An open letter to Gurkha.
kuzi16
Posts: 14,633 ✭✭✭✭
Dear Gurkha,
as i was looking through my humidor today for a noon smoke, i found a cigar that was given to me as a gift in August of 06 for my wedding in the following September. this cigar just happened to be a Gurkha Legend perfecto.
i hesitated for a moment. i have had this cigar aging for about 7 years. i remember the day i got it. i opened the bomb up to find a hand full of really good smokes. At the time you (Gurkha) did not have the increasingly poor reputation that you are probably starting to become accustomed to. Gurkha was not discounted the way it is always discounted now. At the time i got the gift, this was a $20 cigar.
i was excited to place this Legend Perfecto in my humidor.
i was also determined to put it down for some age.
over the years, this cigar got buried in the humidor, then humidors. i would run across it every now and then and smile to myself as i set it back to sleep for another time.
today when i saw it i said to myself "today is the day"
before i even clipped the cap i was trying to determine if i should put this in the "what did you smoke today" thread here on Cigar.com. given today's reputation of Gurkha and the cigars i usually smoke, it may seem a bit strange so see me post it there. i determined that i would post that i was smoking it and i could defend/justify it by talking about how Gurkha did not always have this reputation, how the quality got worse over the years, about how i used to be a fan of Gurkha early on.
i clipped. i toasted. I attempted to draw. before i even had time to taste the cigar i was stopped by a plug.
i re-clipped to no avail.
i searched my house to find the draw poker i made a few years ago and ran it through.
problem solved. of course, this was a 20min process because most reputable companies have some level of quality control, so i rarely have to use a draw poker.
i re-toast. I took a draw on it. the foot is fairly small so when there is little flavor i was not really surprised. As the ring got wider, it was still lacking flavor.
maybe its past its prime?
i am trying to determine in my head if it has been over aged when i notice that the burn is all kinds of crooked and the wrapper is starting to crack further down.
now, i know for a fact that it is not user error on this. this cigar has not been out of an environment that was more than two points plus or minus 68% for the last seven years and i smoke slow so this was not a symptom of over zealous puffing.
this was clearly a construction issue.
I corrected the frequent unevenness of the burn with a torch and tried to move on with life.
the ash was flaky and seemed to be "blooming like a flower" as i smoked. the ash was inconsistent in how it falls. sometimes early, and sometimes it holds for almost an inch.
after a bit of this struggle, i tried to focus back on the flavor. This would have been easier to do if it didnt want to keep going out. when it was puffing the flavor was flat and thin. again, i wonded if this is due to a bit too much age. This was supposed to be a medium-full bodied cigar and in my gut it felt like a medium-full cigar. but the flavor was weak. it is unrefined. it reminds me of a very light version of smoldering savaday (if you have ever worked in the food service industry you know what im talking about). this is a blending issue.
a cigar that has blending issues and construction issues offers me nothing.
Gurkha, this was the last straw.
i tried to forgive you for years. i tried to say that your original lines were still good. i tried to say that you expanded so fast that you couldnt keep up with QC so "give em another shot" because the issues are not as common as we think. (I mean, people notice when things are wrong and make note of it more often than when they go right. things are supposed to work.) i tried not to speak ill of your brand overall because i wanted to hold myself to a higher standard understanding that Gurkha was somebody's life's work. I tried to brush off all the negativity of the brand and it was a classic case of "just not my taste" in the cigar world.
i cant do that anymore.
this cigar represented an earlier incarnation of Gurkha. an incarnation of the brand from when they still seemed to care. they were not trying to pull the wool over anyone's eyes by claiming they were the "Rolls Royce" of cigars. they were trying to make good cigars. they still failed.
this brand is a joke. they make Ford Pintos and place the silver "RR" on the hood and claim its a Rolls Royce. yes there are people that love the pinto, but every now and again the car's gas tank blows up much like the wrapper of the legend i tried to smoke today.
i will never smoke another Gurkha again. i will not be fooled by this brand. i will not be lulled into thinking that "this one may be better" for another time.
I dont care if your brand one day has a huge change in the way it does business and quality goes through the roof. i am done with you.
Gurkha, you ruined my day, and wasted precious humidor space for the last seven years. This was a wedding gift; a gift that i am now ashamed to have been, at one point, proud to have in my humidor.
you did me wrong Gurkha.
you have done my friends wrong.
i wont even give away the remaining trash you have in my humidor.
I wont even give them an honorable funeral by fire in my fire pit.
i will place them in the trash, where they belong.
-kuzi
as i was looking through my humidor today for a noon smoke, i found a cigar that was given to me as a gift in August of 06 for my wedding in the following September. this cigar just happened to be a Gurkha Legend perfecto.
i hesitated for a moment. i have had this cigar aging for about 7 years. i remember the day i got it. i opened the bomb up to find a hand full of really good smokes. At the time you (Gurkha) did not have the increasingly poor reputation that you are probably starting to become accustomed to. Gurkha was not discounted the way it is always discounted now. At the time i got the gift, this was a $20 cigar.
i was excited to place this Legend Perfecto in my humidor.
i was also determined to put it down for some age.
over the years, this cigar got buried in the humidor, then humidors. i would run across it every now and then and smile to myself as i set it back to sleep for another time.
today when i saw it i said to myself "today is the day"
before i even clipped the cap i was trying to determine if i should put this in the "what did you smoke today" thread here on Cigar.com. given today's reputation of Gurkha and the cigars i usually smoke, it may seem a bit strange so see me post it there. i determined that i would post that i was smoking it and i could defend/justify it by talking about how Gurkha did not always have this reputation, how the quality got worse over the years, about how i used to be a fan of Gurkha early on.
i clipped. i toasted. I attempted to draw. before i even had time to taste the cigar i was stopped by a plug.
i re-clipped to no avail.
i searched my house to find the draw poker i made a few years ago and ran it through.
problem solved. of course, this was a 20min process because most reputable companies have some level of quality control, so i rarely have to use a draw poker.
i re-toast. I took a draw on it. the foot is fairly small so when there is little flavor i was not really surprised. As the ring got wider, it was still lacking flavor.
maybe its past its prime?
i am trying to determine in my head if it has been over aged when i notice that the burn is all kinds of crooked and the wrapper is starting to crack further down.
now, i know for a fact that it is not user error on this. this cigar has not been out of an environment that was more than two points plus or minus 68% for the last seven years and i smoke slow so this was not a symptom of over zealous puffing.
this was clearly a construction issue.
I corrected the frequent unevenness of the burn with a torch and tried to move on with life.
the ash was flaky and seemed to be "blooming like a flower" as i smoked. the ash was inconsistent in how it falls. sometimes early, and sometimes it holds for almost an inch.
after a bit of this struggle, i tried to focus back on the flavor. This would have been easier to do if it didnt want to keep going out. when it was puffing the flavor was flat and thin. again, i wonded if this is due to a bit too much age. This was supposed to be a medium-full bodied cigar and in my gut it felt like a medium-full cigar. but the flavor was weak. it is unrefined. it reminds me of a very light version of smoldering savaday (if you have ever worked in the food service industry you know what im talking about). this is a blending issue.
a cigar that has blending issues and construction issues offers me nothing.
Gurkha, this was the last straw.
i tried to forgive you for years. i tried to say that your original lines were still good. i tried to say that you expanded so fast that you couldnt keep up with QC so "give em another shot" because the issues are not as common as we think. (I mean, people notice when things are wrong and make note of it more often than when they go right. things are supposed to work.) i tried not to speak ill of your brand overall because i wanted to hold myself to a higher standard understanding that Gurkha was somebody's life's work. I tried to brush off all the negativity of the brand and it was a classic case of "just not my taste" in the cigar world.
i cant do that anymore.
this cigar represented an earlier incarnation of Gurkha. an incarnation of the brand from when they still seemed to care. they were not trying to pull the wool over anyone's eyes by claiming they were the "Rolls Royce" of cigars. they were trying to make good cigars. they still failed.
this brand is a joke. they make Ford Pintos and place the silver "RR" on the hood and claim its a Rolls Royce. yes there are people that love the pinto, but every now and again the car's gas tank blows up much like the wrapper of the legend i tried to smoke today.
i will never smoke another Gurkha again. i will not be fooled by this brand. i will not be lulled into thinking that "this one may be better" for another time.
I dont care if your brand one day has a huge change in the way it does business and quality goes through the roof. i am done with you.
Gurkha, you ruined my day, and wasted precious humidor space for the last seven years. This was a wedding gift; a gift that i am now ashamed to have been, at one point, proud to have in my humidor.
you did me wrong Gurkha.
you have done my friends wrong.
i wont even give away the remaining trash you have in my humidor.
I wont even give them an honorable funeral by fire in my fire pit.
i will place them in the trash, where they belong.
-kuzi
2
Comments
"but every now and again the car's gas tank blows up much like the wrapper of the legend i tried to smoke today. "
I still got quite a few Gurkhas, I'll take em from ya or better yet donate em to the troops!!!
I know I know,, ok just throw em away!!!
Kuzi that was very well put! I've had a hand full of Gurka's and not one of them burnt good tastes good or smoked to the band without the wrapper in peeling apart
I had a couple of Gurkha's early on that I didn't really care for, but I didn't really hate them either, so I was open to trying other lines of the brand. However, during my purusment of the various info sources, I found out that there were so many different lines, so many of the same line with different names/bands for different online retailers etc, that I just didn't have time to explore this brand anymore. I don't smoke enough to waste my time with all of the crap that they put out. Add the reputation they have as described by Kuzi above, and I just personally don't have time for them.
Having said that, I've always thought the Park Ave was a nice cheap connie with a little rest, so I'll smoke those here and there lol
"If you do not read the newspapers you're uninformed. If you do read the newspapers, you're misinformed." -- Mark Twain
In my previous post I had criticism of Gurkha in general, but also said that I have one of their cigars from time to time from the lines that have been out for awhile that I was already familiar with.
With the increasing amount of low opinions about Gurkha I am seeing, I think I'm just going to boycott them altogether. I no longer want any of my money to go towards a company with their apparent philosophy, regardless of the few good products of theirs I sometimes enjoy. Fortunately, I have substitutes for all three products of theirs that I enjoy and they deliver the cream texture, smooth earthiness, and sweet infusion that I would be looking for if I were to reach for a particular Gurkha.
With the overwhelming number of lines offered, Gurkha could have been another Drew Estate for me. They could offer a wide range of pricepoints and blends, but instead it seems that many of their lines are merely relabeled from other lines and just an excuse to have something to put in a new cool looking box that might catch someone's eye.
"Long ashes my friends."
Gurkha is a company that goes out and buys tobacco that is rare, or limited in quantity and therefor not good to use in big lines that need to be consistent from year to year.
Gurkha is, in my mind a middle man. they buy random tobacco, blend it, and rent factories to roll. all of this leads to many labels that use "rare" tobacco ("rare" is not always "good") and inconsistency because of the different factories.
Johnathan Drew may not make the cigars you enjoy, but he does take pride in what he makes. the QC in the DE factory is actually good, and if you complain to DE because you had a problem, they go out of their way to fix it.
they have very high standards and this give higher prices and an LE feel to their premium lines even though they are regular release.
love or hate DE, the comparison to Gurkha is not there. nope.
it wouldnt matter if i did. i wouldnt want any compensation they sent me.
I actually sang the praises of DE in this thread and started it because I would like to find another company or more that diversifies as well and sample their lines the way I make an effort to do with DE. I've sampled at least a few from many of DE's lines and continuously do so when new lines are released.