Padilla Restructures Entire Brand Portfolio

Source from:  Cigar Aficionado 06/04/2012

Boutique brand maker Ernesto Padilla made a pivotal decision last November-he stopped production of his signature lines. The Padilla Miami, 1932, Dominus and Artemis, cigars that put his company on the map, have all been cancelled. Padilla discontinued them quietly and has since been restructuring his entire company portfolio. Today, Padilla is looking for a fresh start, and he's preparing to introduce three new cigar lines this summer at the International Premium Cigar & Pipe Retailers trade show in Orlando, Florida. "The other cigars were becoming too discounted in the catalogs," Padilla explained in an interview about his decision. "I wanted to be a true boutique brand, and this wasn't the direction for Padilla to go in." The four brands had last been rolled in Honduras at the Fabrica de Tabacos Raices Cubanas S. de R.L. factory, and made only with tobacco grown by agricultural conglomerate Aganorsa S.A. But Padilla's change of direction lead him to two new factories. El Titan de Bronze, a quaint Miami operation, will be producing the new Padilla Miami 8&11 Maduro and the Padilla Invictus. For a larger scale, regular-production line, Padilla has turned to Tabacalera Oliva S.A. (makers of Oliva Serie V and Serie G cigars) to roll Padilla Reserva, a Nicaraguan cigar that will come in both Ecuadoran Habano and Maduro varieties. After his positive experience with the Padilla Studio Tobac Figurado, which is also made by Oliva and scored 93 points in Cigar Aficionado, Padilla enlisted Oliva for the new Reserva line. In a further development, Oliva is set to distribute the Padilla brand in Europe. The Padilla Premier Cru is a three-size line made exclusively for the European market and will consist of Nicaraguan tobacco and an Ecuadoran Habano seed wrapper. Distribution is scheduled to start in September. For more in-depth information on the new blends, brands and the future of Padilla cigars, see the next issue of Cigar Insider, published next Tuesday.Enditem