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These articles are presented here thanks to Anwer Ali Khan
Cigar Box
Cigars were originally sold in
bundles covered with pigs' bladders (with a pod of
vanilla to improve the smell); then came the use
of large chests, holding up to10,000 cigars. But
in 1830, the banking firm of H.Upmann started
shipping back cigars, for the use of its directors
in London, in sealed cedar boxes stamped with the
bank's emblem. When the bank decided to go,
full-scale, into the cigar business, the cedar box
took off as a form of packaging for all the major
Havana brands, and all hand made cigars (though
small quantities today are sometimes packages in
cardboard cartons, and single cigars of many
brands come in aluminum tubes lined with cedar).
Cedar helps to prevent cigars from drying out and
furthers the maturing process.
The idea of using colorful
lithographic labels, now used for all handmade
brands, wherever they come from, started when
Ramon Allones, a Galician immigrant to Cuba,
initiated it for the brand he started in 1837. As
the industry grew in the mid-19th century, so did
the need for clear brand identification. Labels or
other illustrations also appear on the inside of
the lids of many Havana and other brands. Boxes
also usually have colorful decorative borders. The
cedar box is sometimes referred to as a boite
nature. Paper, usually colored, is normally glued
to the interior of the box and is used to cover
the cigars it contains. Finally, after being
filled and checked, the box is nailed shut and
tightly sealed with a green and white label (a
custom dating from 1912) to guarantee that the
cigars are genuine Havanas. The practice of using
labels, usually printed in similar colors and with
similar wording, to seal the box continues today
for most handmade brands, Cuban or not.
The form of packaging called
8-9-8 is used for some cigars in the Partagas and
Ramon Allones brands. These boxes are polished,
have curved edges, and contain 25 cigars, arranged
in three layers with eight at the bottom, nine in
the middle and eight on the top. Cigars with this
sort of packaging are relatively expensive.
Hecho en Cuba has been stamped on
the underside of Cuban boxes since 1961, when it
replaced the English inscription "Made in
Havana--Cuba." Since 1985, they have also carried
a factory code and Cubatabaco's logo, the latter
being replaced with Habanos SA from late 1994. In
1989 the words "Totalmente a Mano" were added.
Meaning "totally by Hand," they provide the only
cast-iron clue that the cigars are genuinely
handmade in the traditional Cuban manner. The
factory code, on Havana cigars, is stamped in
blue--using post revolutionary factory
designations. Thus, for instance:
JM stands for Jose Marti,
formerly H. Upmann.
FPG stands for Francisco Perez
German, formerly Partagas.
BM stands for Briones Montoto,
formerly Romeo Y Julieta.
FR stands fro Fernando Roig,
formerly La Corona.
EL stands for El Laguito.
HM stands for Heroes del Moncada,
formerly El Rey del Mundo
Havana boxes also used to be
stamped with the color of the cigars contained in
them, but this practice has stopped, for the time
being at least. Boxes, in the past, often read
"claro," but this color classification was
frequently inaccurate.
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