Sit back and relax, this is going to be a long post. For the folks from Long Island that are familiar with Roosevelt Field and Sunrise malls, this should be a very entertaining read.
Last Christmas I fulfilled a promise to my wife and made my first ever attempt at quitting smoking. I did so with the Chantix pills. you are supposed to take them for a week while you smoke so it was January 1 that I smoked my very last cigarette.
The first three weeks were not so bad but during the fourth week everything changed. The pills just stopped working and I was about ready to loose it. I was on the edge of buying a pack of cigarettes and instead decided to get an electronic cigarette.
I knew about them from an episode of the television show 'The Doctors' and I know someone through a work related thing that had one and I had seen him 'smoking' it.
Looking at the SE website, there is an 800 number that I could call to find out the nearest brick and mortar location where I could go buy one. When I called the 800 number they informed me the ONLY place on Long Island was the Roosevelt Field Mall.
My closest friend works close to there so I called him and explained that I was loosing it and needed him to go to the mall and get me one of these things and bring it home with him. I am in Amityville so that mall was a bit of a hike and this was more convenient for me. He was good enough to oblige and about an hour later he was at my door with booty in hand.
He bought me one and he bought himself one plus he had 6 boxes of cartridges that they threw in so he gave me three of those too. The exact price he paid is still an unknown to me and in the insterests of friendship it will remain an unknown till the day I die but I gave him $150 because that is what the website said the price was. (ironically the website was pricing the 2.0 and I got the GOLD but they turned out to be the same price so it is a moot point)
Well the SE GOLD pulled me back from the edge and saved me from 'analogs'. I know a lot of people think $150 is a rip off price but the salvation it supplied me was worth it ten fold. Charging that price through the website with drastically reduced overhead is a bit obscene but to pay those prices at a brick and mortar location is really not that crazy.
I ordered more supplies through the website but I was not entirely clear on everything and I got 2.0 supplies. I ended up making a trip or two back to Roosevelt Field for support gear before I finally got my lazy a** in gear to return the old stuff and get GOLD stuff from the website. So far I am only using cartridges and I am even throwing them out when I am done with them because I do not yet know about liquids and refilling on my own.
Now here is an interesting bit of information about the Roosevelt Field Mall kiosk's (there are 2 of them). They will bargain with you if you are good at bargaining. They do charge $55 for atomizers but if you are persistant they will reduce the price to $35. That is what they did for me and I would only consider myself to be average at bargaining. Obviously this is another moot point as they can still be had cheaper online. But so far I have only dealt with official SE outlets.
Well one night I run into a friend and he too has an SE GOLD. He tells me that he gets stuff for his at Sunrise Mall which is so close I could WALK there in about 10 miinutes. He also tells me that they have vials of liquids instead of boxes of cartridges.
The next day I head over to the mall and low and behold there it is, a kiosk dead center of the mall and it has a whole bunch of stuff, not just SE stuff. Just like I was told, they have liquid in vials. Not only that but they have much better prices on the hardware. The same kit that SE was selling for $150, this guy was selling for $120. As if that was not enough, they even had a wider selection of starter kits than the website did.
The kiosks in Sunrise Mall, South Shore Mall, Smithhaven Mall and Walt Whitman Mall are all operated by the same company. The InLife company runs them all.
This is the rundown of the three different starter kits that Smoking Everwhere makes and the prices InLife is charging in the malls.
Kit #1 - $80
1 battery
1 atomizer
10 carts (high)
USB Charger
Kit #2 - $120
2
batteries
1 atomizer
5 carts (high)
wall charger
Kit #3 - $150
2 batteries
1 atomizer
30 carts (10 high, 10 med, 10 low)
wall charger
All are official Smoking Everwhere products or REMARKABLY good bootlegs with perfectly identical packaging.
So anyway, I start getting liquids from the guy at Sunrise Mall. He sells liquids in 10ml eye dropper bottles for $25. I pay that much a couple of times then start bargaining and I get my price down to $20. That goes on for a bit till I finally stumble across this forum and I start lurking.
I came across the foum looking up health related information and I am very glad I did. I did not expect to find such a 'busy community' with so much information available and so many alternatives. I am still a way noob right now. I only have disposable cigar and some liquids coming in the mail so far.
I am in the process of of looking for an alternative to the SE GOLD but the more I look the more I believe my SE GOLD is on par with or better than any other e-ciggarette option available.
So far the only real downside I have to complain about with my SE GOLD is the cartridges REALLY need a slim tip that is easier to grip with teeth. If I keep my SE GOLD sticking out of my mouth where I used to 'carry' an analog it forces my front teeth to be so open I can fit my pinky finger in between my top and botom teeth.
Of all the things said in this thread I think the best advice offered is the guy that said to pop the cap off the back und of the cartridge. I find this very simple little thing can make a tremendous difference in performance.
Without the end cap the draw is much easier and the volume of vapor is greater and the throat hit is easier to achieve.
One other thing I try to be mindfull of is how I carry my e-cig. I do my best to try and not carry it with the cartridge side up since that could allow liquid to run down through the atomizer and into the battery.
All my parts, except 1 battery, are working great, even my two and a half month old atomier that I temporarily thought I killed trying to smoke pot is working great. The only exception is the battery that acts up and does not always switch off. It is just a matter of time and opportunity till I get to Roosevelt Field and I am confident they will replace my battery at no charge.
DW