With the latest release from revered Cuban brand Trinidad breaking the ‘$1,000 a stick’
threshold, Havana cigars are entering a new era.
Egregiously postponed Cuban cigar releases — one prays for mere months, though the delay typically spans a year or two — have become customary for Havanaphiles, those who puff and collect Havana cigars exclusively.
Delays are now so common that it’s fair to wonder if it’s all mastermind marketing, designed to drive consumer fervor. Or is it, as many Dominican and Nicaraguan cigarmakers claim, due to a lack of skilled torcedores (cigar rollers) and a dearth of the dark, rich, oily tobaccos grown in western Cuba’s Pinar del Río province? Perhaps both. No one knows for sure, and the Cubans remain taciturn.
Yet this perpetual tardiness is why I’m writing today about a cigar announced in 2021, first displayed publicly in 2024 — at the annual Festival del Habano — but only recently released. A triple-banded Trinidad Fundadores 55th Anniversary puro (said to have been aged fully rolled for a decade) housed in an ST Dupont humidor, this is an unprecedented offering, and its price is a record $1,150 per cigar.
Although cigars have traded hands privately and at auction for more than $1,000 a stick, no new release has ever done so before. It was, truthfully, only a matter of time, given the race to the four-figure threshold run by Habanos SA (the Cuban concern) and Swiss luxury tobacco company Davidoff.
Trinidad is a marca (brand) that became publicly available only at the end of the 20th century; it had long been offered as a diplomatic gift for foreign dignitaries visiting Cuba. It was created in 1969; teasingly auctioned to a select few carriagetrade collectors at the now-mythical Dinner of the Century, a 1994 charitable benefit held at Laurent, a Parisian temple of haute cuisine; and commercially launched three-and-a-half years later.
Prior to this latest version of the venerable Trinidad Fundadores, the only conventional cigars that approached $1,000 were the Davidoff Oro Blanco Special Reserve 111 Years and the Cohiba Behike 56. In the end, though, there can be only one first past the four-figure post — enter la Trinidad 55.
Is any cigar truly worth a thousand dollars? I’ve personally paid that sum for a stick before — not happily, but while overcome with a bad case of auction fever. To answer the question, let’s turn to the world of tequila for a second. There’s a saying in Mexico: “Un tequila de más de $100 es solo para gringos.” Roughly, “Only gringos buy a bottle of tequila that costs over $100.”
It’s the greater-fool theory in action: something is worth whatever someone is willing to pay. With Trinidad, you’re not just purchasing a cigar but also bragging rights. The perceptible difference between a $50 cigar and a $100 cigar is slim; the difference between a $100 and $1,000 cigar is more negligible still. Unlike a single-malt whisky, aged for decades, or a wristwatch with complications, your $1,000 cigar is still just well-aged, hand-rolled tobacco leaves, albeit in a fancy box.
Over the past decade, Habanos has been able to position Havanas in the same luxury-goods stratum as Hermès Birkin bags, Patek Philippe watches and Louis XIII cognacs. This is no small feat, and the bold Trinidad 55th Anniversary ‘haute humidors’ — each of the 1,000 numbered limited-edition ST Duponts comes filled with 55 of the well-aged cigars — are an audacious example.
