Habanos S.A. is ready to debut its new release strictly designated for La Casa del Habano stores and Habanos Specialists on October 4 during an event in Sofia, Bulgaria. The San Cristóbal de la Habana Prado featured at the event is the revealing for the cigar that was announced at the Festival del Habano in February.
The Prado will be sold in 10-count boxes, exclusively for Casas del Habano outlets and Habanos Specialists. The cigar is a 5X50 petit piramídes vitola that people continued to seek since it premiered on a leaked list of new releases that emerged last November. The list was confirmed by a representative of Habanos S.A. and the cigar was officially shown off in late February. There are nearly 144 Casas and Cigar Aficionado says, the company produces cigars each year that are made especially for those shops. The size of the cigar is used within a number of Edición Regional releases, though its best known for appearing as the Partagás Serie P No.1, released in 2010 and featured in black ceramic jars.
The Habanos Specialists is a project that begun in 2011 but isn’t known as well as the La Casa del Habanos stores. Habanos Specialists designate cigar retailers who are not required to meet the stringent space requirements of a La Casa del Habano. Typical requirements that Habanos Specialists do not need to meet include exclusively carrying Cuban cigars. There are 930 Habanos Specialists around the world as of February while there are just under 150 La Casa del Habano stores.
San Cristobal de la Habana is still relatively new in the Cuban cigar portfolio, which started business back in 1999. The Prado became the fifth cigar that was released as a cigar for Habanos Specialists, joining the San Cristóbal Torreon in 2012, the H. Upmann Connoisseur A in 2013, the Punch Punch 48 from 2016 and the H. Upmann Connossieur B, released in 2017.
The event in which the Prado will debut is being hosted by Kaliman Caribe who is the exclusive distributor for Habanos S.A. products in Bulgaria. He is also an exclusive distributor in other locations such as Albania, Armenia, the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM), the Republic of Serbia, Montenegro, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Eslovenia and Romania.
Although there is the announcement of an official launch, there is no timetable for when the cigar will begin to appear in other parts of the world according to HalfWheel. It is uncertain when there will even be a full release in Bulgaria, as launch events don’t always announce if the cigar is ready to make a full appearance at retail.
Aside from the Prado release date, the Hoyo de Monterrey Escogido, a parejo measuring 7 inches long by 49 ring, was also announced at the Festival as a Casa del Habano exclusive. Although to date, the cigar has not appeared in the marketplace.
