There’s a conversation happening in the cigar world right now that most people are dancing around, and on Episode 039 of Smoke and Steel, we went straight at it. With Cuba facing rolling blackouts, a crippled infrastructure, and a fuel supply that’s been essentially cut off, the question on the table is a simple one with a complicated answer: will the Cuba crisis affect cigar prices – and not just Cubans, but everything in your humidor? We got into it from every angle. But that wasn’t all. We also had some things to say about Crown Heads Thunderkiss first batch versus second batch, cigar of the month clubs, humidor builds, and a green cigar smoked in the spirit of St. Patrick’s Day.

The Cuba Situation and What It Could Mean for Your Humidor

Venezuela was supplying Cuba with all of their fuel. That fuel powered their electrical grid. When the US moved against Maduro and those oil shipments stopped, Cuba went dark – and we’re not being dramatic. We’re talking close to three months without supply, near-constant blackouts, and an infrastructure that was already held together with tape finally starting to give out completely.

The Trump administration has made it clear that any country thinking about stepping in to help Cuba with fuel is going to get hit with tariffs. So nobody’s riding to the rescue right now.

Here’s where it gets interesting for us as cigar smokers. No fuel means factories slow down or stop. It means fields don’t get worked the way they need to be. It means product that was supposed to ship might not. Cuban cigar production was already inconsistent – add an energy crisis on top of that and you’ve got a recipe for supply problems that are going to ripple outward.

If Cuban Supply Drops, What Happens to Everything Else?

We’ve seen this movie before with bourbon. Remember when craft whiskey took off and suddenly your everyday bottle wasn’t on the shelf anymore? The same thing could happen here. If Cuban smokers around the world – and there are a lot of them, especially in Europe – can’t get what they want, they’re going to go looking. And what they find might be sitting right next to what you’ve been buying.

Black Label Trading Company has been working hard to break into the European market. Brands like Padron, Avowed, and others that we love are going to start looking a lot more attractive to people who never gave them a second thought because they were perfectly happy with their Cohibas. That increased demand has to go somewhere, and it’s going to push prices up across the board.

There’s also the flip side. If relations normalize and Cuba eventually comes back online and opens up to American consumers, the demand is going to be absolutely insane. They won’t be able to meet supply on day one, day thirty, or probably day three hundred. So even in the best-case scenario for Cuba, prices spike. There’s no version of this where things get cheaper.

We also talked about what happens to boutique brands that have built their business around hand-selecting retailers and keeping things tight. Do they expand to chase a global opportunity, or do they stay put, protect what they’ve built, and let someone else deal with the headache of international shipping regulations and tariffs? That’s a real decision guys like Mo at Patina are going to have to think about.

What We Think Happens Next

Our read is that some smokers who lose access to Cubans are going to find something else they love and never go back. That’s good for the brands we already support. But it also means more competition for cigars that are already hard to find, more pre-sales before product even lands, and more moments like the ones we’ve had with the Thunderkiss – where something great shows up, sells out immediately, and by the time you hear about it, it’s gone.

Crown Heads Thunderkiss: First Batch vs. Second Batch

Speaking of which. We’ve been going back and forth on the Crown Heads Thunderkiss for a couple episodes now, and this week we finally put it plainly. The first batch was a flat-out steal at $6.75 a stick. We were telling anyone who would listen that we stole those cigars. Bold, vibrant, way more cigar than the price suggested.

The second batch landed and something is different. Construction is fine, burns well, no issues there. But that big flavor that made the first batch so exciting just isn’t showing up the same way. Our best guess is that the first batch had a little more age on it before it went out the door. The thing caught fire after an appearance on the Creekside podcast and the demand went from zero to overwhelming overnight. It’s not hard to imagine they had to move product faster than they planned.

The game plan for now is to bury the remaining sticks in the bottom of the humidor for a few months and see if they come around. At $6.75 a stick they’re still a fair smoke – they’re just not the knockout the first batch was. If you’ve got some, our advice is to be patient with them.

Crown Heads Blood Medicine B+ Expanding

Also on the Crown Heads front, we got a press release from their VP about the Blood Medicine B+ expanding beyond the original Toro. Three new vitolas coming: a 5×52 at $11.50, a 5.5×56 at $12.50, and a 6×54 at $13.50. Only 800 boxes of each at 21 count. If you haven’t had the B+, it’s worth tracking down. And if you can find the Creek Side exclusive Bear Run – same blend, exclusive size – that one was even better.

What We’re Smoking: West Tampa, Avowed, and a Green Cigar for St. Paddy’s Day

Walter opened with the West Tampa Tobacco Co. Maduro, part of Rick Rodriguez’s line – the same Rick Rodriguez who used to be at CAO Cigars. The West Tampa lineup (Black, White, and Maduro) has been impressing us across the board. Keep an eye on Cigar Page if you want to grab some without paying full retail – they blow it out periodically.

Eric was into an Avowed Cigar, picked up through Small Batch along with a sampler that also landed him a spot in their cigar of the month club. The Avowed he was smoking was the 1126, part of a sampler that ran just over $100 for six cigars at roughly $18-20 a stick. Solid value.

And then there was the Cavalier Caethair – a candela, smoked in honor of St. Patrick’s Day. None of us are big candela guys, but it held its own. We’ve had worse. The bar for a candela around here is basically “did you pitch it or not,” and this one made it to the finish line.

We also had a brief moment of silence for the LFD Suave, which two of us have now tried and both ended up pitching. Constant canoeing, wouldn’t stay lit, relighting it every few minutes. Hopefully it was just a couple of flukes because others have been just fine.

Cigar of the Month Clubs, Humidor Builds, and the Joy of Trying New Things

A big theme this episode was how we’ve all drifted away from walking into shops and getting recommendations. When we had a local spot, that was how we found new cigars – you’d walk in, say “what’s new,” and come out with something you’d never have picked yourself. Without that, a lot of us defaulted to buying boxes of what we already know we like.

The cigar of the month clubs – Small Batch and LA Cigar Collective – have been filling that gap. You get cigars you didn’t pick, some of them things you’ll never find anywhere else, and occasionally you fall in love with something new. The downside is that some of those exclusives are genuinely one-and-done. You might smoke one, love it, and never be able to get it again.

On the humidor side, we got into the DIY route – converting gun cabinets, dentist office cases, and flea market finds into functioning humidors by lining them with Spanish cedar. The cedar itself is the expensive part and you’ll need to order it from a specialty supplier. Everything else is just time and patience. It works. We know because we’ve done it.

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