IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/taf/applec/45y2013i1p99-109.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Understanding how experts rate cigars: a ‘havanometric’ analysis

Author

Listed:
  • Nicolas G鲡rd Vaillant
  • François-Charles Wolff

Abstract

Drawing on data from an annual French guidebook published in 2004, this article focuses on the determinants of experts’ ratings on Cuban cigars. We find that high quality cigars are more likely to be recommended to more experienced cigar lovers. Both the self-assessed quality and recommendation depend on the length and diameter of the cigars, but also on more subjective characteristics like number and type of aromas. Results from a Fields’ decomposition show that the quality of cigars is much more sensitive to the presence of a defect and number of aromas than the experts’ recommendation, which is more influenced by the rarity of cigars. Finally, it is essentially the cigars’ objective characteristics that have an influence on their prices, meaning that consumers truly benefit from additional qualitative information when reading experts’ advice and ratings.

Suggested Citation

  • Nicolas G鲡rd Vaillant & François-Charles Wolff, 2013. "Understanding how experts rate cigars: a ‘havanometric’ analysis," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 45(1), pages 99-109, January.
    • Handle: RePEc:taf:applec:45:y:2013:i:1:p:99-109
    DOI: 10.1080/00036846.2011.595691
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1080/00036846.2011.595691
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1080/00036846.2011.595691?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to look for a different version below or search for a different version of it.

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Victor A. Ginsburgh & Jan C. van Ours, 2003. "Expert Opinion and Compensation: Evidence from a Musical Competition," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 93(1), pages 289-296, March.
    2. Freccia, David M. & Jacobsen, Joyce P. & Kilby, Peter, 2003. "Exploring the relationship between price and quality for the case of hand-rolled cigars," The Quarterly Review of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 43(1), pages 169-189.
    3. Combris, Pierre & Lecocq, Sebastien & Visser, Michael, 1997. "Estimation for a Hedonic Price Equation for Bordeaux Wine: Does Quality Matter?," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 107(441), pages 390-402, March.
    4. Ali, Héla Hadj & Lecocq, Sébastien & Visser, Michael, 2010. "The Impact of Gurus: Parker Grades and en primeur Wine Prices," Journal of Wine Economics, Cambridge University Press, vol. 5(1), pages 22-39, April.
    5. Nicolas Vaillant & Philippe Lesot & Quentin Bonnard & Valerie Harrant, 2010. "The use of expert opinion, quality and reputation indicators by consumers: evidence from the French vaulting stallion semen market," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 42(6), pages 739-745.
    6. Corneo, Giacomo & Jeanne, Olivier, 1997. "Conspicuous consumption, snobbism and conformism," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 66(1), pages 55-71, October.
    7. Véronique Chossat & Olivier Gergaud, 2003. "Expert Opinion and Gastronomy: The Recipe for Success," Journal of Cultural Economics, Springer;The Association for Cultural Economics International, vol. 27(2), pages 127-141, May.
    8. Carl Shapiro, 1983. "Premiums for High Quality Products as Returns to Reputations," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 98(4), pages 659-679.
    9. Landon, Stuart & Smith, Constance, 1997. "The Use of Quality and Reputation Indicators by Consumers: The Case of Bordeaux Wine," MPRA Paper 9283, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    10. Stuart Landon & Constance E. Smith, 1998. "Quality Expectations, Reputation, and Price," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 64(3), pages 628-647, January.
    11. Gergaud, Olivier & Guzman, Linett Montano & Verardi, Vincenzo, 2007. "Stardust over Paris Gastronomic Restaurants," Journal of Wine Economics, Cambridge University Press, vol. 2(1), pages 24-39, April.
    12. Gourieroux, Christian & Monfort, Alain & Renault, Eric & Trognon, Alain, 1987. "Simulated residuals," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 34(1-2), pages 201-252.
    13. Florine Livat & Nicolas Vaillant, 2006. "Expert opinion and brand reputation: an analysis from a French Cuban cigars guidebook," Applied Economics Letters, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 13(2), pages 97-100.
    14. Victor Ginsburgh, 2003. "Awards, Success and Aesthetic Quality in the Arts," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 17(2), pages 99-111, Spring.
    15. Nicolas Vaillant & Philippe Lesot & Quentin Bonnard & Valérie Harrant, 2010. "The use of expert opinion, quality and reputation indicators by consumers: evidence from the French vaulting stallion semen market," Post-Print hal-02050913, HAL.
    16. Lecocq, Sébastien & Visser, Michael, 2006. "What Determines Wine Prices: Objective vs. Sensory Characteristics," Journal of Wine Economics, Cambridge University Press, vol. 1(1), pages 42-56, April.
    17. Franklin Allen, 1984. "Reputation and Product Quality," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 15(3), pages 311-327, Autumn.
    18. Pierre Combris & Sebastien Lecocq & Michael Visser, 2000. "Estimation of a hedonic price equation for Burgundy wine," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 32(8), pages 961-967.
    19. Avery, Christopher & Chevalier, Judith, 1999. "Identifying Investor Sentiment from Price Paths: The Case of Football Betting," The Journal of Business, University of Chicago Press, vol. 72(4), pages 493-521, October.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Nicolas Gérard Vaillant & François-charles Wolff, 2012. "Do consumers learn from tasting scores set by experts?," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 32(2), pages 1378-1384.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Dieter Pennerstorfer & Christoph Weiss & Andreas Huber, 2019. "Experts, Reputation and Umbrella Effects: Empirical Evidence from Wine Prices," Economics working papers 2019-08, Department of Economics, Johannes Kepler University Linz, Austria.
    2. Menival, David & Charters, Steve, 2014. "The impact of geographic reputation on the value created in Champagne," Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, vol. 58(2), April.
    3. Nicolas Vaillant & Philippe Lesot & Quentin Bonnard & Valerie Harrant, 2010. "The use of expert opinion, quality and reputation indicators by consumers: evidence from the French vaulting stallion semen market," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 42(6), pages 739-745.
    4. Dubois, Pierre & Nauges, Céline, 2010. "Identifying the effect of unobserved quality and expert reviews in the pricing of experience goods: Empirical application on Bordeaux wine," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 28(3), pages 205-212, May.
    5. Jacobo Núñez & David Martín‐Barroso & Francisco J. Velázquez, 2024. "The hedonic price model for the wine market: A systematic and comparative review of the literature," Agricultural Economics, International Association of Agricultural Economists, vol. 55(2), pages 247-264, March.
    6. Florine Livat & Nicolas Vaillant, 2006. "Expert opinion and brand reputation: an analysis from a French Cuban cigars guidebook," Applied Economics Letters, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 13(2), pages 97-100.
    7. Antonis Michis & Anna Markidou, 2013. "Determinants of retail wine prices: evidence from Cyprus," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 45(1), pages 267-280, August.
    8. James Joseph Fogarty, 2012. "Expert opinion and cuisine reputation in the market for restaurant meals," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 44(31), pages 4115-4123, November.
    9. Fogarty, James Joseph, 2011. "Expert opinion and cuisine reputation in the market for restaurant meals," Working Papers 108666, University of Western Australia, School of Agricultural and Resource Economics.
    10. Vincent Hoang & Takao Iida & Shigeru Matsumoto & Natsuki Watanabe & Clevo Wilson, 2016. "Consumer’s comparison between local and imported organic products: a hedonic analysis of the Japanese table wine market," Eurasian Business Review, Springer;Eurasia Business and Economics Society, vol. 6(3), pages 405-415, December.
    11. Luigi Benfratello & Massimiliano Piacenza & Stefano Sacchetto, 2004. "-What Drives Market Prices in the Wine Industry ? Estimation of a Hedonic Model for Italian Premium Wines," CERIS Working Paper 200411, CNR-IRCrES Research Institute on Sustainable Economic Growth - Torino (TO) ITALY - former Institute for Economic Research on Firms and Growth - Moncalieri (TO) ITALY.
    12. Ali, Héla Hadj & Lecocq, Sébastien & Visser, Michael, 2010. "The Impact of Gurus: Parker Grades and en primeur Wine Prices," Journal of Wine Economics, Cambridge University Press, vol. 5(1), pages 22-39, April.
    13. Livat, Florine & Alston, Julian M. & Cardebat, Jean-Marie, 2019. "Do denominations of origin provide useful quality signals? The case of Bordeaux wines," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 81(C), pages 518-532.
    14. Corsi, Alessandro & Strøm, Steinar, 2013. "The Price Premium for Organic Wines: Estimating a Hedonic Farm-Gate Price Equation," Journal of Wine Economics, Cambridge University Press, vol. 8(1), pages 29-48, May.
    15. M. Laura Donnet & Dave D. Weatherspoon & John P. Hoehn, 2008. "Price determinants in top‐quality e‐auctioned specialty coffees," Agricultural Economics, International Association of Agricultural Economists, vol. 38(3), pages 267-276, May.
    16. Schamel, Guenter, 2003. "International Wine Trade: Analyzing The Value Of Reputation And Quality Signals," 2003 Annual meeting, July 27-30, Montreal, Canada 22157, American Agricultural Economics Association (New Name 2008: Agricultural and Applied Economics Association).
    17. Wallentin, Erik, 2016. "Demand for cinema and diverging tastes of critics and audiences," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 33(C), pages 72-81.
    18. Caracciolo, Francesco & D’Amico, Mario & Di Vita, Giuseppe & Pomarici, Eugenio & Dal Bianco, Andrea & Cembalo, Luigi, 2016. "Private vs. Collective Wine Reputation," International Food and Agribusiness Management Review, International Food and Agribusiness Management Association, vol. 19(3), pages 1-20, August.
    19. Richard Carew & Wojciech J. Florkowski, 2010. "The Importance of Geographic Wine Appellations: Hedonic Pricing of Burgundy Wines in the British Columbia Wine Market," Canadian Journal of Agricultural Economics/Revue canadienne d'agroeconomie, Canadian Agricultural Economics Society/Societe canadienne d'agroeconomie, vol. 58(1), pages 93-108, March.
    20. Schamel, Guenter, 2002. "California Wine Winners: A Hedonic Analysis Of Regional And Winery Reputation Indicators," 2002 Annual meeting, July 28-31, Long Beach, CA 19864, American Agricultural Economics Association (New Name 2008: Agricultural and Applied Economics Association).

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:taf:applec:45:y:2013:i:1:p:99-109. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Chris Longhurst (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.tandfonline.com/RAEC20 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.