History
The Quai d'Orsay brand was created by Cubatabaco in 1973 for the French state tobacco monopoly, SEITA, and was blended with French tastes in mind, being a milder brand. There are a few competing stories as to what the marque's name refers to: one is that it is referring simply to the famous Paris avenue, another is that it refers to the French Foreign Ministry that is located on it, and another is that it is referring to the headquarters of SEITA which is also on the same avenue.
Quai d'Orsay was apparently outside of the umbrella of Habanos SA for a number of years and was managed directly by Cubatabaco and SEITA, but judging by packaging, Habanos SA documents, and SEITA's merger with Tabacalera into the multi-national tobacco company of Altadis, it appears Quai d'Orsay is a part of Habanos SA like all other Cuban-made brands of cigars.
Another oddity of the Quai d'Orsay line are its Corona cigars. Up until the late 1980s, Quai d'Orsay still manufactured its Coronas in two different wrapper shades: Claro and Claro Claro. As the fashion for lighter wrappers diminished (and supposedly as consumers noticed they were paying more for essentially the same cigar with the wrapper making a very minor difference) production eventually ceased of the Coronas Claro Claro. Though the box still says Coronas on it, the official production name is still Coronas Claro.
Read more about this topic: Quai D'Orsay (cigar)
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“Yet poetry, though the last and finest result, is a natural fruit. As naturally as the oak bears an acorn, and the vine a gourd, man bears a poem, either spoken or done. It is the chief and most memorable success, for history is but a prose narrative of poetic deeds.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“It may be well to remember that the highest level of moral aspiration recorded in history was reached by a few ancient Jews—Micah, Isaiah, and the rest—who took no count whatever of what might not happen to them after death. It is not obvious to me why the same point should not by and by be reached by the Gentiles.”
—Thomas Henry Huxley (1825–95)
“The only thing worse than a liar is a liar that’s also a hypocrite!
There are only two great currents in the history of mankind: the baseness which makes conservatives and the envy which makes revolutionaries.”
—Edmond De Goncourt (1822–1896)