First and foremost I am writing this with the intent to possibly help someone who is newer to the vaping world like myself and to possibly help them from making a bad purchase. We all work hard for our money and we hate to see it pissed away on inferior products. * hopefully this forum section is suitable for this thread *
I am a big believer in supporting our local vape stores verses buying online. For one it saves me time. Second, it puts money into our communities. Third, I don't have to worry about my credit card number being placed online. I'm sure there are more reasons but one gets the idea.
About a week ago I had been wanting to buy a Kanger aerotank. I did my homework online, watched reviews gathered prices ect. Knowing I could buy a clone at a fraction of the cost, I decided I wanted to buy the genuine. So I went to the local vape shop and bam, they had em in stock. It was a bit more expensive, but I was more than happy to pay the extra, understanding the fact they have to make money too. I expressed my concerns about clones and was reassured they were all genuine products sold there minus a few RBAs.
Once home, naturally I tore into the box like a little damn kid on Xmas. First, noticing the threads were a bit messed up, then noticing the heads had no markings on them, but everything else was marked as supposed to be. So I filled it up with some topp dog, let it sit for a good fifteen and then was hoping to experience a great vape. I burnt the first nasty ass tasting coil up in less than two hours. The next coil couldn't decide if it was 5 ohms, 3 ohms or 2.5 ohms. Completely useless.
The next day went back to the store and expressed my concerns. At first it was said your vaping on too high of a setting, your burning your wicks. In which it was explained that it's kinda hard to burn the wicks at 7 watts, but if that's the case I want a refund because this is a shit product. So then another employee said that it was probably two bad coils. Sometimes a bad batch comes through the lines. They gave me two updated kanger heads that have more of a internal wick, and said that should solve the issue. And that the threads being messed up just need a good cleaning.
The new heads did indeed work better, I got a whole day out of one. I was quite impressed, notice the sarcasm. So I did what I should have done in the beginning and I scratched that little Gray code off the side of the box and entered it into the kanger authenticity checker deal. The message I received was .. Beware of imitations, this number has been looked up 3775 times since 12/15/2013.
So now I'm quite upset, but i started thinking... Damn it looks just like the real deal... I wonder if the vape shop knew this or if they got screwed over too and thought they had purchased genuine items. Back to the store I went. Taking the tank and box inside I explained it all again and pulled the number up on my phone and showed them the message I had received. First thing that was said is " why did you try to verify its authenticity ". Which I thought odd, but I voiced my concern about them being possibly screwed over and not knowing it. Of course then I was told no owner was there and they'd have to be notified about the situation before anything can be done. And I was asked to come back another day or call in a day or two.
A day later after several phone calls and being passed around and asked again several times of why I would ever check the authenticity of a product, I finally got my answer.
We sell all 1:1 clones at this store except for one brand name that we are authorized to sell. But they are ok to sell as genuine because they are usually made by the same factory, they are just not authorized. You are the first person to ever check the authenticity of a product since we've opened. Bring your tank in and we will look at it to see if we can help with the threads, other than that have a good day. ....Click...
Um...What the fuck... I surely hope not all vape stores practice this. I do not mind buying clones, I do not mind paying extra for items at a local shop. I do however mind buying a item that is said to be genuine(at genuine prices) for it to come out being a clone (that I could have bought for a few bucks online) and the shop knowing this but refusing to admit it unless they are caught. I do not like being tricked and lied too as I know most people don't like it.
So lessons I have learned... If you want a genuine or even if you don't care, but you bought one at local shop and they are 100% reassuring you that it's genuine? Open it up at the counter in front of them and scratch that gray security code. Grab your phone and go to the site and enter it. Then you'll know for sure before the product even leaves the salespersons eyes.
I know this has been a long winded deal, and I'm sure I could add a lot more to this, but I won't torment you all any longer. I truly hope that this is not a common practice. Hopefully my misfortune and my mistake of not verifying things like I should have might help someone else from making this same mistake of wasted money and time on a shit product being sold as genuine.
(H and H vapor , Newport, TN)
Thanks for reading,
Stone
I am a big believer in supporting our local vape stores verses buying online. For one it saves me time. Second, it puts money into our communities. Third, I don't have to worry about my credit card number being placed online. I'm sure there are more reasons but one gets the idea.
About a week ago I had been wanting to buy a Kanger aerotank. I did my homework online, watched reviews gathered prices ect. Knowing I could buy a clone at a fraction of the cost, I decided I wanted to buy the genuine. So I went to the local vape shop and bam, they had em in stock. It was a bit more expensive, but I was more than happy to pay the extra, understanding the fact they have to make money too. I expressed my concerns about clones and was reassured they were all genuine products sold there minus a few RBAs.
Once home, naturally I tore into the box like a little damn kid on Xmas. First, noticing the threads were a bit messed up, then noticing the heads had no markings on them, but everything else was marked as supposed to be. So I filled it up with some topp dog, let it sit for a good fifteen and then was hoping to experience a great vape. I burnt the first nasty ass tasting coil up in less than two hours. The next coil couldn't decide if it was 5 ohms, 3 ohms or 2.5 ohms. Completely useless.
The next day went back to the store and expressed my concerns. At first it was said your vaping on too high of a setting, your burning your wicks. In which it was explained that it's kinda hard to burn the wicks at 7 watts, but if that's the case I want a refund because this is a shit product. So then another employee said that it was probably two bad coils. Sometimes a bad batch comes through the lines. They gave me two updated kanger heads that have more of a internal wick, and said that should solve the issue. And that the threads being messed up just need a good cleaning.
The new heads did indeed work better, I got a whole day out of one. I was quite impressed, notice the sarcasm. So I did what I should have done in the beginning and I scratched that little Gray code off the side of the box and entered it into the kanger authenticity checker deal. The message I received was .. Beware of imitations, this number has been looked up 3775 times since 12/15/2013.
So now I'm quite upset, but i started thinking... Damn it looks just like the real deal... I wonder if the vape shop knew this or if they got screwed over too and thought they had purchased genuine items. Back to the store I went. Taking the tank and box inside I explained it all again and pulled the number up on my phone and showed them the message I had received. First thing that was said is " why did you try to verify its authenticity ". Which I thought odd, but I voiced my concern about them being possibly screwed over and not knowing it. Of course then I was told no owner was there and they'd have to be notified about the situation before anything can be done. And I was asked to come back another day or call in a day or two.
A day later after several phone calls and being passed around and asked again several times of why I would ever check the authenticity of a product, I finally got my answer.
We sell all 1:1 clones at this store except for one brand name that we are authorized to sell. But they are ok to sell as genuine because they are usually made by the same factory, they are just not authorized. You are the first person to ever check the authenticity of a product since we've opened. Bring your tank in and we will look at it to see if we can help with the threads, other than that have a good day. ....Click...
Um...What the fuck... I surely hope not all vape stores practice this. I do not mind buying clones, I do not mind paying extra for items at a local shop. I do however mind buying a item that is said to be genuine(at genuine prices) for it to come out being a clone (that I could have bought for a few bucks online) and the shop knowing this but refusing to admit it unless they are caught. I do not like being tricked and lied too as I know most people don't like it.
So lessons I have learned... If you want a genuine or even if you don't care, but you bought one at local shop and they are 100% reassuring you that it's genuine? Open it up at the counter in front of them and scratch that gray security code. Grab your phone and go to the site and enter it. Then you'll know for sure before the product even leaves the salespersons eyes.
I know this has been a long winded deal, and I'm sure I could add a lot more to this, but I won't torment you all any longer. I truly hope that this is not a common practice. Hopefully my misfortune and my mistake of not verifying things like I should have might help someone else from making this same mistake of wasted money and time on a shit product being sold as genuine.
(H and H vapor , Newport, TN)
Thanks for reading,
Stone
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