PCA 2025 Oscar Valladares

PCA 2025: Oscar Valladares Tobacco & Co.

The 2025 Premium Cigar Association (PCA) Trade Show saw Oscar Valladares Tobacco & Co return to its roots with the introduction of two new releases. Over the past decade, Oscar Valladares has built a significant factory and farming operation in Honduras. One of the first people Valladares started working with was Jim Robinson, a Pittsburgh retailer. That project would be the Leaf by Oscar. Subsequently, Valladares would produce the line synonymous with Robinson, Island Jim. Today, Robinson’s lines are now part of the Oscar Valladares Tobacco & Co portfolio, and this year, the company will release products around Leaf by Oscar and Island Jim.

Leaf by Oscar Broadleaf

Leaf by Oscar has released a limited edition called the Leaf by Oscar Broadleaf. During a customer trip to Honduras in 2012, Robinson discovered a product that Oscar was selling called the 2012 by Oscar. This was a box of cigars, one of which was uniquely covered with a tobacco leaf. The cigar was designed as a special tribute to the Mayan Apocalypse, which folklore predicted would occur on December 21, 2012. The idea was to save this particular cigar to be the last one smoked before the end of the world.

Jim was intrigued by the cigar covered with a tobacco leaf. At the same time, he had been impressed with this newcomer to the cigar business, and he asked Oscar to blend a cigar that could be his house cigar. Jim entrusted the blending to Oscar, requesting that the cigar be wrapped in a tobacco leaf, similar to the 2012 by Oscar. This became the birth of the Leaf and Bean by Oscar series. It was eventually shortened to Leaf by Oscar when it went national.

Leaf by Oscar Broadleaf; Photo Credit: Oscar Valladares Tobacco & Co

This limited-edition Leaf by Oscar features a Connecticut Broadleaf wrapper. Notably, it’s Oscar Valladares’s first cigar to use this wrapper. The company says the wrapper has been aging for three years. The remainder of the blend features Honduran tobacco. The Leaf by Oscar Broadleaf is available in one size, a 6 x 52 Toro. A total of 1,500 20-count boxes have been produced. As with other Leaf by Oscar cigars, the cigar is wrapped in a tobacco leaf. Pricing is $18.00 MSRP.

Island Jim Barber Pole

The Island Jim Barber Pole is the fourth installment in the Island Jim series. The characteristic of all Island Jim cigars is that they come in a single 6 x 52 torpedo size. Each of the cigars look like a #2 pencil with a shagged foot. This latest addition is the Island Jim Barber Pole, which joins the Island Jim, Island Jim San Andres, and Island Jim Connecticut lines. As a regular production offering, it showcases an eye-catching barber pole design with Connecticut and Corojo wrappers skillfully intertwined, wrapped around an undisclosed binder and filler. The Barber Pole is available in boxes of 21, with each cigar priced at $13.00.