Cigar manufacturer Cortès-Vandemarliere invests in local tobacco growers

The tobacco sector is having a particularly hard time, also due to the food and energy crisis. That is why Cortès wants to focus more on local plantations.

Different kind of tobacco for cigars

In the 1980s, there were at least 600 tobacco growers in West Flanders. Now there are barely twenty. Five growers only supply their tobacco to Cortès in small quantities. Most tobacco is rolling tobacco for cigarettes.

Cortes now wants to convince growers to grow other varieties that are suitable for cigars. There are seven types of tobacco in a cigar. West Flemish growers can only grow one variety: Burley. Now that species mainly comes from Italy, France and Spain. The other six species come from South America and Indonesia.

In Handzame, Cortès makes one million cigars a day. These are packaged at the Zwevegem location. The cigars are sold in several European countries, but mainly in France.