I guess Alien Vision's just isn't going....

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Jethead

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Me too. I LOVE Boba's and REALLY want to try Gorilla juice.

Ben was probably massively stressed as was I....

I'm glad to see the slightly snarky message is gone and replaced with what happened. Pretty telling the previous was posted under some major stress. The new message seems...calmer. lol Web stuff is a PITA. I sell online and it takes almost as much time in front of a computer than it does making things to sell. And then when things don't work right? Phhht. It's crazy making for non-techies. AVE hasn't lost me as a potential customer, I'll try again sometime.
 

Euphonious Nonsense

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I guess it's easy for me (as a business owner) to sit here and judge another business owner.

Having said that, the Alien Visions website posts that they will have more Boba's on april 16th, then they open on april 16th and are completely overwhelmed with orders apparently crashing their server all kinds of errors, problems, people questioning if they got their order in, if it got paid for....

Then they post a somewhat sarcastic note about all the help tickets they get as well as a message saying they will reopen for orders at 8am PST. That doesn't happen at all, in fact as far as I can tell they never opened today for business at all.

Look Benjamin LaBarre, if I were you and I knew I pretty much had exclusive ownership of what appears to be the WORLD'S BEST SELLING E-juice, i'd probably get a supplier who could keep up, HJIRE some folks who can mix juice, get a shipper who is willing to deal with you on WORLDWIDE SHIPPING and GET FRIKKING BUSY mixing, selling and shipping the hell outta Boba's while it's hot.

It's a huge fad right now, make your money while you still can.

Sorry, just had to vent.

Seems to me like there are to many vendors who are either to lazy, to scared to invest in their own business or PURPOSELY keeping supply low to create all this drama when people want what you're selling. Vaperev, has like 4 things out of 200 on their ENTIRE site that are in stock.... ProVari has a 4-8 day "processing time" ... is that about?

Another thing.... I just ordered a 236 ml bottle of Mt Baker Vapor's "Peach Tobacco" shipped in 2 days to my home for like $46, why does a 100 ml bottle of Boba's shipped cost $53?

Sorry again, but this just smells to me like crappy business management.

I like Boba's A LOT, and just want to be able to get it without it consuming 1/2 my day to place one stinking online order.....

Flame suit on.........

TPR has a 5-7 day "processing time" on juice orders right now too... I cant lie, it's getting annoying.
 

Rocketpunk

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Tried that route, failed miserably. I mean, in craptacular fashion. Covered in failure sauce.

Your Order Contains...

Cart Items SKU Qty Item Price Item Total
Build Your Own E Juice
(Nicotine Strength: 24 mg/ml (Strong), Blend: Max VG%, Bottle Size: 30 ml + $2.5, Extra Flavoring Shot (.25 cents per shot): 0)
Name Your Flavor: Slave I
Flavor 1*: Graham Cracker
Flavor 2*: Honey
Flavor 3: Coumarin Pipe Tobacco
Flavor 4: Fudge Brownie
"Parts" Flavor 1*: 40
"Parts" Flavor 2*: 25
"Parts" Flavor 3: 25
"Parts" Flavor 4: 10
buildyourownejuice 1


I would've included raisin or raisin bran, but MBV doesn't have that flavor. Yet.

Solution:

Use this site to find the best, agreed upon recipe for boba's.

Goto MBV, and select to build your own juice.

Create juice, place order, wait 2 days.

Voila.

cg
 

ScarletAbby

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Whoops! I guess I just feel like they're more expensive, I dont know why. Sorry to allusion and HHV. Not meaning to be down on them anyway, I love their juices!

I just went to HHV and looked at their prices. They are very reasonable. I think I'll order me some!
Hey no prob, I know is hard to come up with an objective opinion while keeping at bay fanboys/girls :D. I definitely vouch for Ahlusion but I've only tried a couple of other companies (Mt Bakers, HHV, and couple unknown/forgettable B&M) so I'm in no way an expert. If you order from Ahlusion though, wait two weeks and they'll send you an email asking for your feedback (to create your profile) and attached to that you'll find a coupon code. (Ahlusion's fangirl out :] )
 

ScarletAbby

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Having said all that i have in this thread, look, I'm not mad at AVE or anyone in this thread.

Just venting my personal opinion which (BTW my wife tells me) occasionally sucks.
Don't worry, I don't think anyone in this thread (including myself of course :] ) has been in any way or form disrespectful or rude. We're not even bashing vendors. What happened with AVE regarding Boba's availability will just blow over in a couple of days. I agree with you he could have manage these past couple of days better but he's only human after all like Doots said. I probably won't try to get any boba in a while cause my vacation is almost over, next week I go back to work and I'll be working by the time AVE opens so I'll just leave it till next time.
 

McGarnagle

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I think Ben is trying as hard as he can to rectify things.. Being hit lately with the credit card thing is daunting for him and the customer, plus he has to figure out what went wrong. Working with IT as I do, it can take a long time to trace things out and find out if it is even his site at fault , which I doubt it was. More likely it was not directly his site that got hacked but the credit card processor site.

I am pretty sure he doesn't trust giving his recipes to anyone to manufacture, fearing they will steal them or even an employee that wants to start his own juice business..

These things take a lot of time to figure out especially when you are doing everything you can to get orders out the door and still run your business and take care of you and your family..

Yes, I am sure there are things he can and will do to facilitate taking more orders, but there isn't an easy solution when you are dealing with sensitive recipes that can and are stolen by scrupulous people out there.

My card was hacked also using his site, but I dont think it was his site that was at fault.. This is happening all over. Credit card processors have a lot of responsibility to bear for this happpening... But he gets all the headaches for it and has to answer a hundred emails a day of unhappy customers.

How can he get orders done and answer all the support requests? It has to be done..

I would suggest just giving Ben time to get things figured out and I am sure things will get better.. Just like you would want to have if you owned his business and were in his shoes.. No one wants to turn money away including Ben.

I have ordered from him since the beginning and yes, it is not convenient at times to wait to order..

But I do, and I order 100 ml bottles when I can afford it so I dont have to always be waiting,

I know some ppl cant afford it and sometimes I cant either, so I just get the 30ml size of what I like, which is blend 4- 24mg and Havana Gold- 24mg. Some of the others I don't like but those are my 2 favorites from Ben.

I like Ben and he has tried hard to meet everyones expectations of him..

He was around this forum before he started selling juice and is a very nice guy..

Probably a stressed out guy right now.. Please give him a break.

He doesnt have to do this for us at all if he chooses not to..

I think he deserves some kind of break here.. But yes his system needs improvement and he knows it.

The issues are understandable. I am only asking that they send out a mass email to all customers letting them know their card information may have been stolen. This is common business practice, and would not have taken a lot of effort (at least it shouldn't if his system is set up in any reasonable manner). Instead I found out here. Not that it mattered to me since I monitor my card activities pretty well. I caught the fraudulent charge right away, but many others may not have. I am not asking that he has security like fort knox or he should resolve any security issues in minutes. Yet when they do happen, it is is responsibility to alert his customers through email in a timely fashion.

Also, the note that was on his site (which is now gone) was rather unprofessional. Again, that does not take a lot of effort to simply create messages in a friendlier manner. I understand he is probably frustrated at this point, but the last thing a person should do is create a condescending note to his customers (the tone of the note was rather poor). Even the current one, while matter of fact and informative, is not that great IMO. It's not bad, but most places would include verbiage such as "we apologize for the error or any misunderstangin," "thank you for your continued patronage and we are working to rectify the issues," yada yada yada. Most other companies would also create coupons as a thanks to their customers for their patience or continual business through a difficult time.

Those are not things that take a lot of effort, and buy a lot of good will. I understand supply issues. I understand security issues. I understand ordering issues. I don't expect those to be solved overnight and I am patient. Yet his PR through the whole thing, which doesn't take that much effort, has been rather poor.
 

exnihilo

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Tried that route, failed miserably. I mean, in craptacular fashion. Covered in failure sauce.

Your Order Contains...

Cart Items SKU Qty Item Price Item Total
Build Your Own E Juice
(Nicotine Strength: 24 mg/ml (Strong), Blend: Max VG%, Bottle Size: 30 ml + $2.5, Extra Flavoring Shot (.25 cents per shot): 0)
Name Your Flavor: Slave I
Flavor 1*: Graham Cracker
Flavor 2*: Honey
Flavor 3: Coumarin Pipe Tobacco
Flavor 4: Fudge Brownie
"Parts" Flavor 1*: 40
"Parts" Flavor 2*: 25
"Parts" Flavor 3: 25
"Parts" Flavor 4: 10
buildyourownejuice 1


I would've included raisin or raisin bran, but MBV doesn't have that flavor. Yet.

Holy mother of someone's god, that looks, um, huh? You should never let a pothead create flavors for you!

j/k :D . I've seen a lot of recipes on here, but that one is new to me. Graham cracker, coconut, and cotton candy was one I saw that they said tasted similar. I think there's a thread dedicated to replicating the flavor in the DIY section.

A quick digression: The one flavor I love by them, Blend4, hasn't the following, and there for no recipes. -sadface-

cg
 

crzyhrse99

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Cmon now the most popular juice in the market goes offline for what a week? And then folks complain AFTER he noted a limited supply to be for sale on a certain day, lol of course .... is gonna hit the fan!

Go somewhere else (you'll be back) to find juice you can get around the clock, there is a reason its the juice of the year!

Oh and my 60ml went through hehheehe
 

Monk33

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I wish they would take american express..i had to setup an alarm on tuesday and f5 about a dozen time to get my order in. Initially i wanted to get 2 of the 18 ml one of boba and one of gorilla but the price turned me off so only ordered one. Overall i hope its as good as the hype says it is and my visa is not in harms way...
 

crzyhrse99

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Jan 12, 2013
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I wish they would take american express..i had to setup an alarm on tuesday and f5 about a dozen time to get my order in. Initially i wanted to get 2 of the 18 ml one of boba and one of gorilla but the price turned me off so only ordered one. Overall i hope its as good as the hype says it is and my visa is not in harms way...

Better check that order number to make sure it went through, I had my cart filled out way b4 they opened up and had a hell of a time getting it processed. But thankfully it went through and picked up some samples of Bees Knees and Straw Cheescake. Check the homepage to make sure youre order number went through, and speaking of hype lol its pretty good too (reckless TH for a mainly VG juice
)
 

Monk33

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Better check that order number to make sure it went through, I had my cart filled out way b4 they opened up and had a hell of a time getting it processed. But thankfully it went through and picked up some samples of Bees Knees and Straw Cheescake. Check the homepage to make sure youre order number went through, and speaking of hype lol its pretty good too (reckless TH for a mainly VG juice
)

it already went through, its been shipped out and im getting delivery tomorrow.
 

Jethead

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As far as I can tell they have not opened back up after the original problem back on the 16th & 17th.

Wow, I feel for the owner of that place.

So because of a run on 1 or 2 kinds of juice I carry out of like 20 I have I can't sell anything at all because I can't even open my store??

...

I'd be putting Boba's sales on a separate server ASAP and even sooner than that I'd be looking for some new IT guy's or gal's.

Dude must be seriously frustrated.... I know I am as a consumer.
 

BiggestPapi

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I had this exact thought last night. Set up a SEPARATE storefront for Boba's; Gorilla; and any other extremely high-demand juice he has - almost like a boutique site - and keep the remainder for the main AVE site.

I use some of his tobacco flavors (555, Flue) and like them very much - kills me I can't order the 'normal' stuff b/c of the Boba legions. :p
 
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