I know Zen tested and retested everything including many blind taste tests/etc, so I assumed the tip was part of this and thought to myself "if Zen designed it this way, it was likely for a reason".
Maybe there was more reason than I'm realizing though..?
So lets start with something important...
I didn't design Gertrude. (Yes, The name of that drip tip is "Gertrude") She was designed by one of my staff members as part of a drip tip design competition we held in the shop, so the employees could experience first-hand, the process of designing and getting a drip tip into production. Gertrude, designed by Dustin Forkell, was the winner of that competition.
So with that being said, There were quite a few reasons why I decided to use the Gertrude Drip Tip on the Kabuki.
1) Every atomizer I ever made in the past did not include a drip tip. I feel those are personal items that the end-user should find which suits their own needs. In the past few years, the Asian imports started including tips, and consumers became accustomed to the practice. They started questioning why my atties didn't include them. My answer was simple and to the point... you're paying for it, even if you don't use it. Nothing that is "included" is actually free.
2) The Kabuki, as it was designed was tested using hundreds of different tips. Yes they can make a difference, and the ones that made the biggest difference also happened to cost the most. My Mini Ionzer performs AMAZING on the kabuki, but the style may not be to your liking. The performance is unquestionable. But it's not inexpensive enough to include with raising the price to be well over $100.00 for the atty/tip combo. I made the decision to NOT include the tip, yet again. The Kabuki was going to ship without a tip, in keeping with my original marketing.
3) When I came up with the packaging concept, I realized that there needed to be a way to sandwich the
tank between the base unit and the top, so it would not become dislodged in shipping. We had just finished up the Drip Tip design competition that we were doing among the employees, and the winning tip was placed on top of a Kabuki to see if it was the correct height to solve the problem, and it was dead-on... it engaged the top of the package correctly and everything was snug. It isn't an expensive tip to manufacture, because for the Kabuki it would mean we were going to be making them 10,000 at a time... The tip also happened to perform exceptionally well on the
tank, but it really only made it on there because it was an inexpensive solution to a pretty major packaging problem.
The Gertrude tip is what it is; Inexpensive, and it performs very well. She's not going to win any beauty contests, but as a friction fit tip, it's a really solid performer. The Mini ionizer and the Mini Tower REALLY show off the performance, but doggone it, Gertrude comes bloody well close, for a fraction of the price, and actually fits more solidly as well.
Sooooooo..... a lot of thought did go into it, yes, performance was important, but price is everything, especially since I didn't want to add anything that would drive the price up any higher. It's all about the value. Gertrude is packing material, basically... but it performs exceptionally well in spite of the reasons that led to her being included with each and every Kabuki!
