Montecristo

Everyone including people who do not smoke cigars have always heard of the Montecristo No2 and is a cliché or throw away line. Like all the most famous Cuban Cigar brands I have tried every single Montecristo cigar from their range.

The Montecristo brand was created in 1935 by Menéndez, García y Cía then the owners of the popular H. Upmann brand of cigars which are another of my favourite cigars that were enjoyed by President J.F Kennedy and were in fact his favourite brand of Cubans. Having just purchased the H. Upmann brand from J. Frankau & Co. Menéndez and García decided to extend the range of the regular H. Upmann line called the H. Upmann Montecristo Selection. The story has it that the Montecristo brand acquired its name from the “Count De Montecristo” novel that was read to the rollers on the floor whilst producing the cigars. London England has been responsible for the success of many of the cigar brands and Alfred Dunhill can most certainly take the claim for the worldwide success of the Montecristo Cigar accounting for some 50% of the total cigar sales.
If Montecristo is not Cuba's best cigar it most certainly is its biggest ambassador exporting over 30 million cigars each year and shipped with the famous brown and white band. This huge volume makes it necessary for the brand to be produced in seven different factories. Most are in Havana including H. Upmann, La Corona, Partagas and Moncada. Most of these factories produce the ubiquitous Montecristo No. 4, called the Mareva by cigar rollers. About 20 million are made each year. H. Upmann has been making Montecristo the longest, since its original owners the Menendez family founded the brand in 1934. The current H. Upmann factory the Fabrica José Martí is located behind the Partagas factory only a few minutes walk from the Capitol. H. Upmann opened the factory in 1944 and Connoisseurs of the brand know that this factory makes the very best Montecristo cigars and scour cigar shops for boxes printed with the José Martí code on their underside"JM."