I just love how some guys come in complaining about juice flav's
then the price is way to high (cheap next to ciggs)
then you start talking I could make better juice then all the high end places for 6 cents
What I don't understand is how come none of you guy can open up this amazing
ejuice website with top end juice for cheap?
(This is gonna be on the longer side, but I hope you'll read it anyway)
This is part of a larger issue I run into constantly when trying to discuss juice on this forum.
There is a very large group of people who think juice is juice. Its just PG/VG/Nic/Flavor. Why pay these exorbitant prices when I can make gallons for pennies of my own, tailored to my tastes juice?
-This is a half truth, flawed way of looking at the bigger picture.
What rarely comes up, is QUALITY LEVEL. And when it IS brought up, the discussion veers wildly of course and splits into two groups of people, those who think juice is juice, and those who think its not so simple.
Heres the problem though.
Whenever someone expresses an interest in what I will label as "High End" juice, there is an automatic reaction from a very large group of people, and its a negative one. "Ill never pay that much for juice" "What a ripoff, its all marketing" "Yeah maybe if they didnt spend so much on packaging it would cost less" (and my ABSOLUTE favorite) "I can make the same thing for pennies, and it'll probably be better"
And so, the person or persons who don't agree with them, end up coming out looking like pretentious .......s who want to flaunt their money and their vaping status, because there is a smaller amount of them as opposed to the very large group of people who think, juice is juice.
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There is a quality aspect that is hard to define and nail down to one specific thing in the E Juice market. Its easy to identify, but hard to quantify. If I may veer off briefly, my main hobby is coffee. I have been what we call ourselves, Coffeegeeks, for about 5 years now. I try to brew the best possible cup of coffee, extract the best possible espresso, make the best possible cappuccino, that I possibly can make, every time I make them. Ive spent more on equipment that most people spend on a used car. There is an EASILY defined quality level in coffee. And to spare the arguments, Ill leave it there. Coffee can EASILY be defined as what is quality, and what is garbage. Its quantifiable, its fact, and it can be proven and replicated. Same with Wine, and the same with beer. The quality level can be defined, and its not up for interpretation past personal preference.
But with E liquid, the transparency isn't there. Some places are more transparent than others, but for the most part, recipes and ingredients are CLOSELY guarded, so much so that EVERY juice vendor out there can list their ingredients as "PG, VG, Flavor, Nic", and nothing else. Which is fine for the purpose of proving they're not using harmful additives, thats its only the things we desire, but as far as what makes one juice better than the other, us vapers dont get a lot of info.
Two Companies of the top of my head, both of which fall into the "High End" juice category, ARE telling us why their juice is more expensive, why it should be, and what makes it more quality than another brand. Those two are Five Pawns and Ahlusion. Both of these juice brands use their OWN flavors, made from the real world components, in their own way, to produce their flavorings needed for the juices they make. This is an EASILY quantifiable fact about these two brands of juice, as to why they are higher quality than another brand, and why their juice commands a premium price.
Are other juice brands doing this? Yes. Can it be proven beyond a level of doubt? Not likely, because so many companies guard everything about their recipes. But I can easily give you the non quantifiable answer; my tastes tell me they are. Ive tried FP, and Ahlusion, and others juices made from real extracts, and I know the difference. I can easily tell the difference between what is a real apple flavor and what is a synthetic flavoring, but what is quantifiable about that? Nothing. Nothing at all. Why should ANYONE listen to my suggestion about a brand of juice being higher quality, when my only proof is, "I can taste the difference"? Who the F am I?
But there is a quality aspect to eliquid that is so often overlooked.
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Making your own DIY E Juice, is very similar to roasting your own coffee, brewing your own beer or fermenting your own wine. How so you ask? Simple.
-Buy the ingredients you need, follow the instructions on how to combine them and what steps to take, viola, ___________(insert Wine, Beer, EJuice, Roasted Coffee)
Now go ask anybody who has been Roasting Coffee, Brewing Beer or Fermenting wine at their homes for more than a month or two, and they will ALL tell you the same, nearly exact thing.
-"Yes, I can Roast/Brew/Ferment my own stuff, and it IS real Coffee/Beer/Wine, and some of it is even really good. But dont get the wrong idea, Even though I am using the highest quality ingredients I can get my hands on(no starter kits here), and using the best measurement and recording practices, that truth of it is, there is an art to this that must be learned. Its not just as simple as buying quality ingredients and mixing them together correctly, there is a level of skill and knowledge that only comes from doing it"
We say it on the coffee forums all the time when someone wants to get into home roasting(usually when they start complaining about the high cost of coffee, which doesnt take long when they're used to spending 10-15 dollars on grocery store garbage that lasts them a month), that sure,"we'll help you pick the right roaster, show you where to get the best green coffee, and give you the reading materials that will help you, but just be aware, that even with professional grade equipment, its going to take some serious dedication and lots of practice before you are roasting coffee as good as the Top Artisan Roasters.
Its very much the same with E juice. Its not JUST PG/VG/Flavor/Nic. There is an art to making quality juice, and you can see for yourself easily. Go ahead, try it out. Go to any one of the vapeshops selling high end juice.(Elevated, Vaperev, heck, GiantVapes has plenty), buy a couple flavors, and then go and buy PG, VG, Nic and Flavor, and try and replicate it.
Aside from the rare fluke, you will NOT replicate the juice exactly until you have had plenty of time in the DIY game, along with plenty of successes and plenty of failures.
Its not just PG/VG/Flavor/Nic. There is an art to the chemistry of mixing e liquids, and there is a reason premium juices not only taste better, but cost more.
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And that brings me back to Quality Level.
I see many people who refuse to pay a certain amount for E Liquid, and their reasoning is almost never because they can't afford it. The next post which follows is usually, "Well, why not DIY. I make my own juice for 6 cents and its better than anything out there".
Well thats all well and good. By all means, give DIY a shot.
But if all you tried before you started making your own juice, was 6 or 7 vendors who do nothing more than buy the same flavoring anyone else can buy, allow YOU to decide on the right ratios, then mix up a batch, do you really think its fair to call your diy juice better than anything out there? You didn't try any premium juices at all.
There seems to be this, hump, where once a 30ml bottle of juice costs more than $20, it becomes "marketing bs" or "ripoff" or "ridiculously priced".
But when it was $18, there was far less, sometimes no complaints. Alice in Vapeland is a perfect example. If there juice was just a little bit more money, they'd be FARRRR less popular, and would NEVER get away with their 'open one day a week' business model. Even if their juice IS really good.
$22 for 30ml is the usual price for the higher end, what I like to call boutique juices. Brands like, The Standard, Jamesons Irish Vaping Juice, Blueprint, Adams Bomb, Alpha Vape, Mr Good Vape, P.O.E.T..... And the list goes on and on. Actually, Jamesons is $25 a bottle, and Adams Bomb is sometimes $24.
Juice like this, has become 98% of what I vape. And believe me, I have tried so many different juice vendors, its kinda scary how bottles I have just sitting in boxes because Ill never vape them. It took me a WHILE before I was going to even considering trying a $22 dollar a bottle juice, let alone the 27.50 Five Pawns asks(or the 37 dollar price tag their reserve juice costs), but after trying vendor after vendor of 12, 15 dollar juice, that was inconsistent, unsatisfying, often tasting like it was as fake as possible.. I gave in.
And I wont sit here and tell you every single bottle of juice that is $22 or more is automatically awesome. I WILL sit here and tell you, that since Ive started vaping these high end juices, out of all the bottles Ive tried, I can give you ONE that didn't taste like what it was supposed too. Do you know how many bottles of juice I have from plenty of well known vendors, thats tasted nothing like it should? You probably wouldnt even believe me.
Now again, I wont sit here and say that, "I only vape that is $22 a bottle or more. Any less is for peasants and not worthy of my atomizers".
Please. Alice in Vapeland? Fuzion? Good Life? All plenty affordable, and I like their juices too.
My point goes back to what I said at the very start. There is a QUALITY LEVEL, that is not easily defined or quantified, but is clear as day to those who have tasted the difference. And there IS a difference, and unlike Coffee, Beer and Wine, you dont NEED to have a very refined palate. I happen to be a Chef, having a capable and refined palate is a point of pride for me, but Ive got two best friends who think the food I cook is not real food at all, and would much sooner have a Big Mac and fries than my Foie Kobe Burger with chipotle glaze and sweet potatoe slices, AND even these fellas can taste a clear difference in the higher end juices.
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There is a quality level to e liquid, and shunning these higher end juices because you think what they charge is ridiculous, and because you think you can make the same thing for a fraction of what they charge, in the end, is really just hurting YOU.
Because while I may be the minority, Im not alone. There are plenty of people who see a higher price tag and dont immediately think someone is out to get them, but that, perhaps, there is a reason for the higher price.
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TL;DR Version- Dont be fooled into thinking that E Liquid is nothing more than PG/VG/Flavor/Nic, because its much more than that.
