Le Hoyo Du Gourmet got me thinking

[Alexw33]

I?ve been looking to buy a box of Le Hoyo Du Gourmet for a little while now and their apparent hiatus got me thinking. Is part of the reason for the recent trend towards larger RG cigars due to the fact that good quality wrapper leaf is scarce and that the ratio of filler to wrapper is much higher in fatter sticks? This is hardly ground breaking stuff but I don?t recall reading anything on this in the past.

It would seem logical to me that HSA would prioritise thicker cigars in order to partly mitigate the impact to revenue and profit of the tobacco shortage. It might also help explain the lack of skinnier, longer cigars such as the MdO No 2, Des Dieux and CoLa which I believe are hard to locate right now.

Does anybody more knowledgeable than myself have any insight on this?

[ha_banos]

It's easy to look up at the sky and see faces in the clouds.

I have no knowledge or insights. But it stinks of market forces. It seems folks are drawn to bigger fatter sticks. More bands. More money will be spent on those per gram I expect.

Apparently the harvests of 2016 / 2017 have been bumper? Let's see what is released.

My other theory is consistency is hard. Making the same blends people will be happy with over many years is harder than loads of limited releases.

Also there's always new stuff. New shiny bands, new names. New marketing campaigns. New markets growing.

I don't follow the NC marketing. Bit it seems very much more shiny on the whole.

Very clever stuff behind the scenes I'm sure.

Nice one.

[Alexw33]

It's easy to look up at the sky and see faces in the clouds.

I have no knowledge or insights. But it stinks of market forces. It seems folks are drawn to bigger fatter sticks. More bands. More money will be spent on those per gram I expect.

Apparently the harvests of 2016 / 2017 have been bumper? Let's see what is released.

My other theory is consistency is hard. Making the same blends people will be happy with over many years is harder than loads of limited releases.

Also there's always new stuff. New shiny bands, new names. New marketing campaigns. New markets growing.

I don't follow the NC marketing. Bit it seems very much more shiny on the whole.

Very clever stuff behind the scenes I'm sure.

Nice one.

All good points.

Obviously market forces plays a big part, HSA could produce anything they wanted but if there is no market for it they are not going to be able to sell it... But if I was making the decisions and I was limited by what I could produce I would prioritise the most profitable ones per gram (double bands) and the ones with the highest return per measure of what I’m lacking i.e. quality wrapper leaf.

Also the double bands are limited by nature so although HSA would probably like to double band everything and double the prices, the main reason they can charge the premium is the perceived rarity. With this in mind they can only account for a very small amount of the yearly tobacco yield.

Good point on consistency, I’ve never considered that. Maybe they should just create an entirely new catalogue each year to avoid criticism

[gojira]

My guess is that the small RG cigars don’t sell enough. And the des Dieux was supposed to be sitting on shelves for long times. It only sold once people realised that there weren’t any new boxes coming out of Cuba.

If you find the Gourmet somewhere for sale I would be very interested in a box or two Alex. I have been trying to source some but had no luck at all. I still have a few left but I’m rationing them now.

[Cubist]

I think the move to large RG cigars started back in the 90's. I first started smoking cigars in the mid 90's, I was working in London and a friend introduced me to cigars, his interest had been sparked because there were a lot of celebs and movie stars smoking cigars at the time, Arnie, Demi Moore come to mind.
They always seemed to be smoking large RG cigars, and I think that is what drove the move to larger RG's, new, younger smokers wanting to smoke cigars similar to what the celebs and stars were smoking. I imagine all the increase in sales at the time was due to large RG's and so Habanos decided to move their limited resources (tobacco and rollers) over to the new more profitable market in large RG's at the expense of the traditional market in small RG sticks.