illinichaser wrote:You're actually supporting Victor here, and I think Victor is right. You may be able to buy old inventory of the Gurkha, or la perla, while there is a very different cigar being sold now ( new inventory) that CI/CBID hold the rights on and hold the rights on the label.
But no way are cigar manufactures maintaining 2 separate supply chains with 2 different cigars under the same label. That would be impossible to manage.
Basically, it's similar to putting a Cadillac badge on a tarted up Chevy Cavalier and calling it a Cimarron.
Some cigar makers go to lengths to ensure consistency of their cigars year after year and have the supplies of tobacco to produce that consistent product for years. Others either don't have the supply or the blending practices to ensure a consistent product in the long term. If the cigar that results from having to integrate a different wrapper, binder, or filler due to exhausting the supply of the original tobacco, is substantially different than the original, it's disingenuous of the manufacturer to continue to use the original name and ratings and try and pass it off as the same thing. There's certainly a large grey area in this whole issue as it's subjective as to what degree of change in the product crosses the ethical line. It doesn't take too long for the consumer to figure out if a cigar that used to be a higher quality product has gone to the dogs and start avoiding it.
The consumer just has to view all marketing material and product descriptions as suspect puffery, and even so, every once in a while will get burned. As an example I bought some "La Sirena's" puffed as DPG product, and although that might be the case, these were the worst crap that DPG ever produced. Ok, fool me once....
I know the cigars I like and I experiment a lot less than I used to. If I get a couple of batches of a favorite that seem to have gone to the dogs, it gets 86'd from my playlist.
All of the above said, having bought many of my favorites in both B&M's and on line, I generally don't find a difference in blends/quality from either source, this goes for LAdC's, My Father's, Flor De Antilles, and a whole bunch of others. One thing I will say in favor of the product I've received from Cbid, CI and other online sources is that the storage conditions in the on line retailer's warehouses are more consistent than you will find between various B&M sources and also, the physical condition of the product in general seems much better as they don't have walkin customers pawing over the product.
All in all, I am very satisfied with the product I've purchased on line over the last 10 years and every once in a while it takes walking into a B&M to see that the same cigar you're buying for $3-5 per stick really is being sold for 2X-3X that price and appreciate the value of the on line sources. If, every once in a while, I make a mistake and believe some marketing hype that's incorrect and get a dog rocket, well, I'm still way ahead monetarily of where I'd have been buying solely at B&M's.