Heres a closer look.

The bands look good from here.

Note to self: Be careful trading ISOM's with "Frank's friend"

LOL. Honestly, he's just a college buddy who was all excited that he got a box of "Real" cubans and wanted me to check them out knowing I'm so into it. Believe me, it was the hardest thing to tell him that they were fake, not so much that I felt bad for him, but that I felt bad for the owner and what my buddy's gonna do to him if the guy doesn't refund his money when he goes back. LOL.

That "silk" ribbon looks real bad. I'll try to post some pictures of the real thing.

The bands are dead nuts and we actually smoked one each at the casino this weekend and I was almost convinced it was real but a couple of other things came up that didn't jive. First the ribbon used around the cigars is a brighter yellow as oppossed to gold which every other ribbon I have is as well as the writing on the ribbon which is faded. On all my other ribbons, Cohibas, HDM's, BBF's, etc... all have clean dark lettering. The last thing was the Habanos sticker in the upper right hand corner. The real ones are a shrink wrap sticker that feels almost like the Priority Mail Tape they use at the post office. The one used on his box was a thick sticker that was easy to peel back. I just bought 4 898's myself as part of a combo box from Trevor and putting one of those next to his, if it wasn't for the box errors, I never would have been able to tell the difference.

fpaternostro,

I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but... Trevor sells fakes too.

Michael

gscale -I'd be curious to hear what occured that you've heard about him. I've been on almost every forum at one point or another and he's a recommended retailer at every one including one of c-weeklys most reputable on-line dealers. Doesn't mean it didn't happen. E-mail me at [email protected] with the particulars if you can, I'd love to here what happened. Appreciate it.

According to some everyone online sells fakes. I haven't ordered any from him but I have heard from VERY knowledgeable people that this is not the case. Is this just hearsay or did he sell you fakes? If so, what did he sell you that were not legit? I understand if you don’t want to go into details on this on a public forum. Feel free to e-mail me at [email protected].

I have never heard anything like that about Trevor as well.

G-scale-maybe there was an incident you heard of, but he's one of the most reputable guys out there and I'll give you an example why. When you place an order with him, he never charges your card till you e-mail him that the products have been recieved and your satisfied with them. I have ordered a lot from him in the last few months and on one occassion the cabinet box of BBF's I got had a few cigars that the tips had been slightly split. Now the box had never been opened so its impossible for him to know about it. I actually e-mailed him a pic with the few cigars in question and after I thought about it, I was even being a little to picky on a couple of them. LOL. Anyhow, he immediatly figured out a new amount minus the cigars in question and told me that next time the pic. is not even necessarry, just let him know and he'd fix it. Now thats great service. Also, after checking again, he's not only listed on c-weeklys site as one of the most reputable on-line retailers, he's actually one of the sponsers. C-Weekly is an international on-line cigar magazine and they would never have someone advertising on thier site if they had questionable practices.

I'd be shocked if Trevor had fakes. I've recently ordered a lot of stuff from him and it was some of the most top notch stuff I've ever seen. And the service you get from him...WOW! Makes the shipping cost worth it.

I too would love to know what you got that was fake from him.

Trevor is a top notch retailer. However, I adamantly disagree with the following statement, "C-Weekly is an international on-line cigar magazine and they would never have someone advertising on their site if they had questionable practices." I will gladly take this offline and discuss via e-mail. [email protected]

C-Weekly is an international on-line cigar magazine and they would never have someone advertising on thier site if they had questionable practices.

they do have questionable advertisers.

You know what Buck, I need to rephrase that. I know money talks and maybe they would turn a blind eye to that sort of thing, but the point I was trying to make is there is an international on-line forum on there with some pretty savvy guys like Aizzudin of mycigarblog.com who use and recommend Trevor and thats what prompted me to start using him, not the site itself.

Sorry for being a little sensitive about the "advertisers" on that site. I've just personally been burned by two (e-mail me and I'll give you the details). Yes, Aizzudin is someone who you can trust to give you straight up honest advice.

fpaternostro and Buckwheat,

Sorry it took so long, I'm pretty busy today. E-mails sent.

Michael

gscale129, great and troubling information. Thanks for the very detailed response. I'm going to talk to my source in Australia and see what illumination that he can provide.