Smokers’ Hot Fad--Cuban Cigars--Lights Up Customs Service

NEW YORK — Partagas. Cohiba. Montecristo. Bolivar. Punch.

For aficionados, the mere names of Havana cigars conjure fantasies of the ultimate smoke, produced in a country that has transformed tobacco from a crop to a cult and the technique of hand-rolling from a skill to an art.

But more and more cigar smokers are not content to merely imagine the delights of a Cuban Cohiba, which can fetch as much as $50. U.S. Customs Service inspectors seized a record number of Cuban cigars in fiscal 1996--valued at more than $1.1 million--with more than half of those seizures at New York’s John F. Kennedy Airport. And officials predict that the number will rise an estimated 15% to 20% this year.

“Interest will continue to rise,” said Darryl Nitke, publisher of Cigarshop.com., a New York City-based Internet site devoted to cigars. “First, because of the flavor. And second, because of the intrigue and status of smoking a Cuban cigar.”

Just a few days ago in the office at JFK Airport, where Customs Service officials register and store all confiscated contraband brought in by passengers until the items are disposed of or destroyed, Senior Inspector Phoebe Hernandez logged in two boxes holding 25 cigars each from a passenger who had arrived from Singapore hours earlier.

Customs inspectors confiscated goods from travelers entering the United States at JFK 17 times during the first six days of this month, and on 14 occasions the contraband was boxes of Cuban cigars. There are no direct commercial flights between the United States and Cuba, so passengers fly in from other countries, such as Britain, Mexico and Canada, where the cigars are legal.

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Generally, travelers will try to bring in a box or two at a time, but inspectors seized 10 boxes of cigars Aug. 2 from a Los Altos, Calif., man, and, two days later, twice as many from a man who gave a New York City address. Neither was fined because there are no penalties for smuggling cigars through the passenger service area, other than forfeiting the expensive smokes.

“About half the time, the people tell us they have them,” said George J. Burns, a customs passenger service representative.

“They’re trying to be honest for the right reasons. Then you have individuals with a stash in their bags who try to hide them in various ways.”

Usually, would-be smugglers go for a false bottom in a suitcase. But one customs official told of a man who came through the customs area at JFK with two suitcases--one small carry-on, which contained his clothes, and a huge canvas-sided bag packed to the brim with boxes of Habanos.

President Kennedy enjoyed a Havana cigar as much as the next connoisseur, but he still imposed the Cuban trade embargo in 1963 in an attempt to crush the regime of Fidel Castro.

The embargo permits only “persons returning directly from Cuba after a licensed visit there . . . to bring Cuban cigars into the United States, provided the domestic value of such cigars does not exceed 100 U.S. dollars and the cigars are for that person’s personal use and not for resale,” wrote R. Richard Newcomb, director of the U.S. Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control, in a letter last year to members of the Retail Tobacco Dealers of America.

Any other imports of Cuban cigars are illegal, the letter continued, including those bought in third countries and brought into the United States. Americans are prohibited from buying, selling, trading and giving away illegally imported Cuban cigars, Newcomb wrote. If caught, in addition to losing the cigars to authorities, Americans risk civil fines of up to $50,000 per violation and in some cases criminal prosecution and imprisonment.

But that hasn’t stopped some cigar shop owners from selling what they claim to be Cuban cigars to preferred customers. Just as the number of legitimate Cuban cigars finding their way into the United States is rising, so is the number of fakes.

And just because a cigar comes from Havana doesn’t mean it’s a good smoke. A cigar store owner on Long Island who asked not to be named said he stopped offering Cuban cigars to his customers several months ago.

“There was the problem with the quality of the cigars and the problem of getting them” into the country, said the owner. “There’s a few shops on Long Island that sell hundreds of boxes a week. The deterrent for me was the quality of the cigars. My reputation is on the line.”

The embargo was tightened last year by President Clinton after the Cuban military shot down two unarmed civilian planes carrying four Cuban-Americans looking for people who may have escaped the island nation on rafts. Even so, cigar aficionados claim that today, there are 10 times more Cuban cigars available in the United States than there were five years ago.

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Prices have skyrocketed. A Cohiba Churchill, for example, may command $50. At that price, an American authorized to visit Cuba could bring home only two--legally.

“Cigar smoking is as big as ever, and people want what they can’t have,” said Don Castaldo, sommelier at Manhattan’s San Domenico restaurant, which sells cigars and allows customers to smoke them in the bar. “Some people--retailers--will get a line on Cuban cigars and will sell them only to their best customers. Right now, good legal cigars are hard to get.”

San Domenico sells no Cuban cigars but does not stop customers from firing up what they claim to be a Havana. And there are plenty of fakes on the market.

While the market is full of cigars bearing bands and protected in boxes labeled as though they’re from Cuba, there are plenty of Cuban cigars coming into the United States without bands and in boxes manufactured in Honduras.

At least two London tobacconists regularly ship Cuban cigars via air to American customers using this dodge. One Canadian tobacconist will also ship Cuban cigars to U.S. customers.

While more cigars are going up in smoke and more Cuban cigars fall into the hands of customs officials, manufacturers in Cuba plan to step up production to keep up with worldwide demand. Cohiba alone produced 4 million cigars in Cuba last year and plans to expand production by 50% soon, according to a recent article in Cigar Aficionado magazine.

While the coveted Habanos bring hard currency to Cuba, to the Customs Service they’re “a big annoyance,” said Burns, who does not smoke cigars. “It’s drawing away our resources from our main concern--narcotics and the collection of revenue for the United States.”

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Cuban cigars, although considered heady stuff, are not narcotics, and they do not produce revenue for the U.S. government. Even though travelers caught bringing Cuban cigars into the country face no fine, the confiscation of treasured tobacco can hurt. “I don’t know too many people who can afford to lose between $250 and $500 a shot,” Burns said.

So why don’t customs inspectors just turn a blind eye to a box of cigars?

“The president of the United States has said to us this is something we should be very concerned with, and it has to do with his foreign policy toward Cuba,” Burns said of Clinton, who’s been known to smoke a cigar or two. “We have to enforce the rules and regulations. We don’t have the option of being selective.”