Thanks for Smoking, and Have a Pleasant Flight
By Dave Demerjian EmailFebruary 23, 2009 | 11:00:00 AMCategories: Air Travel
Thanks for Smoking, and Have a Pleasant Flight | Autopia from Wired.com
Smoking
Remember the days when a transcontinental flight meant free booze, a delicious meal, and a nice after dinner cigarette? We don't either, but there's a European company that does, and is hoping to bring smoking back to the inflight experience.
Belgium-based Supersmoker is marketing its electronic cigarettes, which it says don't produce the toxin rich smoke of regular cigarettes, as a healthy alternative that can be enjoyed spaces where smoking has been banned, like airplanes. The company says it is in talks with at least one major airline, hoping its battery powered butts will be allowed on long haul flights.
Unlike regular cigarettes, the Supesmoker has no tobacco, doesn't burn, and emits no real smoke. It's made up of a vaporization chamber and a cartridge filled with food-derived liquid that produces a tobacco-like flavor. Yum. When a smoker takes a drag of the faux cigarette, it activates a battery that vaporizes the flavor chamber, emitting smoke that is less dangerous and doesn't smell quite as nasty. Each of the replacable cartridges equals 15 to 20 cigarettes, and the batteries need to be recharged every two days or so. An LED indicator at the tip of the cigarette indicates the battery is about to die.
As for the company's claim that it's just a matter of time before frequent fliers are able to smoke at 30,000 feet, it's news to the airlines. Steve Lott over at the International Air Transport Assocation told Wired.com that his organization, which represents 230 airlines, hasn't heard of any negotiating with Supersmoker.
With its typo filled website and cheesy promotional video (below), it would be easy to write off Supersmoker, except that its electronic cigarettes are selling. The product is on the shelf at Harrods, and sold out when it went on sale in Holland in 2007. Ruyun, the world's market leader, says it sold 300,000 of them last year, and electric cigs received a big boost Stateside when they were given a thumbs up on the thoroughly ridiculous daytime talkfest The Doctors.
Supersmoker isn't the first company hoping to profit from nic fit prone passengers. In 2006 a German entrepreneur announced he was launching a smoke friendly carrier called Smokers International Airline, or Smitair. Smitair was to a be an all business-class affair with plush sleeper seats, good food and flight attendants asking "Kaffee, Tee oder eine Zigarette?" The airline, which never got off the ground, promised on its now-defunct website to "bring back the exclusivity in flying encountered in the 1960s."
Depending on your point of view, the chance to puff away in flight might be a good place to start.
Photo: Flickr/roychung1993
By Dave Demerjian EmailFebruary 23, 2009 | 11:00:00 AMCategories: Air Travel
Thanks for Smoking, and Have a Pleasant Flight | Autopia from Wired.com
Smoking
Remember the days when a transcontinental flight meant free booze, a delicious meal, and a nice after dinner cigarette? We don't either, but there's a European company that does, and is hoping to bring smoking back to the inflight experience.
Belgium-based Supersmoker is marketing its electronic cigarettes, which it says don't produce the toxin rich smoke of regular cigarettes, as a healthy alternative that can be enjoyed spaces where smoking has been banned, like airplanes. The company says it is in talks with at least one major airline, hoping its battery powered butts will be allowed on long haul flights.
Unlike regular cigarettes, the Supesmoker has no tobacco, doesn't burn, and emits no real smoke. It's made up of a vaporization chamber and a cartridge filled with food-derived liquid that produces a tobacco-like flavor. Yum. When a smoker takes a drag of the faux cigarette, it activates a battery that vaporizes the flavor chamber, emitting smoke that is less dangerous and doesn't smell quite as nasty. Each of the replacable cartridges equals 15 to 20 cigarettes, and the batteries need to be recharged every two days or so. An LED indicator at the tip of the cigarette indicates the battery is about to die.
As for the company's claim that it's just a matter of time before frequent fliers are able to smoke at 30,000 feet, it's news to the airlines. Steve Lott over at the International Air Transport Assocation told Wired.com that his organization, which represents 230 airlines, hasn't heard of any negotiating with Supersmoker.
With its typo filled website and cheesy promotional video (below), it would be easy to write off Supersmoker, except that its electronic cigarettes are selling. The product is on the shelf at Harrods, and sold out when it went on sale in Holland in 2007. Ruyun, the world's market leader, says it sold 300,000 of them last year, and electric cigs received a big boost Stateside when they were given a thumbs up on the thoroughly ridiculous daytime talkfest The Doctors.
Supersmoker isn't the first company hoping to profit from nic fit prone passengers. In 2006 a German entrepreneur announced he was launching a smoke friendly carrier called Smokers International Airline, or Smitair. Smitair was to a be an all business-class affair with plush sleeper seats, good food and flight attendants asking "Kaffee, Tee oder eine Zigarette?" The airline, which never got off the ground, promised on its now-defunct website to "bring back the exclusivity in flying encountered in the 1960s."
Depending on your point of view, the chance to puff away in flight might be a good place to start.
Photo: Flickr/roychung1993
