El Güegüense JR 50th Coming Later This Month
There’s another version of Foundation Cigar Co.’s El Güegüense brand debuting later this month.
As the name implies, the El Güegüense JR 50th Collector’s Edition is being released to celebrate the 50th anniversary of JR Cigar. It will be offered in a single 6 1/4 x 46 lonsdale size and uses a blend that is based on another anniversary cigar, the El Güegüense 5 Year Aniversario.
On paper, the blends sound remarkably familiar. The El Güegüense JR 50th uses a corojo 99 wrapper from Jalapa, Nicaragua over a Mexica San Andrés binder and corojo 99 and criollo 99 fillers. For context, the El Güegüense 5 Year Aniversario was described as a Nicaraguan corojo 99 wrapper over a Mexica San Andrés binder and fillers from Estelí and Jalapa.
It will have an MSRP of $13 per cigar and is limited to 500 boxes of 10 cigars. They will go on sale on Aug. 17.
The boxes have an art piece on the inside, designed by Nicholas Melillo, Foundation’s founder, and Alex Garcia, the company’s art director.
“It is an incredible honor to work with JR Cigar on this project and to bring a touch of Foundation Cigars to the 50th Celebration,” said Melillo in a press release. “El Güegüense was our first release and will always hold a special place in my heart, and seeing as how we just released a special 5th anniversary edition, I thought it would be perfect to turn this tweaked blend into something special for JR Cigar.”
JR Cigar was founded by Lew Rothman in 1971 as a small cigar store in Manhattan. Rothman would expand the business with more stores in New Jersey, North Carolina, Michigan, Texas and Washington D.C. In addition, he created Santa Clara as a wholesale distribution company to sell products to other stores. In 1997, 800-JR Cigar, Inc. went public on the NASDAQ, and in 2003, Altadis S.A.—now Imperial Brands, plc—purchased a controlling stake. Last year, Imperial sold JR and its other premium cigar companies to an unnamed Chinese buyer.
The store has released a variety of special cigars and accessories to mark the occasion.
Charlie Minato
I am an editor and co-founder of halfwheel.com/Rueda Media, LLC. I previously co-founded and published TheCigarFeed, one of the two predecessors of halfwheel. I have written about the cigar industry for more than a decade, covering everything from product launches to regulation to M&A. In addition, I handle a lot of the behind-the-scenes stuff here at halfwheel. I enjoy playing tennis, watching boxing, falling asleep to the Le Mans 24, wearing sweatshirts year-round and eating gyros. echte liebe.
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