Buying off eBay - Be kind to a noob please.

[davidruddell]

Hi,

I'm finally (after years of the occasional Romeo/Cohiba on special occasions) starting out as a regular cigar smoker.
I purchased a small selection of quite nice Cuban's and non Cubans from the very nice people at C.Gars, and got a bit of a bargain with a humidor from a pal who's given up smoking (I've upgraded it with a 'Puck' huidifier and a Xikar Digital Hygrometer/Thermometer.

Throughly enjoying even the cheaper stuff.
But... went to a wedding reception last week and the very generous groom was handing out some very nice Cohiba robusto's, and it just brought home the difference between these and my everyday (Josel L Piedra) smokes is huge.

To cut a long story short, I was searching through eBay for a Cuban Crafters cutter, and fell upon an auction for "An Empty Box" of Cohiba Rubustos for ?200 !

I'm a firm believer that you get what you pay for, surely these are fakes?
The chap and I have conversed by mail, he claims to have a brother in Cuba who works at La Corona factory, who sends him a few boxes a month.

He is willing to meet up in person (Central London, busy area, not keen on getting mugged), and let me check they are not fakes.

Is this all too good to be true? Do any of you esteemed smokers have any experience of buying "Empty Boxes" from eBay?

Please be gentle with me on my first posting!

David R

[kingcohiba]

Ebay is flooded with fakes..........and real. I've bought a couple boxes from ebay before and been lucky I have also sold plenty of authentic on ebay. Seems as though its really close to shop prices when I see cigars on there. Better off going through a place you know doesn't sell fakes. Lots of fake cohibas on ebay.....

But what I really find surprising is that I've heard much of the London male population like to take it up the ass! Crazy if u ask me but whatever floats their boat!

[jibjob79]

If it seems too good to be true it probably is. Fakes can use real packaging and the fake cigars can look very good. He might even pop a real cigar in for you to smoke to offload the the other 19 fakes. People get mugged in broad daylight as well.

In conclusion i wouldn't touch it with your barge pole lol. Plus ebay shouldn't be selling cigars.

P.S. i have a cousin twice removed who lives in cuba and has sent me the one and only box ever produced of original cuban cigars, now with 50% off and a few cutter, wanna buy?? They have a hologram of mickey mouse and everythink

[Deano]

Almost beyond all doubt these are fakes.

That story is the most clich?d in cigar lore, and has been dished out umpteen billion times before.

Do not buy. Period.

[Smallclub]

he claims to have a brother in Cuba who works at La Corona factory, who sends him a few boxes a month.

What a joke… The price of a box of Cohiba Robustos, in Cuba, is the equivalent of at least one year's salary of a factory worker…

Don't buy!

[monkey66]

Why take the chance. even meeting up without an expert eye it can be very hard to tell the difference.

Aparrently there are more fakes than real CoRo's in circulation.

IMHO Don't do it, you will always have doubt. Too many good smokes to enjoy without risking your money.

[Coop]

I would always buy from a source that you can trust. Too risky meeting up with someone, especially if they think you have money in your pockets!!!

[captain duff]

Apart from fakes you also don't know how well they have been stored (even assuming they are genuine), which can be a big factor.

That said, I have brought a stick or two via the bay, mostly with good results. I would never normally go down those cuban box routes though (did get a absolutely genuine box of 25 hoyo du maires a while back for a real steal of a price) - but you do occasionally see some decent non-cuban bargains that are not fakes, and so far as these go I've had some great nc smokes recently at ?2 a (big churchill sized) stick, so a bargain in my book. But it is all luck I guess, so buyer beware and all that...

PS, far better if you want some genuine cuban bargains is to look at the for sale section on this site

[nev coss]

don't even think about buying them, everyone who sells on ebay has "someone who works in the factory", even if they are with sales receipts they will be fakes, as they buy a genuine box get the sales slip and then buy a box off the street and sell the street cigars as genuine, typical tourist trick, even worse is the tobacco will be untreated so beetle infestation is typical of fake cigars, you would not want to put them in with your other cigars

[daverave999]

For that kind of money I'd want to be 100% sure, and you won't be if you're buying from ebay. They may be real, they may be fake. Up to you, but I wouldn't.

[Burner]

Interesting that Ebay doesn't allow sale of cigars but will allow uopened packaging to be sold where it is worth more than the contents. I think all they're trying to do is get round the minimum age requirement causing them problems. On the Cohibas - As soon as someone says "I have a friend who knows someone" it's a fake LOL

[davidruddell]

Sincere Thanks to all, good advice!

Ta very muchly all,

As I said in my initial post I was very sceptical of the whole thing.
Guess I needed a Jiminy Cricket voice of common sense to talk me down from my false optimism.

Smoked a lovely non Cuban this evening at another bloody wedding reception (gifted by a fellow fed up husband, avoiding the disco) Oliva Serie V - Double Robusto, blimey very nice.

May a few singles of these this week, any other suggestions for good NC's?

Thanks again

David R

[EugeneSax]

I once arranged to meet up with someone who had Co Ro's for sale on Ebay. He worked in the cigarette industry & regularly visited Cuba on business, claiming to get genuine sticks from his local contacts in the industry. Only problem was they were definitely fakes - they had the then new gold-embossed bands in a box dated, I think Feb 03. I had (still have) 2 boxes of Cohibas dated May 03, Sig IV's with old bands & Robustos with new bands which were only introduced that month. He also had some Monte 4's which he didn't even try to pass off to me as genuine.

It wasn't a wasted meeting though as he had some Cuban country cigars which I bought - cheap as chips, but delicious & what he brought back for his own consumption. He promised he'd contact me again after his next trip & would bring extra back for me but I never heard from him again.

The meeting almost had an interesting twist: We agreed to meet one Thursday when he'd be up this way on business & that a good meeting place would be a pub close to a mutually convenient junction of the M25. Having been brought up in the area I was vaguely aware of a pub nearby & Googled it to check it was still open & get a link to a Google map to send the chap & remind myself. I found the necessary information on the first page of search results, copied & pasted the map link on to an email, and then purely out of curiosity, looked at the second page of search results. There, first item was headlined something along the lines:

"Thursday is Gay Day at the Hautboy Inn".

Needles to say I managed to find an alternative venue to meet this stranger.

By the way - welcome to the forum, David. If you hang around long enough you are sure to learn much to enhance your smoking pleasure, and possibly even meet up with some of the fair few of us who regularly herf in & around the big smoke.

[Habana-Habanos]

Ouch eugene.

[captain duff]

May a few singles of these this week, any other suggestions for good NC's?

Well if you are looking for very reasonably priced non-cuban hand-rolleds available in the UK then you could try the Chinchalero range. Lots of different sizes starting at ?1.65 a stick for the chicos.

Not far off in very good value terms are the La Rica (Nicaraguan) and La Invicta (both Nicuraguuan and Honduran versions). You won't get legitimate cuban anywhere near the prices that these sell for unless they are machine mades - although of course it would be argued (quite rightly) that they not as good as a quality cuban hand rolled, so it all depends on your budget constraints really.

If you want to compare a NC to a Cuban in terms of good quality (but slightly cheaper) smokes then you should definately try a Padilla - the Miami Churchill is particularly good at around ?11 a stick.

Finally, if you want some great value dominican hand-rolleds then look on the for sale section of this site as son of cigar smoke was selling a load of Thompson varieties for bargain basement prices recently. Thompson are a decent budget US brand, they tend to be very mild compared to a cuban, but then again they are very cheap so you pays yer money etc...