The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) ensures that our food is safe, sanitary, and nutritious and that our medical and veterinary products are safe and effective. While we may not give it much thought, we are all protected by the FDA every day. But sometimes the FDA oversteps its bounds—in our opinion—since it now regulates cigars.
Premium Cigars Too
Of the 12 billion cigars sold in the U.S. on a yearly basis, only 315 million are premium cigars (less than 4% of all cigars sales). But these premium cigars, which are primarily handmade and limited edition cigars, must also be FDA-approved for smoking.
The Reason
FDA regulations aim to keep under-aged people from smoking. While this is perfectly reasonable, when it comes to premium cigars, it just doesn’t make a lot of sense.
Premium cigars are just that; premium. That means they cost more than regular machine-made cigars, and as such, because of the cost, they won’t appeal to anyone underage that just wants to smoke a cigar. Let’s face, no kid is going to pay 10 bucks for a single cigar when they can get a couple of 5 packs of machine made sticks for the same price. That just isn’t logical and doesn’t make sense. But that is where the FDA stands, and unless the ruling is overturned, expect to pay more when getting a premium.
What to Expect
From now on, cigar makers will pay user fees that were otherwise picked up by Big Tobacco (cigarette makers). That cost will get passed on to the consumer.
Boxes of cigars will now come with a warning label that must take up 30% of the box size. And, the new regulations may also add up to $20,000 dollars in extra fees to bring a new cigar to the market. You’ll pay for that too.
However, cigars mixtures made before 2007 won’t be FDA regulated, so stock up now!
The beauty of premium cigars is that the blends can change and new blends can be created. By the FDA stepping in it creates a monopoly that only the big cigar company’s can afford cutting out the small independent companies with that said I will start ordering my cigars from abroad where there is a free market