I'm actually in the market for getting a new one (slippery slope... nah I was pushed off the ledge) and I priced both a vino style and a tower of power style, and while it be easy to control the temps with the vino, now that the a/c is working, I want the extra space of a tower, so hopefully the only purchase after that is the aristocrat :-)
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Hmm I am into the look, smell, and class a wood humi has. I only have a coolador for needed space as a word end table type just does not exist in the budget for me. Regardless as to the ability and cost of a vino, I find them to be a souless mechanical looking device and would never want one. A larger fancy plastic device with a higher cost the same. Bayliner boats, etc are cheaper to buy and may do the job, but just watch a Criscraft go by and heads turn.

Wood is the ultimate to me in beauty and class. I see some of the humis made by some of the BOTLs here and am amazed by their skills and the finished product they can turn out. Who ever makes the purple wood humis (sorry I can't remember the name) just rock! One of those would be my lottery winnings purchase.... I may buy a ticket today :-)
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I have 3 wood desktops and 1 cooler. The cooler is where the boxes and the bulk of the samplers go, so there is not as much cedar in there as I would have liked since most of it is bundles and sampler bags.

2 desktops are at home, the third is at work suppemented by my travel-dor.

I just wish I could keep the 2yr old out of the cooler. I sometimes wish I had a vino just so I could put a padlock on it, but I would never be able to afford to put drawers in it.
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While I like my coolerdors, there is something about the scent of the spanish cedar from my desktop humi's that I would not willingly give up.
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:-)
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It died for me awhile ago, and now I just use a cooler. I love large cabinets, but the affordable ones have build quality issues, IMO. It's hard to maintain a consistent RH in all areas of the cabinet, and some don't seal very well. An Aristocrat doesn't have these issues, but they are also major $$$$. I can buy a lot of boxes of high end sticks for what a large temp and RH controlled Aristocrat would cost me.

Coolers for me. :-)
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Thanks for all the responses guys. It seems to be a mix of feelings on here, but the spanish cedar market still seems to be alive and well.:-)
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Never forget that the goal is to properly store your cigars. Any storage meeting this requirement is proper storage.

That said, there is a culture of implied sophistication or elegance around the traditional wood humidor lined with cedar. Certainly, if one wishes to have a show piece, a wood humidor comes first to mind.

I have 3 vinotemps, 2 coleman coolers and will soon have a 100+ box Aristocrat. All work quite well for what they are and have their place in housing my collection. I'll note that I put a lot of cedar in my non-wood storage units to help the buffering and aroma.

As for the death of the wood humidor, I don' think that it will happen any time soon, if for no other reason than aesthetics. The Aristocrat is the first cigar storage that has me remapping the layout of furniture on the main level of the house.
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There is something not right about housing beautiful handmade works of art in a plastic cooler..I vote wood.
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For me there is something very intriguing about a wood humidor. The actual sticks are only half the fun, the humidor is the other half. Something very classy about a nice humidor on top of a desk, or on a book shelf.
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My Vinos definitely served there purpose, but I longed for a tower style, wooden, cooled unit. I finally found one on Craigslist, made by Vinotemp, that suited my needs. I put in a few computer fans to move the air around and couldn't be happier. The Gator Vault smells like a dream when you open it!!
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You have to remember, most of the cigar smoking community has no idea or never thought about coolers for storage. Those of us on the boards are so much more educated about the hobby and we are a very small percentage.

I have a number of coolers but there is nothing like a nice, large piece of furniture to compliment the room it sits in.
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I use a vino for the simple fact that it gets hot as chit here in the summer and I need the cooling unit. I wish I had an aristocrat with the temp control but that's a little out of my league at the moment. I prefer wooden humis but use the plastic out of necessity.
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:-)
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The 100ct desktop from CH.com, and later, a 48qt coolidor. The coolidor has 4 nice size cedar trays and there is extra room for some boxes too. Beads are in both the desktop and coolidor. One of these days (when funds permit), a moveup will take place to possibly an Aristocrat or similar type of wood humidor.

Wood simply rocks:-)
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I have one 400 count and a 200 count both wood and I wouldn't trade them for anything....just love the way they look and smell....
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and yet you have that tupperdor for all the "crappy NC" sticks :-)
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Exactly. Wood evokes sophistication and taste. It's not some toxic plastic goo poured into a mold, cooled, and dumped onto an assembly line. Instead, the natural beauty of trees combined with the labor needed to turn a it into a humidor implies a certain cost. In comparison, a plastic cooler looks "cheap."

The same holds throughout much of the industrialized world. Consider cotton vs. polyester clothes; leather vs. synthetic dress shoes; brick vs. vinyl home exteriors. The list goes on. In the end, natural materials (and their costly manufacturing process) are considered "sophisticated"--even if they're unnecessary or even inferior.

We can argue the merits of synthetic materials, but it won't change the tastes of the public. Who cares if your humidor's chipboard is made from scraps swept off the lumberyard floor? Slap a 1/64" oak laminate on it and you've got instant class. Wood humidors aren't going to disappear, even if they're technically inferior.
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I love the look and feel of a wood humidor, but I also embrace the functionality of my edgestar with chasden's drawers and shelves. Now, if i could only have the edgestar exterior retrofitted with a wood exterior I'd be happy. I've seen a project on here somewhere in one of the threads.
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I've moved past my wooden humi and store completely in coolers. I'd love to build a wooden cabinet as a project someday but the upkeep on the coolers is just so easy.
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