2022 BY THE NUMBERS

A DEEP DIVE INTO A YEAR OF CIGAR AFICIONADO RATINGS SHOWS SOME INTERESTING TRENDS

- THOMAS PAPPALARDO

"It's a tough job, but somebody's got to do it," is the tongue-in-cheek reaction we often get to the revelation that to compile our ratings we taste upwards of 600 cigars during the course of a year. While we do enjoy the task, once a year we strive to bring you even more data about the cigar market-the hard way through math.

Crunching the numbers from six issues of CIGAR AFICIONADO and 24 issues of Cigar Insider, our twice-monthly newsletter, never fails to provide a comprehensive look at what countries produce the highest-quality smokes and which sizes and shapes have scored the best. It can also be a helpful guide on where to get the most bang for your buck.

The good news is that the percentage of highly-rated cigars continues to grow alongside the swelling number of imports. The bad news for consumers is that prices have increased markedly, especially for Cuban cigars.

Cigar choices are growing at a clip rivaled only during the "cigar boom" of the 1990s. The surge witnessed in 2021, with 456 million units imported, seems to have held. By August 2022 imports had already reached 307 million (the last numbers available). Of that number, Nicaragua took the lead at 167 million cigars shipped to the U.S., with the Dominican Republic and Honduras at 84.6 million and 54.4 million, respectively, according to data from the Cigar Association of America.

The bulk of cigars we rate come from the biggest importers to the United States, informally known as The Big Four: Nicaragua, the Dominican Republic, Honduras and Cuba.

Cuba maintains its hold on the top scores with Nicaragua just behind. The Dominican Republic has overtaken Honduras after trailing for a number of years.