Espinosa & General Cigar Co.’s Warzone Line Adds Rabito Vitola
The third and final installment of the Warzone line, a collaboration between Espinosa Premium Cigas and General Cigar Co., is arriving at stores in a new vitola.
The size is one that should be familiar to fans of Espinosa’s offerings, as it is the 6 x 46 Rabito vitola. Like the other sizes in the line, the blend features a Cameroon wrapper that has been aged for five years and comes from General’s tobacco inventory, while the Honduran binder, and fillers from Nicaragua and Columbia come from Espinosa. Unlike the other three sizes in the series—Toro, Robusto and Short Churchill—the Rabito is round and does not feature a soft box press.
“Warzone has been a very successful collaboration, so it should come as no surprise that Justin Andrews and I wanted to end the trilogy on a high note, so to speak,” said Erik Espinosa via a press release. “And since Team Espinosa blended our first Cameroon-wrapped cigars with Justin under Warzone, we agreed that we would take Cameroon to another level with our final release. There was no question when we had the blend that embodied our vision…it was like the lights turned on for all of us…we instinctively knew it was right.”
The Warzone Rabito is priced at $9.19 per cigar, with production limited to 1,500 boxes of 20 cigars, a total run of 30,000 cigars. They are made at the La Zona Cigar Factory in Estelí, Nicaragua.
Warzone debuted in December 2019 in robusto and toro vitolas, and then added a Short Churchill size in November 2020, a size that would finish #18 on halfwheel’s Top 25 Cigars of 2020.
The packaging features imagery that depicts the Ten Years’ War that saw Cuba fight for its independence from Spain between 1868 and 1878, and the first of three wars that eventually led to the island gaining independence. All of the artwork was done by Cuban artist Edin Gutierrez, who has also done the art for Espinosa’s Las 6 Provincias line.
Images courtesy of General Cigar Co.
Update (Sept. 23, 2022) — The original version of this story stated that the Rabito size featured a soft box-press, it is a round cigar.
Patrick Lagreid
I strive to capture the essence of a cigar and the people behind them in my work – every cigar you light up is the culmination of the work of countless people and often represents generations of struggle and stories. For me, it’s about so much more than the cigar – it’s about the story behind it, the experience of enjoying the work of artisans and the way that a good cigar can bring people together. In addition to my work with halfwheel, I’m the public address announcer for the Colorado Rockies and Arizona Diamondbacks during spring training, as well as for the Salt River Rafters of the Arizona Fall League, the WNBA's Phoenix Mercury and previously the Arizona Rattlers of the Indoor Football League. I also work in a number of roles for Major League Baseball, plus I'm a voice over artist. Prior to joining halfwheel, I covered the Phoenix and national cigar scene for Examiner.com, and was an editor for Cigar Snob magazine.
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