If you really enjoy savouring the taste and aroma of a really good cigar; but believe that, since the embargo on Cuban goods, you can no longer indulge in such a luxury; keep your eyes and ears open for anyone offering Cohiba Cigars For Sale. Maybe you have enough cigar knowledge to respond along the lines of – “hold it right there buddy; Cuban cigars are illegal here in the States and I am going to report you to the authorities” – and you would be both correct and in error at the same time.
This is because there are two very distinct types of Cohiba Cigars For Sale; one of them is very much a product of Castro’s Cuban revolution and, as such, cannot be sold or advertised in the USA (under the terms of the embargo). The other may well be identical in appearance, taste and aroma but it has absolutely no connection with Cuba (other than a shared brand name).
This latter cigar can be openly sold here in the States by an American company called The General Cigar Company whose Cohiba cigars are produced from tobaccos grown in Nicaragua, the Dominican Republic and Honduras; where tobacco plantations were established by owners of Cuban tobacco farms fleeing their home country after the Revolution and as their lands and factories were being nationalized. Some took Cuban tobacco seedlings with them and sought out foreign lands where the geography, geology and climate were near identical to Cuba’s and where they could duplicate the cigar quality that they were producing before the Revolution. Because of their long involvement with the cigar industry and their depth of cigar knowledge; most of these émigrés were successful in their new homes.
However, there remained the problem of brand identity. After nationalizing the production of cigars, the Cuban Government set up a company called Habanos SA to handle the worldwide marketing of Cuban cigars tesco. Naturally, Habanos applied for trademark protection on all the old pre-revolutionary brand names and they obtained this nearly everywhere; apart from the United States. Maybe they would have won in the US also; had it not been for the introduction of the Cuban trade embargo by the United States on 19 October 1960 (almost two years after Castro came to power).
Not only did the embargo stop Cuban Cohiba cigars competing with the Cohiba Cigars For Sale from The General Cigar Company; it also refused Cuba’s request for copyright protection on the brand name. Hence, the American Cohiba cigars are perfectly legal here (while the Cuban ones are totally illegal).