I just read the recommendations to e-juice manufacturers

[timbit]

I just read the recommendations to e-juices suppliers/manufacturers thread & I was hoping to add something...

I'm allergic to a number of things, I have even had seizures from certain cigarette brands due to additives in them... Whenever I get e-juices from anywhere, the first thing I do is take out my Epipens & a bottle of epinephrine, put on a pair of gloves & mask, then I open a bottle drip a drip on a Q-Tip & wipe it on my arm just to see if something in it is going to kill me...

I have to take these precautions because I can't get straight answers on whether "x flavor" has "x ingredients" in it. I know what I'm allergic to, I don't expect other to know for me & even if I was told the product was safe I'ld still have my epipens handy when using a new product for the first few times... But I don't want to have to play Russian roulette with my life just because I want to try a new flavor & some company is so paranoid about corporate espionage that they won't tell a customer who asks whether "x ingredient(s)" in "x product(s)".

I used to make handmade cosmetics, toiletries, etc. &I had no issue with listing all my ingredients & what they could have come in contact with. The last thing I wanted was to risk killing my customer because they put on some makeup or washed with my soap. Sure I didn't put my exact recipes on the label & if someone asked me for them I'ld have laughed them off but it was no sweat off my back to include a basic ingredient list & it shouldn't be for you either.

I also included a clear name of my product... Lavender eucalyptus soap, lime flavored red #22 lipstick, etc. I would certainly never have called my product wama-bama-ding-dong because then my customer wouldn't know what I was selling & wouldn't buy the product. Yes, cutesy names sound sort of cool at first when your thinking them up & are bored of plain old names but it isn't cute to the customer trying to figure out what wama-bama-ding-dong is or if they want/need it.

I totally second the idea of more options, if I like a flavor I'm going to buy lots & I don't want to buy it 1oz at a time, much less have to buy multiple 1oz bottles just to get a decent amount. Same goes for packaging, I don't want a great juice that doesn't get along with plastic to come in a plastic bottle. If I bought a juice I liked, then one day I went to use it, found it had eaten the bottle away, was no longer any good & had to throw it out; I can promise you I won't be buying anything from you again. I don't like throwing my money away. Same with shipping, if I know that a juice needs to be steeped for 2 weeks, I'll go with the cheapest slowest shipping, so when it gets here I can try it right away instead of being teased by a juice I want to try, have in my hand & can't touch for another 2 weeks.

Lastly, create sample packs... Whether you pick certain combinations or say choose 10, 20, 30, etc samples (or a pack with one of each) & offer a bit of a discount on it. Offer a reasonable amount in a sample, at least 5ml. If you did that I would probably spend a good chunk of change to get it, just to try out them all & find the ones I like. Then I'ld spend a lot of money for many years to come because I like your company, policies, products & feel like you actually respect & care about me.

So that's my rant, can it be included? At least the part about allergies because I tried calling lots of companies & almost no one would even tell if their products contain specific things I have anaphylaxic allergies to.

Adam

 

[RT88]

please list your known anaphalaxic agents

 

[gr1llmeacheese]

You just made me take stock. Of the 14 flavors I currently have in rotation only four have straightforward names that explain clearly what they taste like. CLS gets a pass since custard is right there in the name.

 

[bryaninaustin]

Whenever I get e-juices from anywhere, the first thing I do is take out my Epipens & a bottle of epinephrine, put on a pair of gloves & mask, then I open a bottle drip a drip on a Q-Tip & wipe it on my arm just to see if something in it is going to kill me...

That sucks. I would hope that some reputable vendors, especially those who sell organic or all natural, like Virgin, Velvet Cloud, HDV, etc., would be informed and responsive.

Same with shipping, if I know that a juice needs to be steeped for 2 weeks, I'll go with the cheapest slowest shipping, so when it gets here I can try it right away instead of being teased by a juice I want to try, have in my hand & can't touch for another 2 weeks.

Smart and thrifty!

 

[timbit]

The most important & severe is oranges... Not citrus (though oranges were citrus), not lemons, limes, etc. though oranges hybrids/crosses have also caused reactions...

Citric Acid depending on its source, i.e. from oranges or orange hybrids/crosses

Papaya & papaya hybrid/crosses

Many synthetic perfumes though most essential oils are fine.

Aspartame, Saccharin & to a much lesser degree sucralose.

MSG i.e. monosodium glutamate

Certain plants cause an allergic hay fever like reaction.

Gluten as a result of celiac's disease

Any chemical that's proceeded in the body by Cytochrome liver pathway (so basically 90% of the meds out there)

From gluten & below, they aren't actually allergies as muchas autoimmune disorders that are significantly effected by things...

The fruits mentioned, certain synthetic perfumes & the1st 2 artificial sweeteners are the worst of the true allergies & the one between gluten & the 1st 2 artificial sweeteners are true allergies but to a far lesser extant.

Bryan- as for being thrifty, you don't know the half of it... did you ever see or hear of the TV show "extreme couponing", well for the longest time until I got hit by a car that was what I did (among other things). I actually almost never paid for groceries, my service dog ate a raw food organic whole food diet that was paid for by couponing (along with mine) & I was able to donate thousands of dollars of food to thefood bank each year. One time I got 300 memory foam pillows that I donated to a local shelter. It was great fun...

Adam

 

[timbit]

Oops I forgot yeast, as in the yeast used to ferment beer, wine & other alcohol. I can only drink distilled non-aged alcohol. I'm a vodka man!

Its not anaphylactic but its severe & could theoretically become anaphylactic since it already causes the lovely hives (yes I know some docs & allergists class hives as anaphylactic but I don't generally unless it causes a life threatening effect, mainly for me they are just so itchy & sore)...

Adam

 

[Izan]

It looks like the only ingredient you might have to worry about is sucralose.

Have you investigated some of the kosher/halal juice vendors?
They tend to be proud of only using a few ingredients and boast about what they are.

Have fun
I

 

[lasttango]

I can't disagree with the allergen information... no one wants to see someone get hurt...

I don't have a real allergy or have any real life-thratening reactions to particular ingredients, but there are certain flavorings from certain flavoring companies that make me feel quite sick. I typically email vendors and ask them if they use x, y or z... and most of the time, they let me know. Some get high and mighty and tell me there recipe is a big secret... I understand that too... but I can't buy from them in this case.

I also really like the plastic bottle comment... yeah, why send juice that erodes plastic in plastic?


but... some of the recommendations here and from that thread are kind of unrealistic or ignorant when you really think about it... they reflect general misunderstandings about the kind of business people many of our vendors are... Some have no place owning a business... no matter how good or bad their liquid is... they just don't have the skills or appropriate disposition to be in business... very few of these... but they do exist....

...but, many are destined to be small business that really can't afford to grow. They need more labor... or they are dependent on other vendors to supply them with key ingredients that just aren't easily and readily available.

I used to know this lady that made the most delicious cheesecakes you could imagine. She charged $40 per cheesecake... her ingredients were incredibly expensive... and each cheesecake was extremely time consuming. No matter how hard she tried, she could only produce 25-30 cheesecakes per week.
To hire someone else... she'd need to pump out triple the amount of cheese cakes... which would have been impossible. Her sweet spot might have leveled out at 265 cheesecakes and 3 employees... and then she's need a bigger kitchen and refrigerator. etc etc etc etc.

Ultimately, she's be unhappy... because her job would now include managing employees and considerably more math. She was happy making 25 cheesecakes and having a few extra hundred bucks in her pocket. Being the next sara lee didn't look appealing or possible.

Would it have made sense for her to stand on the corner passing out cheesecake samples when she was already so busy? Were some people mad because they were on a 3 week waiting list for one of her cheesecakes? Did her cheesecake business slow down when the grocery stores were low on her secret ingredients?

Did business slow during the weeks her father was ill and she had to drive him 30 miles each way to the hospital?

Did she ever take vacations?

"Our" vendors are much like this. I frequently say "OUR vendors" because many of them were just squids on the message boards like us... and we cheeered them on and encouraged them to sell their liquids... they came from places like ecf. We take some pride in them...

From a marketing sales POV... the "cutesy" names are how a vendor might differentiate their product... I think that's fun...
It's a shame when a vendor makes some simple crappy liquid and gives it a great name that makes you perceive it as something better than it is, but you learn to look deeper...

I too find it somewhat annoying when a vendor doesn't give any clues about what the liquid is supposed to taste like...

One of my favorite vendors: riptrippers/vapetrik is notorious for this. The only reason I continue to buy liquids from him is that I took a chance and I liked it... that's part of the mystique... part of the fun to the people who buy from him. It's his thing. He's driven to make liquids and watch people guess - it seems to amuse him. My advice to the .... retentive is: don't buy this liquid... there are so many vendors out there...

and the sample size argument... I have no use for a 3ml to 6ml bottle of something but I understand many people appreciate these samples...

It's just not always viable for every vendor to do this. So many vendors can barely keep up with real orders... they close mid-week or when capacity is full. These are good vendors. Good business people.

...but they can't afford to grow... grow enough to accommodate samples... At best, they could push out some generic samples... I just don't see how it would make any sense for a vendor to lose time and money pumping out samples when they can barely get normal orders out - I think this would be something vendors who need more business would do... after all, these vendors have the time... and need the customers.

anyway...

It's no wonder why the FDA will easily be able to step in...

More and more people are vaping... more and more opinions... good and bad... customers start demanding certain standards...

Vaping will become like the public education system soon... we are obligated to teach to tests instead of teaching to children... we are obligated to cut back on art, music and electives and teach extra reading comprehension and math...

Vendors will ultimately be stripped of the ability to supply us with creative and unique juices or they will be obligated to meet the individual demands of everyone... until the are driven out of business.

 

[retired1]

I also really like the plastic bottle comment... yeah, why send juice that erodes plastic in plastic?

Because plastic is not the same across the board. It's the type of plastic used the makes a difference. Just because it's a tank cracker doesn't mean it shouldn't be shipped in a plastic bottle. The composition and method of manufacturing are totally different between the two types.