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My girlfriend phoned me up a couple of weeks back to say that a friend of hers had been visited by some relatives who live in Cuba and that they had given her some cigars to try and sell. A familiar sounding story and all the alarm bells started ringing straight away but I have to admit that my pulse did quicken a little at the thought of the slim chance of me grabbing some top class smokes from someone who doesn't know their market value. The friend dropped them off to my girlfriend and I had her describe them over the phone and straight away my excitement doubled but my suspicions quadrupled as it would seem that she was staring at 2 x 25 boxes of Cohiba maduro 5 Genios 
Oooh, the things I could do with 50 of those at bargain bucket prices 
Later that evening, I had her bring them over and I looked forward to making a direct comparison with the 10 box that I had in my humi.Here's what I found......
Right off the bat my heart sank as the cardboard outer boxes were ultra flimsy and had no seals or factory code/date on them. The presentation boxes themselves had a woodgrain finish rather than the smooth lacquered one of the originals and the printing was definitely not as crisp. The clasp of the case whilst being of a similar style to the originals had an awful blobby cohiba logo on it that was barely legible. Once open, the shoddy construction of the case itself was there for all to see with uneven and unfinished edges aplenty and there was even the obligatory diagonal rather than half moon shaped cut on the corner of the cedar inlay....one thing I will say is that it gave me a timely reminder of just how well made and nicely finished some of our cigar boxes actually are.
The sticks themselves didn't actually look too bad. They were well rolled, they were all the same length and width and the wrapper was a fairly nice dark colour. The bands were fairly well printed with gold lettering and nice sharp edges. A direct comparison with a kosher stick shows that the band suffers from all the usual fake flaws though, a lack of raised gold lettering, a slightly orange hue to the yellow background, incorrect number of white squares and subtle differences to the 'Habana, Cuba' font. The final test of comparison was aroma and the fake's half decent looks were totally belied by it's smell or more appropriately its lack of, the real Maduro 5 has a lovely rich aroma with sweet chocolatey notes and the imposter had very little smell to speak of other than that of a regular production cigarette.
Ooh, one little last minute find was that some kind soul had tucked some fake warranty and habanos stickers in the bottom of the box so that they could be applied at will by a counterfeiter wishing to up his game.
All in all it was an interesting experience to see these fauxhiba's up close but I've still got that little twinge of disappointment that I don't currently have 50 bargain Genios's in my humi.
Oooh, the things I could do with 50 of those at bargain bucket prices Later that evening, I had her bring them over and I looked forward to making a direct comparison with the 10 box that I had in my humi.Here's what I found......Right off the bat my heart sank as the cardboard outer boxes were ultra flimsy and had no seals or factory code/date on them. The presentation boxes themselves had a woodgrain finish rather than the smooth lacquered one of the originals and the printing was definitely not as crisp. The clasp of the case whilst being of a similar style to the originals had an awful blobby cohiba logo on it that was barely legible. Once open, the shoddy construction of the case itself was there for all to see with uneven and unfinished edges aplenty and there was even the obligatory diagonal rather than half moon shaped cut on the corner of the cedar inlay....one thing I will say is that it gave me a timely reminder of just how well made and nicely finished some of our cigar boxes actually are.
The sticks themselves didn't actually look too bad. They were well rolled, they were all the same length and width and the wrapper was a fairly nice dark colour. The bands were fairly well printed with gold lettering and nice sharp edges. A direct comparison with a kosher stick shows that the band suffers from all the usual fake flaws though, a lack of raised gold lettering, a slightly orange hue to the yellow background, incorrect number of white squares and subtle differences to the 'Habana, Cuba' font. The final test of comparison was aroma and the fake's half decent looks were totally belied by it's smell or more appropriately its lack of, the real Maduro 5 has a lovely rich aroma with sweet chocolatey notes and the imposter had very little smell to speak of other than that of a regular production cigarette.
Ooh, one little last minute find was that some kind soul had tucked some fake warranty and habanos stickers in the bottom of the box so that they could be applied at will by a counterfeiter wishing to up his game.
All in all it was an interesting experience to see these fauxhiba's up close but I've still got that little twinge of disappointment that I don't currently have 50 bargain Genios's in my humi.
Makes you think
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