I will be in Tampa in three weeks and would LOVE to know where to go to get my Maduro Opus cigars for Gasparilla.
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ROFL. no offense but did you read the thread?
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oops :-)
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This is my thought especially since you have all the big wigs of the manufacturer right in your backyard. His greed definitely got the best of him because I would hope that Fuente would no longer make him a dealer let alone an official Opus retailer.
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That's what I thought too. This guy has got to be incredibly stupid and/or greedy to risk his his good standing with Fuente by selling fakes.
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Ill be going through that area next month (actually right by the shop) and it will be fun to stop in and ask them if they have any maduro opus or sharks for sale. rofl ! seriously though they looked damn real to me.
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it's too bad that they won't discuss what they are doing about the situation.
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:-):-)

One of my favorite "holidays".
:-)
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if anyone else has had dealings with the B&M that seem shady please email drew@cigarfamily.com

if they sold enough there could be felony charges associated with it. at the very least PM me to discuss what happened.
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I asked about NC fakes not too long ago and I was basically told via this forum that they don't really exist as a problem. I found it hard to believe then, for basically this reason right here. Some of the rare expensive stuff sells for way more than the average CC. I would think there would be a hell of a market for a forged rare Padron. Sorry you had this experience Jay, but glad you got your money back.
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I've asked about NC fakes too, having never heard them discussed much until now, and from the pictures, those Opus bands look pretty damn good. so I'm curious. Do you think they actually had those printed, or are they legit bands acquired through not so legit means? I don't know much about printing but those look fairly sophisticated, definitely not a home job.

If they were printed, I would think that should be cause for real concern, because whoever made these is clearly capable of producing believable counterfeits.
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not to mention that a cigar like the shark is not an easy cigar to make. everything about these look good at first glance! scary!!
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It is pretty easy to remove opusX bands from cigars. The bands are so think, they usually come off pretty easily for me without tearing. A little hot air would probably make them come off even easier. So the bands could be legit, just not the cigars.
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For all we know the problem could be deeper rooted than just a local B&M. Like Only Fuentes mentioned, the Shark is not your run of the mill roll so for all we know it could be someone in the Fuente factory or an ex employee of the Fuentes creating these fakes. If this were the case I would be curious to see if they are sneaking out tobacco and using the same tobacco for the fakes and if in fact they taste the same or even similar for that matter. I highly doubt it but I would be curious to know what the deal is on these. Wasn't there an issue with fake BBMFs making their way around last year too, especially on Ebay? Again, not an easy cigar to fake. I guess just like CCs the more rare NCs should be inspected for authenticity just the same except in this case you can't even trust the authorized dealer.
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I've never heard of a good tasting Opus X fake. Everyone I know who has smoked them has said that they tasted both awful and absolutely nothing like a Fuente, no matter how perfect they looked.

Also, Sharks aren't that difficult to roll. The BBMF style shape (which is not exclusive to Fuente BTW), yeah, a bit more complex, but nothing a good roller can't master. Plus, repetition will teach precision; if all the person is going to do is crank out the same shaped fake all year long, it won't take them long to master one shape.
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well they didn't do a great job pressing them. rolling them is easy but getting them to keep the square foot and body is tough when you are rushing production. here's a few other pics.

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these really are much better quality fakes and i believe that the bands and the ribbon are the real thing. someone at the factory is probably leaking them out or they are just taking them from the other cigars (as mentioned earlier about how easy it would be).
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Did you smoke one?
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nope, took them back and got my money. i'm not going to risk inhaling mold or some other unknown agent.
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Ick, yes, that is a bad pressing job. Looking at that cigar, it makes me wonder if a roller was even involved in this, or someone (ie: the shop) just took some existing torpedo with a similar looking wrapper and after possibly cutting the cigar down to size, just jury rigged up a half-assed pressing arrangement of some sort. Same wonder for the maduros, are those even custom rolled, or did someone just take some inexpensive maduro that comes in a cedar sleeve and swap the band (the sizes don't match up to a FFOXM, but the 5 Vegas Serie A was the first thing that came to mind looking at your most recent photo).

Anyway, if those are real bands, how many were made would likely give an indicator as to where the bands came from. Recycling bands from legitimate cigars is possible, but not practical for anything more than a small quantity of fakes, so for a large quantity, I'd lean more toward "smuggled out of the factory" or "stolen direct from the printers" - from my experience, bands normally come packed in boxes like what business cards come in - same quantities too- 200, 500, maybe even 1000. Then multiple business card boxes packed into larger cardboard boxes for transport. Probably not that hard to make one or two of the smaller boxes disappear.
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Oh, and I don't think the ribbon is that special that you couldn't easily find dozens of rolls of it at any number of different sewing & craft stores in the US.
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