Landing the day after the Thanksgiving holiday, Black Friday signals the start of the Christmas season. It’s a day when clothes, kitchen appliances, TVs, and our favorite cigars fall to all-time low prices, often with minimal stock available.

In our biggest sale ever, we’ll run you through some of our smoking-hot Black Friday cigar deals so you can get even more burn for your buck. This year’s blockbuster shopping event will take place on Friday, November 25, but it begs the question: “Why is it called Black Friday?”

Black Friday online sales totaled $8.9 billion during Black Friday in 2021. Still, it wasn’t until the late 1980s that this shopping extravaganza became synonymous with an onslaught of online adverts, bargains, and deals.

Black Friday was first coined in 1869 when financiers Jay Gould and Jim Fisk attempted to increase gold prices by buying and hoarding large amounts.

Once President Ulysses S. Grant got wind of their audacious plan, he flooded the market with the U.S. Treasury gold, which was being used to clear Civil War and Reconstruction debts.

Consequently, the economy suffered severe damage lasting several years, foreign trading ceased, and the stock market dropped 20%. It financially destroyed Americans who had taken out loans but now could not repay them, hence the term “Black Friday.”

Philadelphian police brought about black Friday’s revival in the late 1950s and early 1960s. Large volumes of traffic on the day between Thanksgiving and the Army-Navy game caused chaos and disruption to the city. Heaping additional pressures on law enforcement, it forced them to work longer hours to deal with the congestion, overcrowding, and general disorder.

The Black Friday we all know today is about holiday shopping and saving some pennies before Santa visits. Reinvented to denote a retailer’s profitability, Black Friday is the day that pushes their accounts into the black (earning profit) rather than in the red (operating at a loss).

Today, Black Friday is rarely a one-day event for retailers, and some companies have turned it into a month-long promotional season in-store and online. At the very least, it lasts over the weekend and rolls into the second-biggest shopping day (“Cyber Monday”) — a day devoted to online shopping.

Black Friday has evolved into a global phenomenon, with countries from Finland to Paraguay and Papua New Guinea all adopting this shopping craze. Now that you know how it got its name, check out our top picks for the best cigar Black Friday deals below.

With doorbuster deals on top brands and exclusive savings for JR Plus Members, take advantage of super low prices on customer favorites, and sought-after premium smokes.

Once the private cigar brand of former Cuban President Fidel Castro and his top-level officials, Cohiba Cigars are known for providing extravagant taste and a luxurious smoking experience. While they still operate out of their original stomping ground in Habanos S.A., Cuba, their US market smokes are hand-rolled in the Dominican Republic under the General Cigar Company umbrella.

One of our best sellers is the Cohiba Black Robusto Maduro, with its light caramel sweetness and a hint of pepper on the back of the throat.

Cohiba Red Dots are outstanding cigars, and the Cohiba Red Dot Robusto is no exception. This medium-strength smoke is known to connoisseurs worldwide, with its 5 x 49 size perfect for 30 minutes of smoking pleasure. The beautiful Cameroon wrapper gives a little kick to every draw that delivers lush leather, coffee, and cocoa notes.

Tugging on the heartstrings of cigar lovers since 1875, Romeo y Julieta Cigars are one of the most popular Cuban heritage brands. Named after Shakespeare’s famous tragedy, their extraordinary attention to quality, construction, and flavor remains unwavering. With factories in the Dominican Republic, Nicaragua, and Honduras, non-Cuban Romeo y Julieta Cigars pay respect to its history with an impressive portfolio to suit every palate.

The Romeo y Julieta 1875 Gran Toro makes for a fantastic everyday smoke, building in richness as it burns, with delicious hits of cedar, hazelnuts, white pepper, and flecks of spice.

Released in 2005 to celebrate 130 years of Romeo y Julieta, why not light up Christmas with the Romeo y Julieta Aniversario Toro? Dressed in a rich sun-grown Ecuadorian Sumatra wrapper, this creamy smoke has a delectable nutty flavor with subtleties of leather, raisin, and spice. With Christmas fast approaching, it makes for a great holiday gift for all your friends and family that cherish a one-of-a-kind, celebratory smoke. Blink, and you’ll miss it, so keep an eye out for this beauty on our Black Friday deals.

If you have a taste for the spicy side of cigars, check out the Romeo 505 Nicaragua — a collaboration with the famous Plascencia Cigar family. A classic Nicaraguan puro with its naturally sweet aroma and well-balanced, full-bodied flavor profile, expect notes of toasted chestnuts, leather, earth, and plenty of black pepper underneath.

Immensely popular with cigar smokers worldwide, the Montecristo brand has a reputation for creating some of the most coveted smokes and thoughtful blends.

The Montecristo White Series is cloaked in a light blonde wrapper leaf and is creamy and flavorful with a seamless draw. Ideal for those seeking a mellow profile, it offers delicious chocolatey, coffee, and nutty flavors, with a touch of vanilla lingering on the palate.

If you want to make your stogie experience even more epic, look no further than the Montecristo Epic Churchill. Put a couple of hours aside to puff away on this colossal, full-bodied smoke that delivers bold flavors of pepper, oak, leather, and cocoa with a creamy texture. It’s difficult to go wrong with a Montecristo, and this monster smoke certainly lives up to its name.

No matter the time of day, we’ve got a stogie for everyone to enjoy. Start your morning strong with the Rocky Patel Java Maduro Robusto. Its decadent chocolate and coffee bean notes are a match made in heaven with your cup of joe.

Conversely, Davidoff Winston Churchill’s The Late Hour presents smooth flavors of mild pepper, cream, coffee, oak, and subtle whiskey nuances. A smoke for after-dark, light up in the wee hours of the night for a luxury-class cigar that’s remarkably consistent from the first draw to the nub.

Of course, we’ll also be offering discounts on many other leading brands, from Davidoff to Punch and Padron, along with our large selection of cigar accessories that include ashtrays, cutters, and humidors.

Check the JR Cigars website for exclusive Black Friday cigar deals ahead of Christmas, and bag yourself a bargain or the perfect cigar gift for a loved one this holiday season.