So ok. My wife packed my humidors for the move...she packed them wrong. I unpacked my cigars and they were dryed out and brittle. Throw aways basically. Now the good news was i hadn't been buying for a while so there were only a few hundred smokes in the boxes. But they had a little bit of age on them ( like a year or two) Now i am smoking store bought almost the same day.

So now i have the oppurtunity to start my collection over. How would you do it on a budget and space issue. I have 4 smaller humidors (150 counts mainly) but not ones that fit a box fully intact. I would need to unpack it. Coolerdors are not available for purely aestetic purposes fro my wife.

The goal is two fold

a) Have cigars available for smoke immediately
b) begin building the collection to get back to smoking cigars with age

I don't smoke alot, maybe 3 cigars a week.
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i've saved a few dry and brittle cigars, did you try saving them with some loving RH?
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How long were they without rh? After recalibrating a hygrometer(digital I assume) load up a humi and take a reading. There is a good chance you can slowly bring them back. 5% rh at a time and let them sit for at least a week before going up another 5%. Unless they were extremely dry for a long period of time this should revive them. Let them sit for a month or two at 60-65% and them give them a try. :-)

At the same time take this opportunity to load up a cooler with new smokes,
"Just in case":-)
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At the rate you smoke go quality over quantity. From the sounds of it, you had alot of cigars that you for the most part don't seem at a loss for.

Get a box of Tat's, Illusiones or VSG's or Pepin Blacks for the high end.

Maybe a box of Punch Rare Corojo or Hoyo Dark Sumartas for more of an everyday smoke.

Work up from there. If you want more answers to this question you should list the kind that you liked or flavor profiles you enjoy.
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Oliva, Padron, Gran Habano and Indian/Rocky brands are all good choices for quality at a fair price. As was previously indicated, the cigars that you now have can quite possibly be salvaged.
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Unless your move took a couple months, you should be able to nurse them back without issue.

Why would you trust your wife to pack your cigars?:-)
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Huh?? Something fishy here
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Um... why would you try to put a cigar box inside a 150 count humidor?


As others have pointed out, your cigars are probably still salvageable. You got time to nurse them back, especially since you don't smoke very frequently.
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Cigars are not as delicate as many think. The dry ones likely could be resuscitated with the TLC expalined above. No point in simply tossing a couple hundred smokes for dryness w/o trying to fix the problem.
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Not looking for types to start with. I Know what i like i am more looking to style. Would you start with the 5ers or would you start with a box you like? Would you use it as an oppurtnity to go purely ISOM? Or would you stick with what you know?

The move took a month and the travel was 3k miles (NY to Seattle). The jostling of dry cigars did not do well with the travel. There were a few that were salvageable, mainly of the box pressed variety and a few in tubes or glass. I have been traveling back and forth to seattle for a month and my wife did 99% of the packing. Trust me its not that i am not upset its simply i have come to acceptence, there is nothing i can do about except for start a new.

So given a budget of say 300 a month. for say 6 months. Would you start with fivers? Start with a box? Would you go a cab of shorts? Do they smoke ok fresh? These are the types of things i am looking for answers with. Would you use the chance to go purely ISOM? Or would you combo it? Get a box of stuff you want to age and a fiver here or there to keep something smoking.?
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I would definitely use the opportunity to go Cuban :-)

Get a box of good, inexpensive Cuban cigars and a box of something you like. Then get 5ers of a bunch of stuff you also like but don't exactly need boxes of. Once you're established again, start experimenting with the Dark Side...
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It seems like you already know what you like so why not start buying boxes. You can also check the WTS thread and get some good smokes from some fellow Inmates.:-)
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try saving them...it sound like its not to late
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if you know what you like, grab a couple boxes of those, and then get some fivers, try some habanos

your situation sounds like me, in that you don't smoke a ton. Don't waste your time with a lot of "budget" smokes (unless you enjoy them) for the sake of savings. Buy good smokes since you're not smoking 1 or more per day
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Well I would say nobody can answer that question but you, you know what you like and what you want if you want to age some sticks and smoke some I guess my best answer would be buy a fiver and a box of the same cigar, smoke the fiver and start the aging process on the box with 300 a month for 6 months you have a nice budget there you should be able to get those humidors filled back up in no time unless you are going for all top shelf sticks, but even then you are going to be able to fill up that humidor by at lest one box a month less the very top shelf brand!!
Josh
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I guess us Army guys are retarded or something.

We throw our cigar cases in COnEx's that take anywhere from 90 days or more to get back the US from Iraq....and our cigars survive that trip easily.

On another note, it only took us two days to transport the entire house from CA to NC.

I dunno. Good luck with your rebuilding!!!
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You think it really has anything to do with the Army???
:-) :-) :-)
Friggin window licker...
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Even at a month you should be good. I know there are times that I won't even crack my one humi for 3 to 4 weeks at a clip and never had an issue with the gars drying out. I'm with Tobii, maybe I am missing something but your sticks should not be that dry. I can understand damage during a move and is pretty much why when I moved to NC from NY, my humidors rode in the car and not the truck.
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$$$

If you are starting over...start right. Start with some cheaper boxes of CC...Monte #5s. Party Shorts, PL Montecarlos, Boli PCs. You won't regret it...I promise. :-)
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Start soon. The SCHIP tax starts in April.
The tax will add $8-$10 per box, so cheaper smokes
will see a larger percentage increase.

Chemyst :-)
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