Can NC companies be trusted?

[PuroDan]

Lately there have been threads posted about NC's. One well known cigar manufacture says one thing, another supposed expert says something different. A quote here, a quote there. People claim that they their fingers and lips get stained while smoking certain kinds of them. What wrapper/binder/filler are you getting? So whats really in them and can the NC companies be trusted? Your thoughts.

[SmokyFontaine]

They absolutely can not. Every single one I've ever had, both of them, were filled with used werewolf tampons. Plus I heard the wrappers are actually painted banana peels. 

[mprach024]

Can Taco Bell be trusted?  They claim there’s actual meat in their ground beef.....but I’ve heard otherwise.

Corporations have blatant motives at times to hide/bend the truth on proprietary make ups of their products.  I put NC companies in this boat.  The NC world is the Wild West, it’s not controlled, there’s no governing board (not saying there should be), so they can do whatever however they want to increase product quality where they want, cut costs (corners) where they want, and claim what they want.  If they lie about a filler, wrapper, etc there’s no Cigar Jail or anyone to fine them, and proving inconsistencies is next to impossible.  

If there is a “just” or rational motive to deceive than some companies (not all of course) will choose that. That’s human nature in any industry, because it’s run by humans.  Humans are just the worst people 😀.

[Kaptain Karl]

Honestly...I enjoyed supporting the NC world more than the CC. In the NC world you can support entrepreneurs, innovators, capitalism and free markets. With CC’s I’m supporting a repressive, totalitarian regime from a political philosophy that I consider to be evil. It just happens that Cuba produces my favorite tobacco and that’s the ONLY reason why that’s where my money ends up. I’m not proud of it, but it is what it is. 

[mprach024]

6 minutes ago, Kaptain Karl said:

Honestly...I enjoyed supporting the NC world more than the CC. In the NC world you can support entrepreneurs, innovators, capitalism and free markets. With CC’s I’m supporting a repressive, totalitarian regime from a political philosophy that I consider to be evil. It just happens that Cuba produces my favorite tobacco and that’s the ONLY reason why that’s where my money ends up. I’m not proud of it, but it is what it is. 

This gets a *harumph* from me

[NSXCIGAR]

With cigars, either you like it or you don't. I'll smoke a used werewolf tampon if it tastes good. Competition insures companies stay consistent and keep improving. If a company makes false claims, that's a problem and I would imagine there would be some liability in countries where the products are sold. If a company makes no claims, buy at your own risk. It's not food, it can't kill you. If you want to know about a company's practices, email them. If you don't like their response, don't buy. If you feel making no claims is suspicious, don't buy.

Ironically, Cuba seems to be far more open about their practices than NC producers. They have a state-run monopoly--what do they care who knows what? Their leaf can't be duplicated. They are in the unique position with a geographic monopoly over a unique product of being able to be fully open with their practices unlike almost every other company in the world. 

[Enduin]

I think the mistake is generalizing NCs as if they were one conglomerate that follows the same methods and philosophy. This is not any different that NC fanboys saying all Cubans are inconsistent, plugged, whatever. If anything with CCs you actually do have one company (Habanos S.A.) that does have a certain philosophy and MO. And in spite of that we know that there are Cuban factories doing a better job than others, or some years being better than others.

Some NC brands are 100% legit, others are not. Depends on the brand. 

When I was smoking NCs I liked most cigars made by the Eiroas and Christian Eiroa in particular. Illusione cigars are also good cigars, and they made one in particular (Illusione fume d'amour) that was rolled with no ligero but it was VERY flavorful, something very much against the NC trend. The La Palina Goldie was a solid cigar, smooth and flavorful, but quite overpriced. I'm pretty confident these companies are not doing anything sketchy. 

I'm not a big fan of Fuente, My Father, Tatuaje, Padron, but I'm still pretty confident the quality is good, just not a fan of the flavor profile.

When it comes to brands like Rocky Patel, Alec Bradley, Drew Estate, and some other big brands I think it's hit or miss. Like many mainstream companies there might be some shenanigans but they also some times make something legit. I did actually like the original Prensado in corona gorda format quite a bit, but never liked it the following years and haven't liked any other AB offerings. 

Then you have the Gurkhas and other lower tier or gimmicky where shenanigans are almost guaranteed. 

 

[NSXCIGAR]

1 hour ago, Enduin said:

I think the mistake is generalizing NCs as if they were one conglomerate that follows the same methods and philosophy.

I don't really see that happening. The issue is that there are an awful lot of NC producers that engage in questionable practices and the ones that don't could probably do a better job at distinguishing themselves. 

But short of a governing body determining what is Scotch whisky or Cognac brandy or Champagne sparkling wine it's pretty much either you like the product or you don't.

[El Presidente]

They are about as honest as HSA 

Does anyone really care?

[PuroDan]

1 hour ago, Enduin said:

I think the mistake is generalizing NCs as if they were one conglomerate that follows the same methods and philosophy. This is not any different that NC fanboys saying all Cubans are inconsistent, plugged, whatever. If anything with CCs you actually do have one company (Habanos S.A.) that does have a certain philosophy and MO. And in spite of that we know that there are Cuban factories doing a better job than others, or some years being better than others.

Some NC brands are 100% legit, others are not. Depends on the brand. 

When I was smoking NCs I liked most cigars made by the Eiroas and Christian Eiroa in particular. Illusione cigars are also good cigars, and they made one in particular (Illusione fume d'amour) that was rolled with no ligero but it was VERY flavorful, something very much against the NC trend. The La Palina Goldie was a solid cigar, smooth and flavorful, but quite overpriced. I'm pretty confident these companies are not doing anything sketchy. 

I'm not a big fan of Fuente, My Father, Tatuaje, Padron, but I'm still pretty confident the quality is good, just not a fan of the flavor profile.

When it comes to brands like Rocky Patel, Alec Bradley, Drew Estate, and some other big brands I think it's hit or miss. Like many mainstream companies there might be some shenanigans but they also some times make something legit. I did actually like the original Prensado in corona gorda format quite a bit, but never liked it the following years and haven't liked any other AB offerings. 

Then you have the Gurkhas and other lower tier or gimmicky where shenanigans are almost guaranteed. 

 

I should have been a bit more thorough in my post. I dont mean all NC companies. The reason i started this thread is because of the accusations of Padron using a mexican wrapper. Obviously its just an accusation. If true it's a bit shocking to me as Padron is well respected. How credible is the website? I couldnt answer that. Cigar Aficionado and the rest of the well respected sites list Padron as a puro

[MrBirdman]

The day we smoke politicians and elect cigars is the day I’ll start losing sleep over their integrity. Enough to worry about as it is. 

[PuroDan]

4 minutes ago, MrBirdman said:

The day we smoke politicians and elect cigars is the day I’ll start losing sleep over their integrity. Enough to worry about as it is. 

Good point.

[Bijan]

9 minutes ago, MrBirdman said:

The day we smoke politicians and elect cigars is the day I’ll start losing sleep over their integrity. Enough to worry about as it is. 

You must not get much sleep 😂

[La_Tigre]

2 hours ago, NSXCIGAR said:

With cigars, either you like it or you don't. I'll smoke a used werewolf tampon if it tastes good.

We only smoke rosado werewolf tampons thank you very much...

[El Presidente]

6 minutes ago, La_Tigre said:

We only smoke rosado werewolf tampons thank you very much...

2020 are the best in years 

[Tstew75]

uh oh

[Enduin]

1 hour ago, PuroDan said:

I should have been a bit more thorough in my post. I dont mean all NC companies. The reason i started this thread is because of the accusations of Padron using a mexican wrapper. Obviously its just an accusation. If true it's a bit shocking to me as Padron is well respected. How credible is the website? I couldnt answer that. Cigar Aficionado and the rest of the well respected sites list Padron as a puro

 

Gotcha. In that case I think it also really depends of how we define "trust". There is a difference between using a San Andres wrapper and hint hint calling the cigar a puro vs using weird chemical stuff to paint the wrapper or flavor the cigar that btw might or might not be very good for you. Yes I know we don't smoke cigars because they are healthy, but it's not like you can start dipping them in cyanide because "might as well" LOL. 

So, you can trust good NC companies to not pull off serious nonsense, but they might still cut a little corner here and there or "bend" the truth on some details. And like the Prez says that's about the same trust we can put in HSA. I mean do we REALLY know that there is medio tiempo in every BHK? I know this was debated in another thread. And the truth is that if something is very difficult to detect by the end user and it's not too outrageous, it absolutely plausible that even the best companies might not do 100% of what they say/you expect. 

With that said, at the bottom end of the spectrum, with the crappiest cigar companies, you can probably expect worse shenanigans from NCs than CCs, simply because of access to the means for implementing said shenanigans that might not be available or economically feasible for Cubans. 

This is not just a cigar thing. I worked for years in the spirit industry and worked in several really good distilleries that pride and market themselves as "small batch highest quality" sort of distilleries. And I personally saw or heard them talking about stuff that frankly was quite disappointing. Like for example omitting a botanical from a product when one year it was more difficult to source because "nobody is gonna notice anyway". And these are the good ones! From the bad ones you can expect them to not only use a bunch of artificial stuff, but also to push the boundaries of how much methanol (the toxic stuff that makes you blind if you consume too much of it) is legally allowed in the final product because methanol is dirt cheap compared to ethanol and it's gonna increase their profit, even if only by a few pennies per bottle, since they sell millions. I have friends who worked in even fancy restaurants and they shared similar stories. 

 

 

[Kevin48438]

1 hour ago, PuroDan said:

I should have been a bit more thorough in my post. I dont mean all NC companies. The reason i started this thread is because of the accusations of Padron using a mexican wrapper. Obviously its just an accusation. If true it's a bit shocking to me as Padron is well respected. How credible is the website? I couldnt answer that. Cigar Aficionado and the rest of the well respected sites list Padron as a puro

Tobacco origin is considered a small lie and nobody cares.  It’s regarded more as marketing information than technical information.

[PuroDan]

1 minute ago, Kevin48438 said:

Tobacco origin is considered a small lie and nobody cares.  It’s regarded more as marketing information than technical information.

Again... In the NC world. Me personally, I care what is in and on my cigar. Just me

[El Presidente]

1 minute ago, Kevin48438 said:

Tobacco origin is considered a small lie and nobody cares.  It’s regarded more as marketing information than technical information.

I like to think of it along the lines of "best efforts" 

There are always times when something (wrapper/binder/viso) from a certain region is simply not available for one reason or another. It may only be temporary. You adjust and move on. 

[El Presidente]

Just now, PuroDan said:

Again... In the NC world. Me personally, I care what is in and on my cigar. Just me

Dan that is fair enough but the pareto 80/20 rule would apply. 

80% of their market wouldn't care. I would push that to over 90%

 

[nKostyan]

I agree that the question is incorrect. HSA is a single manufacturer, compared to many NC manufacturers. At the same time, in my opinion, HSA has more sins than any NC brand. It will more correct to compare Cuban and non-Cuban tobacco, but as we know, it is the best in the world

[BrightonCorgi]

If it's a Davidoff or Fuente cigar, I trust it 100%

[Joeyjojo]

Mmm...a literal monopoly in a communist dictatorship or a plethora of companies in different countries and different M.O's?

At least with NC companies if you don't like the product or conduct of one company/individual, you can at least try another. 

  

[canadianbeaver]

In the past year I have been loading the investment side of my collection with my favorite NC, Opus X. Would say it now makes up 10% of my collection. Feel free to say big whoop.

When we travel, especially in the US of A, we get cigars in the lounge we visit. Padron, Ashton VSG, certain Davidoff, AF’s. We are picky, admit that.

If it was a desert island we would smoke Swisher Sweets. Just sayin.

CB