First of all someone needs to convince the suppliers and manufacturers to market the atomizers as disposable. It appears that typically starter kits contained 2 batteries and one atomizer causing a subconscious expectation among consumers that the atomizer is a long lasting piece of equipment. We most of us have figured out by now that the atomizers are basically cat crap in a tube waiting to happen to the user at the most annoying possible moment.
Concurrent with the push that the atomizers are disposable the prices need to drop to about $5 a piece (the magic "cost of a pack" number) and the warranties need to be eliminated. I can't think of any other $8 device that gets the kind of use that an atomizer gets that has a six month warranty for goodness sake. At the same time someone needs to implement a buy-back program. I'm fairly confident that the atomizers can be retooled and refurbished by the manufacturers... possibly even some enterprising company in the US.
Suppose you're buying your atomizers in packs of five every month at $5 each, every time one starts acting funky you just toss it in a box and when you have twenty "dead" atomizers you close the box, tape it up and throw it in the mail box. A week later you get a $10 credit on your account (Or whatever, enough to make it worth your time to throw it in the mailbox).
THEN, someone needs to come up with a PCC that holds and charges at least two batteries at the same time AND has a built in passthru. You're in the car, you pull a retractable cord out of the bottom of your PCC and plug it into the usb adapter that lives in the cigarette lighter socket. You open your PCC and pull out the passthru battery, screw on an atomizer and begin vaping while the PCC lays on the other seat/dash/console/whatever. You arrive at your destination, unplug the charger and it retracts into the PCC, unscrew the atomizer from the passthru battery and pull out a regular battery, screw the atty onto that and go about your business.
Or you just retract the cables, go into your office and plug into a usb port on your computer and carry on without worrying about battery life. Your atomizer starts acting weird, no problem just unscrew it and shove it in a slot in the side of your PCC, a fresh atty pops out the bottom pez like and you carry on as per usual. Same with carts on the other side of the PCC box.
Fit all that into something the size of a pack of analog 100s, sell them for $100 and sell them by the hundreds of thousands... of course in reality it will be the size of a brick, break every other day and leak nicotine and battery acid all over the place.
The point is until e-cigs are only marginally more annoying than analogs they're gonna be a tough sell on the average smoker. Heck, SOMEONE needs to come up with an automatic cartridge refiller... Most of us are willing to fiddle fart around with all this stuff but face it, we're weird. And I want every smoker off those bloody stupid analogs, because they deserve to have a better life just like I do.
Tonight, for the first time in my life I found out what other people have been putting up with. My wife and I were on the way to dinner and we stopped at an intersection and I realized I was smelling smoke, sure enough the people in the car next to us were smoking, and we had our windows rolled up. I was stunned, I had no idea tobacco smoke really carried like that. I almost jumped out of the van and ran over to their car yelling "dude! you have GOT to try this, it'll change your life!" I didn't because I do try to limit my insane outbursts... and I live in a concealed carry state.
The US used to be famous for innovation, somewhere there's got to be someone able to take this vaping thing to the next level that will help mainstream it before Big Tobacco and the feds figure out what's going on. If e-cigs become as common as iPhones there won't be anything the govt can do about it and I think the key to mainstreaming the whole thing is cost and ease of use (isn't that pretty much always the case?)
So there's the plan, my work here is done.
Concurrent with the push that the atomizers are disposable the prices need to drop to about $5 a piece (the magic "cost of a pack" number) and the warranties need to be eliminated. I can't think of any other $8 device that gets the kind of use that an atomizer gets that has a six month warranty for goodness sake. At the same time someone needs to implement a buy-back program. I'm fairly confident that the atomizers can be retooled and refurbished by the manufacturers... possibly even some enterprising company in the US.
Suppose you're buying your atomizers in packs of five every month at $5 each, every time one starts acting funky you just toss it in a box and when you have twenty "dead" atomizers you close the box, tape it up and throw it in the mail box. A week later you get a $10 credit on your account (Or whatever, enough to make it worth your time to throw it in the mailbox).
THEN, someone needs to come up with a PCC that holds and charges at least two batteries at the same time AND has a built in passthru. You're in the car, you pull a retractable cord out of the bottom of your PCC and plug it into the usb adapter that lives in the cigarette lighter socket. You open your PCC and pull out the passthru battery, screw on an atomizer and begin vaping while the PCC lays on the other seat/dash/console/whatever. You arrive at your destination, unplug the charger and it retracts into the PCC, unscrew the atomizer from the passthru battery and pull out a regular battery, screw the atty onto that and go about your business.
Or you just retract the cables, go into your office and plug into a usb port on your computer and carry on without worrying about battery life. Your atomizer starts acting weird, no problem just unscrew it and shove it in a slot in the side of your PCC, a fresh atty pops out the bottom pez like and you carry on as per usual. Same with carts on the other side of the PCC box.
Fit all that into something the size of a pack of analog 100s, sell them for $100 and sell them by the hundreds of thousands... of course in reality it will be the size of a brick, break every other day and leak nicotine and battery acid all over the place.
The point is until e-cigs are only marginally more annoying than analogs they're gonna be a tough sell on the average smoker. Heck, SOMEONE needs to come up with an automatic cartridge refiller... Most of us are willing to fiddle fart around with all this stuff but face it, we're weird. And I want every smoker off those bloody stupid analogs, because they deserve to have a better life just like I do.
Tonight, for the first time in my life I found out what other people have been putting up with. My wife and I were on the way to dinner and we stopped at an intersection and I realized I was smelling smoke, sure enough the people in the car next to us were smoking, and we had our windows rolled up. I was stunned, I had no idea tobacco smoke really carried like that. I almost jumped out of the van and ran over to their car yelling "dude! you have GOT to try this, it'll change your life!" I didn't because I do try to limit my insane outbursts... and I live in a concealed carry state.
The US used to be famous for innovation, somewhere there's got to be someone able to take this vaping thing to the next level that will help mainstream it before Big Tobacco and the feds figure out what's going on. If e-cigs become as common as iPhones there won't be anything the govt can do about it and I think the key to mainstreaming the whole thing is cost and ease of use (isn't that pretty much always the case?)
So there's the plan, my work here is done.
