Recent Posts

Alvo - you are now officially CAM-VIP's Head of Derby Operations

Does the title suit you?

Russell

The CAM-VIP map has been updated today and now has 315 entries - please keep them coming

Link removed by Chrissie due to community walks maps throwing up a malware warning.

Russell

10 motives have been trying to get ecig vending machines into pubs for 2 years now with seemingly minimal uptake. They regularly advertise heavily in the 'Morning Advertiser' the pub trade magazine.

The problem they will have Gordy (and Matchless for that matter) is they are trying to charge the same for a disposable as an entry level rechargeable with two cartomisers. Disposables are way too expensive for what they are. Daz (safercigs) has been trying to get a good diaposable that we can get into pubs for £3 a go - he's been struggling. It is only at that price point that you will get more people giving them a go in Pubs!

I agree about the prices Gordy - that is where forums come into their own though, when that vaper looks for alternatives However many people are willing to pay that!

The products may not come close to what we use Hissie but they satisfy thousands and thousands of people.

I'll give you some examples from my own experience. My local pub is a vaping pub and the landlady has recently started to stock few disposables and look-a-like rechargeables behind the bar as well as a few more exotic kits (on CAM-VIP's behalf). The ones that sell are the look-a-likes and the people who buy them keep coming back for cartomisers. At the last count, 8 people have bought Trog's social smokers and are quite happy with them.

One of the more adventurous regulars bought an eGo tank kit on World Vaping Day from Tony2Stix as he was told that it would work better for him - he has since sold it on and gone back to the social smoker.

At work, I have sold 9 SDKs on behalf of CAM-VIP and the people who I sold them to are still using them and buy 510 cartomisers from the vendors we recommend (cos they are cheap) - they have no interest in buying eliquid or upgrading etc - they are happy with what they have got.

Another example is the manager of another pub in my town, she just buys disposables and is quite happy doing so.

A supporting vendor of CAM-VIP (they donate kits to us) have thousands of satisfied customers that just use their Halo look-a-likes and keep returning to buy their non-standard cartomisers.

Us enthusiasts have an overly inflated idea of what impact we have on getting smokers to vape - our input really is negligible. Forums come into their own with those new vapers that are not happy with their look-a-likes. Then we come into our own

Russell

The vendors are spreading the word about ecigs - classic examples being e-lites and 10 motives. The majority of the uptake is through vendors (especially the ones that enthusiasts wouldn't recommend) spending a fortune on advertising in the national press and gettin geezers like Dr Hilary Jones to place their product on national TV.

Because we are enthusiasts, does not mean that we have anything but minimal power (on our own) in spreading the word without media coverage of our 'events'. The majority of credit for the explosion of vaping goes to the lookie-likey vendors and the MONEY they spend on getting the word out there.

Russell

Intervention is inevitable Hissie. It has always been a matter of time, but it is nothing to be scared of as using ecigs is better than all the alternatives to smoking out there. The number of ecig users is now substantial now, so the government will have to come up with some impressive arguments to convince the general public of why they should be medicinalised or taxed to high holy heaven.

The main frustration CAM-VIP has (and Rusty had) is the unwillingness of vaping enthusiasts to 'spread the word' about ecigs.

VapeFest will come and go again this year with no media coverage just like it did last year. World Vaping Day was put on a thursday because it was supposed to be a slack news day - unfortunately with only 7 organised events in the whole of the UK it came and went without any media coverage yet again

The government, tobacco companies and pharmaceutical companies have known about ecigs for a long, long time and are acting on their threat - they are just taking their time to get the 'legal stuff' right before they challenge them as they know that they have no moral high ground.

Vaping enthusiasts with their need for low resistance, high wattage devices (pipe bombs), high mg eliquid for mixing and their obsession with looking like a steam train, will end up being the reason why restrictions will be brought in, not the 200,000 or so that are quite happy with their lookie-likies.

Russell