根據美國雪茄協會（Cigar Association of America）發布的數據，2021年有4.56億支手工雪茄進入美國，這個數字非常漂亮，和2020年相比，進口量增長了25.3%。雪茄零售商表示，雪茄的銷售量也創下了美國歷史新高。

老弗吉尼亞煙草公司（Old Virginia Tobacco Co.）的加里·佩什（Gary Pesh）自1980年以來一直從事雪茄銷售工作，他有七家門店，他說：2021年絕對是非凡的一年，銷售額對比2020年實現了兩位數的增長。

佛羅里達州奧蘭多的皇冠煙草公司（ Corona Cigar Co.）的老板杰夫·鮑里謝維奇（Jeff Borysiewicz）賣雪茄26年了，他也稱過去的一年是“他見過最好的一年”。

多米尼加、尼加拉瓜、洪都拉斯這三個主要的雪茄制造國在2021年對美國的雪茄出口量都實現了明顯增長，尼加拉瓜出口了2.409億支雪茄，比2020年增長了29.4%。在美國雪茄進口數量里，尼加拉瓜占到了半壁江山，比例是52.8%。多米尼加的雪茄出口量增長了22.5%，達到了1.295億支。洪都拉斯出口量是8420萬支，增長了18.3%。

2020年美國雪茄進口數量3.613億支，已經很強勁，比2019年增長了7%。這個增長是在2020年上半年出現新冠病毒疫情而帶來的雪茄廠停產的情況下實現的，尤其是多米尼加、洪都拉斯停產時間比較長。2020年年末的雪茄進口量猛增。

相比之下，2021年12月份的雪茄進口數據沒有那么多，12月份單月的進口數量同比下降了23.8%。

回購過去，在1990年之前，手工雪茄在美國的銷量不高，年進口量在1億支以內。1977年到1992年，每年雪茄進口量在7300萬到1.03億支之間。1990年代中期，美國雪茄銷量呈爆炸式增長，1995年進口1.36億支，1996年是2.43億支，1997年達到了4.·18億支。這三年是讓人記憶猶新的強勁三年。

過去十年對于雪茄行業是一個好年代。2021年是美國雪茄進口量連續第十年超過3億支的年份，也是1997年以來第一次超過4億支的年份。

附參考文章：

The numbers are in, and they are extraordinary. Last year, 456 million handmade cigars were shipped to the United States, according to the Cigar Association of America. Shipments were up by 25.3 percent over 2020. Cigar retailers said that imports only tell part of the story—cigars are also selling in record numbers.?

“It was an absolutely phenomenal year, double-digit growth from the year previous—and 2020 was pretty good,” says Gary Pesh, who has been selling cigars since 1980. Pesh, of Old Virginia Tobacco Co., owns seven stores. “It really was one of the better years we’ve had.”

Jeff Borysiewicz, owner of Corona Cigar Co. in Orlando, Florida, calls the year “the best I’ve ever seen,” he says. He’s been selling cigars for 26 years.

All three of the major cigar-producing countries posted gains in 2022, all of them significant. Nicaragua, the market leader by far, shipped 240.9 million handmade cigars in 2021, an increase of 29.4 percent over 2020’s numbers. (Nicaragua accounts for more than half of handmade cigar shipments to the United States, 52.8 percent.) The Dominican Republic posted a gain of 22.5 percent, shipping 129.5 million cigars. Honduras had an increase of 18.3 percent, to 84.2 million handmade cigars.

The strong 2021 followed a fairly strong 2020, when 361.3 million handmade cigars were shipped to the United States, a seven-percent increase over 2019 numbers. That growth came despite pandemic shutdowns in cigar factories—particularly in the Dominican Republic and Honduras—in the first half of 2020. The gains were particularly strong in late 2020, with a stunning 71 percent increase in December 2020 when compared to December 2019.

By comparison, December 2021 was not as good. It was almost inevitable to disappoint, given the showing in December the previous year, but December cigar shipments were down 23.8 percent compared to December 2020.?

Looking back, before the 1990s, handmade cigar sales in the United States were small. Imports were at or below 100 million units. Between 1977 and 1992, annual premium cigar imports ranged between 73 million and 103 million cigars, according to the Cigar Association of America. Cigar sales in America exploded in the mid 1990s, climbing to 136 million cigars in 1995, 243 million in 1996 and 418 million in 1997—three years that were the most robust that anyone alive could remember in the world of cigars.?

Cigar shipments cooled after 1997, then climbed back. The past decade has been a good one for cigars, and this was the tenth year in a row that cigar imports exceeded 300 million units, and the first year since 1997 when imports were more than 400 million units.