An article published by ‘The Spectator’ speaks of La Aurora Cigars as a major player in the success of Dominican cigars around the world. The article, published on August 11th, explains: “The Dominican Republic began to nose ahead of Cuba and Nicaragua during the so-called ‘cigar boom’ of the early 1990s, but its success didn’t happen overnight – the oldest factory, La Aurora, was founded 120 years ago by an 18-year old called Eduardo León Jimenes”.
The author of the article, Simon de Burton, stresses that La Aurora is now “the biggest commercial organisation in the DR, but it still prides itself on the hand-rolled, doble figurado ‘perfecto’ cigars of which only 100 are made per day”.
He adds: “Since Jimenes established the business, the plantations around Santiago have expanded to cover more than 600,000 acres, not to mention the packaging manufacturers, cigar factories, greenhouses and fertilizer producers.”
Specifically, the text published in ‘The Spectator‘ focuses on explaining how Cuba was dethroned as the cigar capital of the world, with the Dominican Republic’s throne now being number one. As the author of the article describes, the boom in cigar production in the Dominican Republic dates back to 1959, when the Cuban revolution (which was then the world’s leading cigar exporter) – “led to the nationalisation of industry”.
In this regard, he says that many of the best growers moved to the Dominican Republic. This was compounded by the assassination of the Dominican Republic’s dictator, General Rafael Trujillo (who ruled the cigar business with an iron fist), and the US ban on all Cuban imports.
To illustrate the success of Dominican cigars, the article notes that the Dominican Republic broke through the US$1 billion barrier almost three years ago and its exports continue to grow, making cigars its fifth largest export after gold, electrical goods, textiles and medical equipment.