There’s a new La Gloria Cubana coming next month and, like the cigar that made the brand famous in the early 1990s, it’s made in Miami. | Cigar Aficionado
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I spend quite a bit of time trying to make sure that none of
halfwheel’s reviewers are reviewing the same brand of cigars consecutively. Typically that means trying to make sure that a brand doesn’t have its cigars reviewed by the same reviewer twice in a row. Every once in a while that happens, but an even rarer occurrence is to have consecutive reviews from a particular reviewer be of the same brand.
Of course, that is because there are actually two very different La Gloria Cubanas. One of them is sold only in the U.S., a brand owned by Scandinavian Tobacco Group and sold by Forged Cigar Co. Then there is the brand being reviewed today, the Cuban La Gloria Cubana owned by Habanos S.A. which is the La Gloria Cubana cigar sold in every country that is not the United States.
Partagas Notes that this only includes the U.S. distribution rights for these brands, which are separate from the Cuban versions of these cigars.
Some of these brands like Bolivar and Partagas are ones that General has tried to remake multiple times, seemingly not very successfully. So on one hand it’s not surprising to see STG trying something else, but Forged Cigar Co. is a pretty drastic step that left many including General’s competitors quite confused.
The company says it’s a multi-million dollar investment, which included the hiring of 12 sales representatives, making the brand new Forged Cigar Co. one of the largest sales teams in the cigar industry. STG says that Forged will also receive marketing support and, of course, new products.
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