Rolling cigars in the C.Gars office!

Yes rolling fresh robustos in the C.Gars offices today!


Eduardo rolling cigars in the CGARS office


Eduardo Diaz Gonzalez – Head of Production at Cohiba


33 year-old Eduardo Diaz, Head of Production at Havana’s top cigar factory El Laguito – the headquarters of Cohiba, is in the UK for a ten week tour to demonstrate cigar rolling from mid-July to the end of September 2008.

Eduardo’s path to his present, prestigious post has been unusual. He started his career in photography where he developed visual skills. Then twelve years ago at the height of the cigar boom, his ability was spotted by the H. Upmann factory, which recruited him as an escogidor or colour grader.

Colour grading in Cuban cigar factories has always been one of the most respected and best paid jobs. It demands an acute sense of colour because the finished cigars must first be sorted into over 60 different shades and then all the cigars that will be placed in a single box must be matched precisely so that they please the eye.

Eduardo proved so adept at this task that a year later he was appointed to manage the colour grading department at the Romeo y Julieta factory.

Romeo’s Director at that time insisted that all his senior people should be able to roll cigars, so Eduardo was sent to the school where he soon qualified as Grade 8, which allowed him to make cigars like Robustos.

Since then he has not only achieved the top grade in rolling, which means he can make cigars of any size, but also, when the Romeo factory was closed for refurbishment in 2006, he went straight to El Laguito first to manage its colour grading department and now to be Head of Production.
Eduardo has two children, a girl of seven and a baby boy. The baby was born just one week before Eduardo came to England giving him the perfect excuse to celebrate with his favourite cigar – the Cohiba Robusto.