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from cigarette products.”
His analogy is that FDA “went into a
bee’s nest with no clue what to do after-
wards, now that the bees are flying around.”
He says that the agency has no con-
cept of how to test the products because it
doesn’t know anything about how to cure
cigars, how to ferment them, etc. It has no
idea about the taste profile or any other ci-
gar profile because “it is unlike any other
product on the market.They are navigating
in a field they have no concept about.”
Patel is hoping to make this “less bur-
densome on all of us” once he and other
leading cigar makers “sit down at the ne-
gotiation table” with FDA. “That’s the
plan anyway.”
Is it likely that the law will be changed
in favor of the cigar industry?
Through Patel’s eyes, “We’ve done
something that’s never been done before;
we’re finally getting our language [for
premium cigar exemption and a change
for the predicate date] and bill out of the
House. [Now] we have to get it through
the Senate, which is more challenging. If
I was a betting man, I’d say we have a 20-
25 percent chance of it moving through
the Senate. No stone will be unturned.
We have five months to get it through.”
Johnson agrees that FDA has “no idea
what they’re doing with tobacco, especial-
ly cigars. This is an artisan industry; we
are not manufacturers of chemicals, this
is tobacco.”
Patel adds, “I have to call it a handmade
cottage industry, and I think we will have
the opportunity to sit down with FDA
and get some of the definitions we’re
looking for. We’re hopeful to work with
them, but right now there is too much
ambiguity in this rule.”
The “Future of New
Products” Conversation
Is the future of new products, as the in-
dustry knows it, now dead?
The future of limited editions, in par-
ticular, is very uncertain. “We can make
them for places outside of this country,
we can release them to Europe, but that
doesn’t help our U.S. retailers,”states John-
son. “Right now, we don’t know where one
SKU of a limited edition really stands yet.
If I come out with a new size of a previous
limited edition, can I file for an SE to the
previous one? I hope so, and I will keep on
releasing them until they tell me it’s not
part of the rule.”
Herein lies one of the most important
aspects of the new ruling: how FDA de-
fines the ingredient list. “How it’s carved
out—is it country of origin?—plays a ma-
jor role in what we can release for the rest
of our lives,” says Patel. “We’re definitely
going to release [new lines] in Europe.
We’ll make some for ourselves, but in this
country, it will be something to watch over
the next year or two. I’m hopeful, like ev-
eryone else, that we’ll have to persevere
and navigate our way through this.”
The “Positives of
Regulation” Conversation
Is there really a silver lining in the recent
regulatory madness? Oh yes, say some ci-
gar makers.
“We’ve been really sluggish for many
years,” says Johnson. “We go to trade
shows, we buy new cigars, we see what’s
C I GAR SENSE
Cigar makers like Rocky Patel worked feverishly
to launch products before August 8.
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TOBACCO BUSINESS INTERNATIONAL
SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2016