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Daily drivers vs. monthly cigar budget

Just curious what y'all use as daily smokes.. As I am new, I really haven't found my perfect go to daily driver. Most often than not, when I am just not sure what to grab, I reach for a 5 Vegas probably, but still have a tendency to get bored with them if smoked too much. I mean, I think I understand that daily smokes are generally the ones you can tolerate at high volume at the best value, therefor leaving your high value/dollar smokes for more 'special' occasions and keeping your bank account in good standing. But, honestly I am still so new at this I don't even have a cigar budget yet. Don't get me wrong... I have thoroughly enjoyed the ride so far, but feel I need to be settling into a more familiar role. I also suppose I need to settle in on a value I can live with. Would $3 to $4 a stick be a goal, and in the realm of what's normal? Or is that too high/low? I guess long term there is a pretty big difference between $3 and $4. Also, I realize that it depends largely on your income but I am curious about averages more than anything else, and this is just a juggling act I haven't solved yet. I mean, if I could find some 2$ sticks I can be happy with, I'd be totally stoked! And, obviously, there a HUGE difference between $2 and $4!

Comments

  • Gray4linesGray4lines Posts: 4,691 ✭✭✭✭✭
    With cigar.com deals, MOST of my smokes are in the $3-$4 range. I am comfortable with that price for an any/everyday smoke. I think that $3-$4 is a reasonable goal for quality, affordable smokes. Sometimes you can even find sub $3 deals on pretty nice cigars...

    Most importantly, only buy what you like. If you are buying only "tolerable" smokes, even for just $2, you are wasting money. Sure, a $2 cigar will not be quite the same as a $12 cigar, but you can certainly find quality cigars that you enjoy at a price that makes them even better!
    LLA - Lancero Lovers of America
  • RainRain Posts: 8,958 ✭✭✭
    Here is how to works most of the time.You show up here and meet all these great people. Then they send you premi prems, so you smoke all of those. Then when you get back to your budget sticks, you have been spoiled. Then you're up late ordering smoke to hide it from your wife. Take it from me bro....RUN.
  • Sweetleaf69Sweetleaf69 Posts: 43
    Rain:
    Here is how to works most of the time.You show up here and meet all these great people. Then they send you premi prems, so you smoke all of those. Then when you get back to your budget sticks, you have been spoiled. Then you're up late ordering smoke to hide it from your wife. Take it from me bro....RUN.
    Haha! That's awesome. I'm not married, but I can see staying up late and trying to hide it from myself... ;) Ok guys, thanks for the advice! Seems I am on the right path, anyway. I quite smoking cigarettes a year ago last September to further explore this new world. Sounds like I have a new and much more expensive habit! Just got to figure it all out.
  • armaes8armaes8 Posts: 279
    I found that buying some coronas or petit coronas of brands you really enjoy are a good way to go. It allows you to get the flavors and aromas you really enjoy without compromising price for a cheaper stick you might not like, and you get the feeling of smoking a good stick without having to chill out for a couple of hours. I love firing up a smaller stick for my drive, and then a bigger stick for being stationary for some time.
  • Gray4linesGray4lines Posts: 4,691 ✭✭✭✭✭
    armaes8:
    I found that buying some coronas or petit coronas of brands you really enjoy are a good way to go. It allows you to get the flavors and aromas you really enjoy without compromising price for a cheaper stick you might not like, and you get the feeling of smoking a good stick without having to chill out for a couple of hours. I love firing up a smaller stick for my drive, and then a bigger stick for being stationary for some time.
    I was thinking this too... for example, Padron Londres can be found for $2-$2.50. Still a padron, and still takes me ab 45 min to smoke, but way cheap!
    LLA - Lancero Lovers of America
  • cabinetmakercabinetmaker Posts: 2,560 ✭✭
    They always have good smokes in bundles of 16-20, i usually get a couple at least. Lately I've been smoking lots of a.j. Fernandez overruns. I think i have ten bundles unopened, 3 opened. I've smoked through about 10 or so bundles and love them. I mix in something with a band every now and then just to mix it up.
  • cabinetmakercabinetmaker Posts: 2,560 ✭✭
    Oh, and price of a cigar really is meaningless. I've had $3 smokes that blew away 12-20 $ smokes and I've had $30 cigars that weren't fit to wipe my ass with. Find what you like, then look for that flavor profile in a cheaper cigar.
  • bbass2bbass2 Posts: 1,059 ✭✭
    The majority of my stash is $2-4 a stick. With all the specials and samplers around you can get some really good smokes in that range. There are always the exceptions where I'll buy singles of lines that rarely, if ever, go on special - Illusione, LFD, Tat.
  • BigshizzaBigshizza Posts: 15,644 ✭✭✭✭✭
    cabinetmaker:
    Oh, and price of a cigar really is meaningless. I've had $3 smokes that blew away 12-20 $ smokes and I've had $30 cigars that weren't fit to wipe my ass with. Find what you like, then look for that flavor profile in a cheaper cigar.
    Very true, your taste is your taste but the journey is the best. Fun to do the research, talk to the people here and read!
  • kuzi16kuzi16 Posts: 14,633 ✭✭✭✭
    dont smoke daily. smoke less often, but smoke only what you like. i have no problem lighting a $15 cigar because i have a day off because i know i will enjoy it fully. i do have a problem lighting five $3 cigars that i dont really like 5 days in a row.

    there are huge differences in the concepts of "price" and "value"

    yes, a Davidoff corona is (as of 4-18-13) $11.70, but that cigar will give me over an hour of pure enjoyment. where as if i smoke four $3 churchills of some cheap brand i will end up with a cumulative 12 hours of being annoyed and underwhelmed.

    enjoyment is hard to quantify. if you like the cheap $3 churchills, by all means smoke away. just only smoke what you like.
  • Gray4linesGray4lines Posts: 4,691 ✭✭✭✭✭
    kuzi16:
    only smoke what you like.
    That's it!
    LLA - Lancero Lovers of America
  • RhamlinRhamlin Posts: 8,908 ✭✭✭✭✭
    With the samplers ccom and the other site offer its pretty easy to get great cigars below 5$ which to me Is a good price for an everyday cigar. But you want to beware of those samplers that offer a ton of smokes at dirt cheap prices. I went this route in the beginning and wound up with a humi full of crap. I still mostly stick with samplers mainly because I just love seeing all the different sticks and discovering a stick sitting in the bottom I had forgotten about for a year. There's a bunch threads about budget cigars here that have lots of good suggestions for an everyday/yardgar. One of my favorite is 1844. Pretty cheap and if you got to toss it, no big loss.
  • cabinetmakercabinetmaker Posts: 2,560 ✭✭
    kuzi16:
    dont smoke daily. smoke less often, but smoke only what you like. i have no problem lighting a $15 cigar because i have a day off because i know i will enjoy it fully. i do have a problem lighting five $3 cigars that i dont really like 5 days in a row.

    there are huge differences in the concepts of "price" and "value"

    yes, a Davidoff corona is (as of 4-18-13) $11.70, but that cigar will give me over an hour of pure enjoyment. where as if i smoke four $3 churchills of some cheap brand i will end up with a cumulative 12 hours of being annoyed and underwhelmed.

    enjoyment is hard to quantify. if you like the cheap $3 churchills, by all means smoke away. just only smoke what you like.
    I smoke four or five a day, I enjoy them all. :p
  • Lee.mcglynnLee.mcglynn Posts: 5,960 ✭✭✭✭
    IMO a cigar is about the experience and not the price! I've found I almost always grab a padron,camacho or la aurora when I can't decide. As of lately some of my stuff is at a age that I enjoy and will start smoking the jdn's and pepins. But as for a answer it really just depends on you
    Money can't buy taste
  • jgibvjgibv Posts: 9,244 ✭✭✭✭✭
    cabinetmaker:
    Oh, and price of a cigar really is meaningless. I've had $3 smokes that blew away 12-20 $ smokes and I've had $30 cigars that weren't fit to wipe my ass with. Find what you like, then look for that flavor profile in a cheaper cigar.
    So very very true.
    Just because the price is higher, doesn't necessarily make it better, and it sure does not mean you will like it better.
    kuzi16:

    enjoyment is hard to quantify. if you like the cheap $3 churchills, by all means smoke away. just only smoke what you like.
    Like.
    Thumbs up


    I know which $2-4 smokes I love and which ones I can't stand .... I don't have a $$ tree in the front yard so that's what fills up most of my humidors ....
    There's some $3 smokes that I like much better than some $10 smokes

    * I have a new address as of 3/24/18 *

  • webmostwebmost Posts: 7,713 ✭✭✭✭✭
    I tell you a bargain bundled cigar.com smoke that just blows away sticks costing four times as much, and that is the Fonseca Arana. Spicy, aromatic, delicious.

    “It has been a source of great pain to me to have met with so many among [my] opponents who had not the liberality to distinguish between political and social opposition; who transferred at once to the person, the hatred they bore to his political opinions.” —Thomas Jefferson (1808)


  • phobicsquirrelphobicsquirrel Posts: 7,347 ✭✭✭
    kuzi16:
    dont smoke daily. smoke less often, but smoke only what you like. i have no problem lighting a $15 cigar because i have a day off because i know i will enjoy it fully. i do have a problem lighting five $3 cigars that i dont really like 5 days in a row.

    there are huge differences in the concepts of "price" and "value"

    yes, a Davidoff corona is (as of 4-18-13) $11.70, but that cigar will give me over an hour of pure enjoyment. where as if i smoke four $3 churchills of some cheap brand i will end up with a cumulative 12 hours of being annoyed and underwhelmed.

    enjoyment is hard to quantify. if you like the cheap $3 churchills, by all means smoke away. just only smoke what you like.
    Well put!
  • ddubridgeddubridge Posts: 3,978 ✭✭✭
    webmost:
    I tell you a bargain bundled cigar.com smoke that just blows away sticks costing four times as much, and that is the Fonseca Arana. Spicy, aromatic, delicious.

    +1. Just awesome.
  • kingdavid5kingdavid5 Posts: 293
    I usually smoke padron 2000-3000 there about 5$ in my area but I def would like to try the AJ Fernandez overruns. I have found myself lately buying single sticks which I know is the biggest mistake because I spend 10 times as much but I have been so spoiled by higher quality cigars for example I smoke allot of under crowns, oliva V, San lotano ovals but I need to budget down
  • curtpickcurtpick Posts: 2,757 ✭✭✭
    Rain:
    Here is how to works most of the time.You show up here and meet all these great people. Then they send you premi prems, so you smoke all of those. Then when you get back to your budget sticks, you have been spoiled. Then you're up late ordering smoke to hide it from your wife. Take it from me bro....RUN.

    Exactly ! LOL

    I dont really have a "daily" smoke. I keep a ton of different sticks around. And like them all !
    Soon enough you'll find what profiles you like and you will gravitate towards that flavor profile.
    DON'T GET CAUGHT UP INTO HYPE !
    It will only cost you in the end.
    Sit back and learn, and enjoy !
    Family, Friends, Golf, Cigars, Fine Whiskey, Good beer.... is there anything else ?  Follow on instagram @crguy1961
  • Gray4linesGray4lines Posts: 4,691 ✭✭✭✭✭
    kingdavid5:
    I usually smoke padron 2000-3000 there about 5$ in my area but I def would like to try the AJ Fernandez overruns. I have found myself lately buying single sticks which I know is the biggest mistake because I spend 10 times as much but I have been so spoiled by higher quality cigars for example I smoke allot of under crowns, oliva V, San lotano ovals but I need to budget down
    I dunno about Ovals, but Oliva V's and Undercrowns can be had for a great deal on ccom..... send them an email!
    LLA - Lancero Lovers of America
  • jadeltjadelt Posts: 763 ✭✭
    Being the simple guy that I am here is my answer to your question. My daily smokes...

    1. Ramon Bueso $3-$4

    2. 5 Vegas Classic $2

    My "special" stash includes Undercrown and Tatuaje Miami Noellas and as of last night AVO Classic Robusto.
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