Southern Draw Announces Jacobs Ladder Lancero as First Ignite Release

Earlier this week, Southern Draw Cigars announced its new Ignite Series, a collection of limited editions with a charitable contribution.

The first of those releases will debut this Saturday at Texas Cigar Festival, an annual event hosted by Serious Cigars, which has been rebranded as Casa de Montecristo. That cigar is a 6 1/2 x 40 box-pressed lancero that uses the Jacobs Ladder blend.

This is the fourth size for the blend, which debuted last year. It uses a Pennsylvania broadleaf wrapper, an Ecuadorian maduro binder and fillers from Nicaragua.

A total of 1,000 jars of 10 will be produced for the release: 500 black and 500 white. The first 100 will be on sale this Saturday, an additional 400 will go on sale at other Casa de Montecristo locations around the country and an additional 500 will be released at a future day.

“We are excited to partner with Robert and Sharon Holt and the Southern Draw family on the release of the IGNITE project,” said Ernie R. Watson, senior merchandise manager for Casa de Montecristo, in a press release. “As the largest brick and mortar cigar lounge chain in the country and the first retailer to receive and offer these for purchase, we feel that our customers will be just as excited as we are to try these exclusive items. The IGNITE jars will be first available at our Texas Cigar Festival in Houston, TX on April 14th 2018. Shortly after, you’ll be able to purchase these at many of our 20 retail locations, including our newest additions in Tampa, FL. until our limited supply is gone.”

The Ignite Series is a collection of releases with the goal of creating cigars with charity in mind. For each release, both Southern Draw and the retailer will donate $3.75 per jar to a charity, for a total of $7.50 per jar.

Operation Cigars for Warrior, a charity that sends cigars to active duty military, will be the recipient of the first charitable donations.

Casa de Montecristo is a collection of retail stores around the country, some of which are owned by its parent company—Imperial Brands, plc, which also owns Altadis U.S.A. and JR Cigar—while others are franchise locations.

The second Ignite release will happen on May 12 at Famous Smoke Shop & Leaf Cigar Bar in Easton, Pa., while the Cigars International will be getting two unique cigars as part of the third release, with the cigars set to debut in September and November.

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.