"Cigars now regularly feature as part of wine sales at Christie's South Kensington with as many as 50 boxes in any one sale," says Brian Ebbesen, the famous London auction house's cigar and wine specialist. "The serious collector's market is in pre-revolutionary Havanas with boxes frequently fetching as much as ?4,000. However, a browse through the catalogue will quickly establish that lighting up an Havana needn't be a costly affair. After all, the last thing you want with a good cigar is a sharp intake of breath."

Aside from the cigars themselves, this new breed of collectors is starting to home in on antique cigar cutters, cigar brands and labels, books, ephemera, pocket cases and humidors.

"To mark the 30th anniversary of Cohiba, 45 humidors were created, each with their own individual number and filled with Robustos Especiales, a unique size not commercially available," says Ebbesen. One of the Cohiba humidors, number 3, was recently sold at Christie's South Kensington for ?10,925.

On May 20, Christie's South Kensington held a 'one off' sale dedicated to 200 cigar lots, concentrating on mature and vintage rarities. The total sale including wines fetched ?600,000, about two-thirds of which was spent on fine cigars. "On average the cigars fetched 50 per cent more than our estimates," says Ebbesen. "Wine is a better-known commodity and tends to stick to its original estimated price. But everything went!"

A record price paid at a Christie's auction for Havanas was shattered three times in under a year. At their London auction on 5th December 1996, saw Peter de Savary buy 163 cigars dating from the mid 19th Century for f17,000 (?108 each), the top price for a rare cigar was around ?50. Then on 18th May in Geneva, a box of 25 Trinidads (the Havana that's never been sold commercially), went for no less than ?6,950 or ?278 each.

Only three weeks later on 5th June, back in London, one of the 501 limited edition 1492 Humidors, made to celebrate the 500th Anniversary of Columbus in 1992, notched up ?15,000 or ?300 for each of the 50 Corona Gorda sized cigars it contained. Not bad when you think it went on sale back in 1992 for ?850.

Christies held their largest cigar auction of the year in cigar land of London St James's in April 2002.

Prices were very firm and interest in the room as well as from telephone bidders worldwide was extremely high. It appears that the interest in aged and rare Havana cigars of excellent quality and provenance is at an all time high. Some highlights of the sale included Dunhill Estupendos sold for ?4100 for a box of 10, Davidoff 80th Anniversario (1985) box of 20 sold for ?12,000. A 1960's Montecristo Desktop Humidor with 25 Montecristo No. 2 sold for ?6,000, Cifuentes Crystal Tubes box of 10 from the 1970s sold for ?4,600. There was also a good variety of superb pre embargo Havanas.

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