What makes a liquid "premium" vs "mid-grade" vs "cheap"?

[Kabooma]

Just wondering..

I've ordered from a few "premium" sites, and yes, the juice was excellent, but also I've tried a few less expensive options, and clearly there is a difference, but I also DIY my own.

What I don't get is that I should assume taste is subjective, so what other factors make those labels besides price?

Where would my DIY fall? I use wiz labs for base and Lorann for flavor and HDV for sweetner.. I like my stuff much better than anything I've tried, outside of some pink spot and HHV stuff... and when I nail down a good recipe to match those, I would think my flavors would be equally as excellent..

Guess I'm asking more than just one question. Let's really flesh it all out, I'm super curious.

 

[Harlen]

I like what I make better then anything I can buy.
So what I make is the premium all others are mid grade or low grade lol

 

[Jimi D.]

I like what I make better then anything I can buy.
So what I make is the premium all others are mid grade or low grade lol

I would say my own is premium as well. I only use flavors from Poland. VG PG from Procter & Gamble. Nic base from Nude and Wizard Labs. Three grades from vendors, "marketing bologna".

 

[KjAthena]

What makes a juice company "premium" to me
Unusual hard to duplicate flavors (think gourmet teas, coffees, chocolates, unusual deserts)
quality ingredients
exceptional customer service
Great packaging
I prefer glass drippier bottles
I am a sucker for personalized notes/samples great artwork and imagination on the website.

Simple I can make cheap....a company that makes me want to spend $$$ with them is wonderful

 

[Train2]

It's very simple, really: If you can get away charging
$.01 to $.39/ml: budget liquid
$.40 to $.60/ml: mid-range liquid
$.60 to $1.00/ml: premium liquid
>$1/ml: marketing guru/con artist

Seriously though - the vendors that are long-term successful at higher prices, mostly have a few juices that are unique that establish their brand as premium. If you CAN'T get that flavor you love elsewhere, it justifies a higher price. I think that the unique flavor is probably more a matter of an unexpected, or complex recipe - and not necessarily any higher priced ingredients...
No one's going to thrive long term charging $1/ml for something that's pretty clearly 1 or 2 TFA flavors in a straight mix, as someone charging less will end up getting that business.

 

[spaceballsrules]

Your DIY is as "premium" as any juice vendor. Same quality nic, PG, VG, and flavors. The difference is that [I assume] you don't have a website to build and maintain, customer service to attend to, a mixing lab that is akin to a premium science lab where all employees wear labcoats, facemasks, and shoe covers, and you don't print out really nice informative labels and stick them on glass bottles with fancy dripper tops. You probably don't mix up massive batches of juice and steep them for 2 weeks before bottling and labeling, either. Some vendors have recipes that are proprietary, and demand for that flavor is high. All of this factors into the cost of the juice. Also, some vendors just blatantly overcharge for their product to make more $$$.

 

[Crunktanium]

It's easy to mix Pineapple and Coconut with Rum or simply use a premade flavoring. Much harder to add a hint of orange and cranberry to a tea. That is without it actually tasting to much like orange and cranberry rather then tea or being overly bitter or sweet. Then there is the issue of how many ways you can possibly mix similar flavors and actually make each recipe truly unique. I see many simple recipes posted all the time but rarely see the very complex recipes being given away.

Developing well blended recipes takes a good bit of time and can be (not always) costly for the R&D. I know one juice maker that spends about an hour or two a day for up to two weeks developing a single flavor. In the span of time spent mixing and testing one juice it lessens the number of orders for existing flavors he can fill. He could hire someone to fill more orders but that just adds more overhead. And this particular vendor sells for $.45/ml for his juice. If he added glass vials, fancy labels and packaging like AiV you would then have a higher premium juice. Though not all premium juice is actually premium or actually worth a cent more then the cheap stuff.

Many people who vape simply don't care about DIY and can afford to buy what they like. Most people who can afford a $300+ mod should have no problem paying $1/ml for juice. These are the same people who will pay $2 for a premium beer or $200 for a premium wine. There is cheap beer in cheaper cans (Yuck!) for those who like cheap and plenty of DIY resources for both beer and wine. And again like with liquors there are vendors who charge more for steeping so the juice is ready when you buy it.

 

[JJOOHHNN]

I might be mistaken but I thought the premium stuff was organic and they were brewing up their own mixers.

Kind of like a bakery or making flavors from scratch. I don't know what goes into making juice but that is what I thought was going on.

 

[Thunderball]

Yeah.. put it in a glass bottle and a nice sticker, placing it in its own individual container and grossly over charging...BAM !! Premium E liquid.

 

[CloudZ]

My opinion is that the grades you mentioned are all subjective, you can rank it by price or by how much you like it. "Grade", when other people talk about it, doesn't tell me anything about how "good" it is.

For price, I consider "cheap" juice to be anything less than $7/15mL. "Mid" is $7 to $12/15mL. "Premium" is anything more expensive than that. DIY is always "cheap" in this regard, unless you factor in your time making it.

Then there is "perceived quality", how much I like it, how "good" it tastes, etc. I consider HHV, AVE, BWB, and MOV to be "premium" because I think they all make high quality juice which tastes very good to me, yet they are "mid" priced. A few juices from vendors like MBV and ECB, and even a couple by Hangsen I picked up at Fasttech I would call "mid" despite clearly being "cheap" in price. These ones don't give me that "premium" feeling, so I think they are just "pretty good". I have bought "mid" priced juice that tastes "cheap" and certainly quite a few that both cost and taste "cheap".

I don't bother with anything that is actually "premium" priced in my mind, because I know taste is subjective and I might not like it. Or, I might really like it and be tempted to spend more than I want to on juice. My "mid" priced "premiums" are satisfying enough.

Sorry for all the quotations and useless babbling... just wanted to get my opinion in on this topic.

 

[spaceballsrules]

I wanted to add that there are vendors that make their own flavor or tobacco extractions, and that deserves a "premium" label if the flavors are good. I can think of a couple of vendors who make their own flavor extracts, which takes some serious distillation hardware. There are a bunch of vendors that make their own tobacco extractions, which is a skill all its own when done correctly.

 

[JJOOHHNN]

I wanted to add that there are vendors that make their own flavor or tobacco extractions, and that deserves a "premium" label if the flavors are good. I can think of a couple of vendors who make their own flavor extracts, which takes some serious distillation hardware. There are a bunch of vendors that make their own tobacco extractions, which is a skill all its own when done correctly.

That is what I assumed premium was. Where they made their own flavors. I don't know who all makes their own flavors but that is the impression that I got one what was premium.

 

[Steamix]

TPE - The PERFUMERS Apprentice - the name says it basically: perfumers and flavourists are a bit like composers . Composers use musical instruments and score sheets . Flavourists and perfumers juggle chemicals and percentages or ppm's ....
Some create symphonies or million sellers - others create dissonant pieces that may entice your dog in joining in the howling....

Simple example : Vanilla flavour - the 'true' vanilla flavour is like 200 odd chemicals in various concentrations.

Buy pure vanillin - dissolve - blend with a bit of ethy maltol and you get something that resembles vanilla. May be even marketable in the 'budget stratum' because vanillin is cheap to make.

Do the same and add some miniscule amopunts of a dozen other constituents for a more 'rounded out' flavour that comes closer to the true thing - means more testing, more researching, more ingriedients or extracts which will make the final product better tasting and more expensive. Successful flavours and successful perfumes - their exact composition are closely guarded trade secrets. Because it that very reason which makes the difference between ho-hum and wow.... and 'wow' always commands a few cents more than ho-hum...

 

[Fulgurant]

That is what I assumed premium was. Where they made their own flavors. I don't know who all makes their own flavors but that is the impression that I got one what was premium.

Right, that's the presumption. Whether it's always or even usually true is another question. And then there are vendors who charge premium prices for generally well-regarded juices but suck at customer relations, or who just flat-out suck at running a business.

So the matter boils down to what you like. Once you've established what flavors you like, most juices are pretty damn cheap in comparison with cigarettes, anyway.

 

[white88stag]

From my research, applying the term "premium" to a label does not require any confirmation of standards and should not be interpreted to convey anything more than your standard "Super Funtime #1 Best in USA" e liquid.

It'd be nice to think there was a Premium Police that made sure knuckleheads making bathtub liquids couldn't apply the term.

 

[Train2]

Some are like that. Some, who knows?!

I might be mistaken but I thought the premium stuff was organic and they were brewing up their own mixers.

Kind of like a bakery or making flavors from scratch. I don't know what goes into making juice but that is what I thought was going on.

 

[Crunktanium]

It'd be nice to think there was a Premium Police that made sure knuckleheads making bathtub liquids couldn't apply the term.

I am actually more trusting of a guy in his bathroom (where the industry began) with off the shelf flavor then a super lab using who knows what. For me what makes good juice is safe ingredients and not being cheap on flavor. Some premium vendors even load their stuff down with mostly PG simply to save money on flavoring. The standard 70/30 works in most cases but a true premium vendor should be doing a balancing act with every mix. I expect a cheap mix from average juice but not something that costs more then twice the norm.

Don't care how or where you mix as long as it's 100% US, bottles/equipment are clean and the juice is full flavor with low calories. What we don't want is big Pharma or Tobacco and their super labs taking over. If that does happen what you will get at a real premium will not be better for you.

 

[spaceballsrules]

That is what I assumed premium was. Where they made their own flavors. I don't know who all makes their own flavors but that is the impression that I got one what was premium.

A good example of a vendor that makes their own distillations and extractions would be Ahlusion. 80% of their flavors are made in house.

Another example would be Want2Vape, who do most of their own tobacco extractions in-house.

There are also vendors that do some extractions, but also use flavors made by others, and are happy to tell you exactly which juices have which flavors, such as GoodeJuice.

There are lots of examples of each kind all over the place, and the good ones are happy to tell you where they source their ingredients, either through descriptions on their websites or by just asking them nicely.

 

[RT88]

It's Taste Taste Taste. that comes from blending skill and the experience and intuition of a skilled chef, followed by supply and demand. Build it and they will taste it and they will come.

Premium ingredients usually give better and repeatable taste, but if they could get that taste with something else we would still buy it because i dont see an ingredient list anywhere. the fancy chefs at expensive restaurants sometimes use expensive hard to get ingredients, but thats the exception. mostly they are using things you can buy at the supermarket.