Vaporblunt 2.0 & VB 2.0 DLX

Why do you guys not like gotvape? Just out of curiosity. I have known the owners of that company for about 6 years and they are pretty cool dudes.

I'm sure there are other complaints but last time a new vape came around, the Puffit, they had undercover company employees here at FC praising the unit to increase sales.

As you might have noticed from your dealings here, we don't like to be duped and we are pretty adamant about it.

there are plenty of postings out there about GotVape but i DID order from them and it was the PuffIT. their customer service and shipping departments are horribly in need for improvement. i pre-ordered the PuffiT and then they went on sale for real.... people that were not part of the pre-order were getting their units before me. i was "supposed" to get a "fan pack" with my pre-order and i did not get one. i let them know and they said they would send one out and there were certain things that were supposed to be in it. when my pack came the certain items were not there and all i got was some health brochures and stickers. when i told them about what was missing..again i was told it would be sent out. well..... 3 weeks later and 3 emails later i finally got what was supposed to be in my pre-order. when i had to send in my PuffiT for an RMA they were going to make me pay for shipping both ways when other users on this forum were able to return theirs and did not pay shipping both ways. i called them out on it and they still made me pay to ship it to them but paid for the shipping back.

i would NEVER, EVER, EVER buy from them again!!! if that means that the new "got to have" vape that is only being sold through them will not make into my hands till someone sells it here in the classifieds section

I am obviously biased because I consider them friends and I am not trying to make excuses for them, however I know for a fact that isn't how they want to run their company. I think what happens a lot of times is as a company becomes successful the principles that essential made them successful get diluted as more and more employees are hired. No one ever cares about your company as much as you do, however to run a large company requires many people. Basically, owners with vision build companies than as those owners transition into ceo's instead of being in the trenches things start to degress. I am not speaking about gotvape, I speaking of all businesses including best buy and target.

With that said, GotVape is in fact the US distributors, but please let me explain what that means. They will sell to other vape companies and wholesalers who will then have the vb2.0 on their sites also. This is pretty common in this industry. Also, www.thevaporblunt.com will always have our products for sale direct to US customers. As for Canada B.O.B dist will handle our friends north of the border.

Good leaders understand that they should never fully "leave the trenches"... So this may be a case of poor leadership over morals?

Again, I can not speak for anyone's situation other than my own. But I can admit in the beginning we had a few customer service issues that we wouldn't have had if I were in our customer service department full time. Employees tend not to snitch on themselves, that is why I made myself available to the general public by releasing my personal email. But for every real customer that emails me with a real problem I get 100 people that email looking for a job, trying to sell me something or flat out asking for free merchandise. I have a phrase I use a lot "Heavy is the Crown".

I understand from a customer view they could care less about these things and they just want their shit fixed, but I must admit that customer service is very complicated. One example of this is when I sent Sticks his vb 2.0 dlx. I told my warehouse manager to overnight it to him. I than told him it was overnighted, and to expect it. He txt me at 6 pm saying he still didn't have it, so I tracked it and low and behold, it was shipped 2 day express. I'm sure Sticks has better things to do than wait for a package that isn't coming. My point is, I was extremely involved in this case and it still got fucked up. Short of shipping the package myself I don't know what else I could have done. I'm not making excuses, I just think a lot of people forget how often McDonald's forgets your French fries, but I get pissed as hell when I get back home without the right food also. Idk, it's just speculation I suppose.

I'll call the owners personally today and tell them my homies on FC aren't feeling them, I guarantee that is something they would want to know.

Great to hear, well at least the can still buy it direct part.

I too was deeply offended when GV played us all for fools with the early 'customer' reviews. Still am. Folks that put up their money long before, and were still waiting, were lead to believe those 'customers' had simply ordered them before they did. GV could have told folks they were going to use XX of the first, long awaited, shipment for demos but they told us otherwise. They were found out in what I honestly have to call a lie. GV deliberately tried to mislead us and they failed to keep their contractual commitment to the first buyers doing it. They promised distribution of the scarce first run to prepaid customers based on order date. That didn't happen it seems.

I 'swore off' GV. Satisfaction of ownership includes how you got it. I waited many months and paid more and higher shipping to get it from HK when that channel finally opened up. Kissing my chances of service goodby in the process (I'm not going to send it back to China....). I didn't buy from the other vendors since GV would have profited (even minorly) from that. I don't want them to have any of my money, I'd rather go without. Just my twisted principles, but IMO you should treat folks (especially customers) with respect and that starts with being honest with them. They've had their chance with me. Absent some contrition of course, which I of course don't expect.

It was a cold, calculated deception to boost their sales. In my mind, no question about it. I don't support that. Just the way I 'vote with my wallet'?

OF

Everybody fucks up ... there's always 2 sides to the story ... I, for one, would be interested to hear the other side through TRVB. (Not that I'm likely to buy much through GV since I'm in Canada, but still ...) Everybody has made bad decisions that they regret and wish they could take back ... sometimes the bridge is burnt and its too late ... other times a 2nd chance is given ... I'm a big fan of 2nd chances (and even 3rd and 4th chances if the person/company is truly trying to make things better and fix the past issues so it doesn't happen again) ... just my Canadian 2 cents ... probably leaves me open to being taken advantage of lots, but most of the time people rise to the occasion when given the opportunity so it happens less than one would think (or maybe I have a horseshoe up my ass! ... ie. I'm lucky ... pardon the expression )

Very well put, JC. Forgiveness of past transgressions is a keystone of our civilization, given the contrition part. IMO that's the key.

Otherwise we've the Yankee folk saying to fall back on 'Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me'. "Let the buyer be ware" is not only the moral but legal basis of such dealings, I have been made aware.

No reflection on the fine products they carry, of course. Just their business model that allows this to happen unchecked.

OF

well i'm sad to hear, but not shocked, that TRVB is going with GotVape if i buy the VB 2.0 i will do the direct route for sure. there is no way GV is getting a single penny from my pocket ever again. Glad there is a direct route.

It also wasn't just about mmenzie clearly horrible expedience. It is posted all of the place here. We have other companies and barely any issues. Like you said mistakes happen, but if they do you need to fix them and make the customer happy. From all I read GV just wants your purchase and couldn't care less after they get the money. That is not a mistake from low level employees. Also employees have stupidvisors and training so maybe they need to retrain.

And FWIW(I used OF's acronym yea me), I would have reprimanded that guy who messed up sticks shipping after you gave him exact instructions. I cannot tolerate people like that.

All I know is it's very difficult to get competent, reliable, hard working employees for any company or job ... if mild ineptitude was not tolerated most mid-large size companies would probably have to fire the majority of their employees on a regular basis ... I think it's best to offer positive coaching and try to build your sometimes less than competent staff into being competent (if they have that potential) rather than have unmanageable turnover.

I think the reality is that to expect everyone to be an all-star at their job is a pipe dream and one all too often has to settle for enthusiastic mediocrity ... I'm kinda' wandering off topic here too ... I don't know how frequent/bad GV's transgressions have been so I'm not really defending them just playing devil's advocate in case they do deserve another chance (basing my assumption that they might based on TRVB's relationship with the owners and the way he's conducted himself with the launch of the VB2)

Great point. I have a friend who says 'if we get one that reads and writes English well and can pass the drug test we'll hire them and see if we can make use of them somehow'. A serious problem calling for good supervision skills as Dreamer so rightly points out. These are tough times, no doubt about it.

However, here the decision to cheat the customers and give the scarce units to employees so they could pretend to be happy customers (complete with photos taken there I understand?) is not the work of a rogue employee (that would be theft), it had to be a matter of management policy.

In a world too often filled with avoiding responsibility, this one can't be dodged IMO. Mister GV had to know it as it happened, the buzz was all over the thread. Once it was discovered not a single wronged customer reported apology or compensation....at least they didn't tell us. You can connect the dots anyway you want. When I do it, it comes up the same. I'm sure they'll do just fine without any more of my money (I was a happy customer before) and I get the benefit of feeling good about what I believe in for half a year's wait and about fifty bucks extra. A win-win of sorts?

OF

I am kind of embarrassed to say this, but I almost never read any other threads other than my own, I had no clue that these issues happened here. It interferes with my creativity to see other peoples products, I hate looking at vaporizers. It seriously gives me writers block, if that makes sense. Non the less, I do agree with jcat that their is two sides to every story and I also believe if the majority of any group all say the same thing there is usually some merit. All of that info you guys just told me is a little more than I'm comfortable just calling them up and questioning them about, but when we meet next face to face I will defiantly bring this conversation up and see if they are aware or have a reply.

In all honesty, this is probably the truest statement I have ever heard. My staff reads this so I can't bash to much, but they know as well as I do that for some of our team this is a job, and IMO I prefer to employ people in search of a career. However this is America, and pretty much anyone can do whatever they want and that includes doing a mediocre job or just enough to get by. But if I waited for a room full of 100 % dedicated employees who were willing to live the vaporblunt like I do, I'd be waiting a long time. Constant training and good management is really the only option.

Anyways, I didn't know GV was going to trigger such a debate, if it's ok with you guys I'd rather get back to talking about the vb 2.0. I'll let OF know via pm once I talk to them and he can post in the appriopriate place his thoughts on their response if they have one. OF is a logical choice, being that he has such a way with words

As for VB 2.0, we are probably less than 2 weeks from launching. I'm getting a preview of the new website by Saturday night according to my guy, than we are only waiting on the 2.0 dlx boxes to arrive and to finish QC on the first couple hundred units. Also, I will never create a product that you can not buy directly from us, some people simply like to deal with the source and I would never relinquish that, so fear not!

i apologize that my comment derailed the thread that much. in the end.... all that matters is you offer a direct source to purchase

Please, no apology needed for civil, honest opinions?

I agree with TRVB, we may have covered it as well as needed. And we didn't come here to run down GV, we came here to discuss what I think is an excellent vape. TRVB seems to have taken folks comments to heart and woven them into a significantly improved product for out enjoyment. We've also been told Palm got the same treatment, pretty exciting if you asked me.

And it's not just here. For those not haunting some of the other makers, D9 seems to be doing this very thing, incorporating the changes users are asking for. Likewise the new TV Cera is a point by point improvement on the prior model.

I know nobody asked me, but I think that is a fantastic thing to have happen for us. Constructive suggestions seriously considered by the folks we depend on to provide the gear we want and need. We are indeed blessed by such makers. Let's hope it is a trend that continues to spread but also let's consider playing our part in the Capitalist game, reward those who support us with our business? IMO in this case we have ample reason to do so. Those who haven't taken another serious look at this rascal in view of their needs have missed a great bet IMO. Still time to repent. Go back and check what the Beta Testers reported.....

Thanks for listening to me rant again, good weekend to all. The rains have finally come here, but that's OK we'll be wanting that water later......

OF

2 things the VB2 and the Pax have going for them in my opinion is the vapor tubes going down the length of the body and back out the other side ... adds to the length of the vapor path allowing more cooling without increasing the footprint of the vape. This is in contrast to the Solo with the glass tube and the INH that requires the extension to cool sufficiently (to get things back on track ... excellent very interesting conversation though )

Great point. And cleaning that tube couldn't be much easier. Push or pry the screen out, remove the mouthpiece and you have clear access to both ends. A bit of cotton dampened with ISO pushed through it with a bamboo skewer leaves it squeaky clean in a single pass. The next time I got smarter and dug out some of my old pipe cleaners.....who knew they were Vapor Blunt cleaners too?

OF

I am in a real reflective mood this morning. I am using the palm 2.0 and making sure its ready to reveal (yes I vape at 6 am) and I couldn't help but think about the last year. The original vb was launched around thanksgiving last year. In 12 short months we have developed 4 vaporizers, we have balled out in vegas at the CHAMPS show twice while promoting this brand, we went to San Fran and did the cup. I've failed, I've learned, I've succeeded. However this movie ends, when the credits role I will be proud if what we have done.

I have made friends who I have never met (yes, I'm talking about you), I have lost friends that I seen every day (RIP). I have made new life long friends i met on our engineering team all while Aggonizing over details with my ears open to criticism. I have struggled to adapt into a new business that I had no mentor or previous experience in, yet here I am. So wether or not you like my products or you hate them, I would like to share that I would not have traded this experience for any amount of money and I appreciate each and every person who has taken time to tell me what they think about our work.

We sit on the verge of the launch of the revisions of the VB and Palm, and as I await the fate of these 2.0's I can guarantee you one thing, we have given all we have to this project. I have said on the forum many of times this isn't about money, it's about leaving our small footprint in this world. So, Thank you. Thanks for all of the advice, thanks for all of the criticism. Thank you for all of the PM's of condolences in the last 2 weeks. Thank you to every single person who has ever purchased a VB made product.

I just derailed my own thread, but sometimes you have to stop and tell those around you how you feel or you may never have a chance to, again thank you. To quote Terrell Owens "Get your popcorn ready" because this movie just started. I hope you like it.

In regards to the vapor hot/coolness, using the mint flavored tip it drastically cools the vapor.

Well it's like when you chew really minty gum and then drink water and it seems 40 degrees colder than it really is... Same situation it's a subtle taste as well in my original review for the VB 1.0 I did like the tips.

Follow up thoughts: I think the water option is great I really do but when it comes down to it, the heat retention and design of the vaporizer doesn't allow for full utilization of the option. Now with that being said, I do like the unit by itself and it does perform well with some technique. Was it the solo killer I was expecting? Unfortunately not. I will not post my explanation as I do not want to cause a VS battle etc. if you'd like to know more feel free to PM me.

Quick update, I do believe our website will be up and this product will launch by Friday.