the Soy Bean market, it is like hogging up all the hot-dogs off the cart when there is a long line, buying 100 rolls of toilet paper when you need 5...!

I love freedom. Should they be stopped? No! Last thing we need is more government. Should they be crushed financially and taught a lesson, absolutely?

I did not buy the unwanted Diplo 1 (example only) due to pending scarcity. I wrote about my fondness and encouraged others to try it based on its taste and value. I bought them to smoke them, share them with friends, not to be afraid to open the box for its value.

I have long resented being called a collector (along with guru). I am neither. I am a cigar smoker. A regular guy that puts ketchup on my fries, happy to eat tri-tip over Wagyu, and will pass on all forms of fish eggs unless I am fishing for trout.

The collector has ruined this custom. He can take his glossy, fancy picture books and tasting notes and shove them where the sun does not shine. The collector/speculator has pushed this luxury image crap and shit in the water we swim in.

I would love to see his financial back busted! And if the value of my cigars to the public goes with it... So be it. I bought cigars to consume and share. Their value is with me and I don't want it changed higher, I want them to still be made. Sorry folks, but I want to see the drivers of cigar value to lose their ass and I am happy to see the few (rhetorically) that I own go down the toilet with them.

From day one here I have bagged on the collector, the cigar aging expert and a host of high-brow, high-hatted pin heads that have long been moving to make a secondary market in cigar collecting. The writing and opining of these folks have made cigars into something far from what they were ever meant to be. They have destroyed this great pastime. They have devolved its progress, once starting with the very rich, to back to being affordable by only the very rich.

Read some posts of some of these newer folks. They have not been smoking 39 years like me. They are just starting out. Where's the fun, the adventure, the excitement I had? They have been f'd over by some would-be image maker for their own self-aggrandizement. I feel for these guys/gals.

Don't play with fireworks you might hurt yourself. Don't swim in the undertow, ride a dirt bike, it hurts the land! Wear your mask, don't shake hands, fear your neighbor... Don't you dare consider tobacco...

Okay, your kids have been priced out the real estate market. A new pickup truck costs 80 Gs. Should they not be able to afford the simple pleasure of a great cigar?

Way to go collectors. Go back coins and Beany Babies will you. Beetle blight on you!

-the Pig

[Bijan]

36 minutes ago, PigFish said:

This is not providing liquidity in the Soy Bean market, it is like hogging up all the hot-dogs off the cart when there is a long line, buying 100 rolls of toilet paper when you need 5...!

Hot dogs are food. Toilet paper a basic necessity. Cuban cigars are a luxury good.

They were for the rich, then fell on hard times and now once again for the rich.

From time immemorial until maybe 30, 40 years ago, Cuban cigars were not what the everyman would smoke. Normal people made fun of $1 cigars (or $10 cigars, or $0.25 cigars, depending on the time period).

Then people stopped smoking cigars, take that and add the delayed impact of the US embargo, and they became somewhat reasonably priced.

This is like complaining that real estate in certain US city centers that was for the rich once, then became slums, is now once again unaffordable. And speculators and flippers are ruining these places for ordinary people.

There are plenty of $3 Churchills and Robustos out there, if anyone is hurting for a smoke. It's kind of weird to say that there's something unique and special about Cuban cigars, and then crap on tasting notes by people trying to put names to those flavours.

If it's just about brotherhood and an affordable pleasure, why not smoke a pipe or a Non Cuban cigar. I'm sure many are.

[PigFish]

One needs to go no further than to create an analogy if one wants to find an argument on a bulletin board!!! -LOL

I expected to lose a few people here.

Now back to my scheduled programming….

-the Pig

[Bijan]

11 minutes ago, PigFish said:

One needs to go no further than to create an analogy if one wants to find an argument on a bulletin board!!! -LOL

My apologies. I did not mean to pick on the analogy but address your whole message and argument.

Who is to blame that RGPC, RG Perlas, Bolivar PC and Partagas shorts are unaffordable or uneconomical? Collectors? Snobs?

In the end we had a good run. May the good times return again some day.

Edit: One of my favourite CCs is hoyo du depute, it was available at $110-$120 a box when I started (just a couple of years ago). Now it's twice that. It is what it is, but it's not the Instagram crowd, or the speculators who are to blame for the price doubling since then.

[Nevrknow]

1 hour ago, Bijan said:

Edit: One of my favourite CCs is hoyo du depute,

One of mine now too. Getting started I had the first one ROTT. I thought these things suck!. 8 mos of rest and no way am I NOT smoking these. Smooth as silk.

[Monterey]

15 hours ago, Fugu said:

Absolutely. Honestly, and I really don’t want to come over as provocative, but it amuses me to see folks getting heated up about HSA’s new price finding attempts, while at the same time CORO or Reyes are being snapped up in 24:24 at new pricing in no time ....

 

Where did I blame anyone (except you)?  I actually said that I support Cuba's movement.  I'm just not a customer anymore.  I took issue with you passing off a massive increase after 6 months describing it "as normal".  You completely changed the narrative of what was being discussed.  Your entire response had nothing to do with your incorrect original statement.

The good news is that without me buying, there is plenty more for you to pick up

[Tstew75]

These price increase threads are gold 🍿