Ecigs Abroad

[scaffman69]

Oct 22, 2013 11:39:31 GMT alvoram said:

Just got back from 2 weeks in Tenerife (35 degrees back to this sucks, but that's another matter)

I didn't see a single person using Ecigs, and not a single shop selling them on our explorations. What is with this? Is this a business opportunity waiting to happen considering the numbers of brits that holiday on the island? Or is it a direct reflection on the price of cigarettes over there?

I know a lot of people say there is not much to be saved by using Ecigs, but I find that I am saving around £60 a week. With 20 cigs costing 2.50 EUR over there, is there much less motivation to use an alternative?

BTW I missed the TPD announcement whilst I was over there, what fantastic news to come back to.

My friend has just set a shop up in northern Spain as all the locals found his e-cig amazing and had never seen them. So yes untapped deffo for the market he was looking at, your ordinary Joe Bloggs.

[toots]

Oct 24, 2013 21:56:21 GMT alvoram said:

Hi Toots,

Thank you for your reply.

I love Tenerife, I like diverse places. Where one minute you can be in familiar surroundings with home comforts, yet dig a little further and you can experience other cultures. Which part do you live in Toots?

I honestly didn't see any shops. Though I didn't go inside any of those Indian electronic stores where they stand outside trying to push you, as far as I could see in, they all seemed to have the same stuff... Cameras, cheap tablets, mp3 players and so on. (if these are the Indian shops you mean?)

Whilst I didn't see anyone vaping, I did actually have a couple of drag artists at Decades near the strip (which was a bloody good night btw, Decades that is, not the strip, haha) tell me that they vaped when they saw me using one.

It's a shame the local prices are high though, especially as when you say, the cigarettes are ridiculously low in price.

Hi alvoram, yes in the tourist areas you should feel right at home with all the English bars mixed in with the Spanish ones (trying to be English haha), but travel a little bit further up the mountains and it's like being in a different world altogether where the locals more than likely do not speak a word of English and where you can be right in the midst of the Canarian culture and cuisine, oh and normally a lot cheaper prices in the shops and bars too.

Having lived here now almost 13 years, when we venture out for meals we tend not to go to the touristic areas, but travel out to the Canarian places, both for the cheap food & drink and to be able to really mix with the native Canarians. Once accepted into their fold you find them to be so genuinely friendly and sincere, but it does take a while for the villagers to really accept you, and their culture is so laid back and gentle it is unbelievable.

I live on the Golf del Sur, it's not that well known to tourists, it is a small area almost like a village. Everyone knows everyone and everyone's business, you can't go anywhere in the village without meeting at least 10 people you know, and of course, everyone knowing which bar you were in the night before and what you were doing haha.

Yeah, I did mean those Indian shops selling electronics etc. Not so sure about the big towns like Los Christianos or Las Americas stocking the e-liquids in those shops, but they do where I live, probably coz too many of us locals have stopped buying analogue cigs.

I know 'the strip' well, must say though I haven't been down there in a few years now, but hear plenty about it from others.

As for prices of vaping gear etc being high, we probably just haven't got enough competition between the shops as they are mostly, if not all, franchises of 'Good Smoke'. Maybe I should open up an independent shop and give them some competition haha.

[chrisjw]

The Canarians in particular, are a law unto themselves............I lived in the Canaries for 22 years & when they bought in the "No smoking" in bars & restaurants, the majority of them totally blanked it...................

[toots]

Oct 25, 2013 16:05:01 GMT chrisjw said:

The Canarians in particular, are a law unto themselves............I lived in the Canaries for 22 years & when they bought in the "No smoking" in bars & restaurants, the majority of them totally blanked it...................

When they first brought in that law, it was different in the Canaries from Spain. Here the bar/restaurant owners could decide whether they wanted to prohibit smoking or not in their bars. Some prohibited smoking and put their prohibit signs up, but that did not last long because no-one went into their bars, everyone just went into the bars/restaurants who had the opposite signs up allowing smoking, so those prohibit signs were soon changed to allowing signs . That lasted for a good couple of years or more, before the full ban was brought in and all bars/restaurants had to stop people smoking.

Actually it doesn't really affect us in the Canaries too much because the weather is generally good here all year round and most people sit outside the bars anyway.

Which island did you live on chris?

[chrisjw]

I lived in Lanzarote toots...........Moved there in 1985 ( before it got commercialised ) & left to move to France in 2007.......Have gone full circle & back in the UK now.......

[toots]

Oct 25, 2013 16:27:19 GMT chrisjw said:

I lived in Lanzarote toots...........Moved there in 1985 ( before it got commercialised ) & left to move to France in 2007.......Have gone full circle & back in the UK now.......

Only been to Lanzarote once, and only for a day whilst on a 7 day cruise between the islands. Can't remember the name of the place now where they have the coach tours around all the volcanic rock and end up at the live volcano that they cook the chickens on, is it El Teguise or something similar? Anyway we did that little tour and watched the steam spitting up from the active volcano's and saw all the chicken being cooked. Was a good day out.

I don't think I could ever move back to the UK now, like you've done. Each time I have gone back to England for a short while I can't wait to get back here. Just couldn't hack it back there anymore. Too stressful, all rush rush rush, not to mention the weather. Nope, couldn't do it