Screwball One Year Recap
Hi y'all, Cal here the founder of Vapvana.
It's crazy to think that ~14 months ago I shipped out the first round of early adopter Screwballs into the wild. We have gone through some milestones since then, and I wanted to take a moment to highlight a few of them.
2 Naming Contests
We've launched 2 naming contests, one for the Screwball and one for our mascot Coach Reuben. There has been ~$3,000 worth of prizes given out between both contests.
Product Refinement
Based off of feedback we've continued to refine the Screwball experience, here are some of the improvements we've made over the last year:
- Half bowl screen setting (early adopters round)
- 10-24 Handle threading (early adopters round)
- New housing design with flat top (post presale)
- Hybrid bowl design (post presale)
- Custom coil guard (post presale)
It took ~10 rounds of iterations to get to the early adopters round, and another ~5 rounds to get where we are today. I've put thousands of hours (and bowls) into making the Screwball the best product possible (IMO).
Bigger Than Myself
Over the past 3-4 months there has been a significant increase in sales that have officially made this business bigger than myself. 2.5 years ago I was staying in my childhood bedroom at my parents when this project started, so it was a surreal experience getting to the point I could no longer handle the day to day operations myself.
FC Market Share
For transparency purposes, I checked how many times the coupon code 'FC10' has been used in the past 90 days. It was used ~17 times out of the ~1,260 orders we had go through our site.
As we continue to grow we unfortunately have to start choosing where to put resources, and may not be as active here as people would like.
New Team Members
To help keep up with the increased sales, I've hired two team members to focus on two important parts of the business:
Head of AZ Operations - Holding down the day to day shipping is Rupert. He is a cannabis enthusiast who has been fully converted to being combusted free. He also helps out at our in person events, and our video content.
Head of Customer Success - Our most recent hire is Beau, who is a long time vape enthusiast and well equipped to help answer customers, process warranties, and anything else needed behind the scenes. Beau will also be the one making updates here in the future.
Growing Pains
During the growth spurt these past few months there has been some unintentional 'collateral damage' with customer service. I apologize if our service hasn't met your expectations during the transition of getting Beau into place.
If you placed an order and are unhappy for any reason please reach out through our website and we will do our best to make things right.
O-Ring Issues
If you haven't received an email from us, there was a mistake made with the wrong type of o-rings being used for the first round of production. This has caused issues with the glass joints getting stuck, or green residue being left from alcohol (the correct o-rings are Viton, and we have soaked them in 99% Isopropyl alcohol for 7 days straight with no issues).
These problems will be solved by using the correct o-rings. If you're having any issues with your hybrid bowl(s) then please reach out for free replacements through our website, or fill out our warranty form here:
vapvana.com/pages/warranty-returns-form
Website Inventory Limitations
We use Shopify as our e-commerce platform, and there are limitations to how the inventory works within the template we use. When there is over 20 units in inventory, the icon shows a green light and the text 'In stock, ready to ship' which can be confusing for a pre-order listing. However, if we set it to 20 units or less, it would show a yellow light with the remaining units left.
Based off of how the template was setup, I chose to set the pre-orders to start with 20 units and manually update them as they sold. My intention was to remove confusion with the pre-order process, not increase sales through artificial scarcity.
After reading peoples perspective on our 'marketing tactics', I went back into Shopify to see if I could update the settings. I was able to create a new template, and de-activate the inventory counter for all our current pre-orders.
The Vapvana Difference
Being a vape customer the past decade, I try my best make sure we provide a great customer experience based off of my own personal experiences. Ultimately, I know the feeling of spending a good amount of money on a product that didn't live up to my expectations.
I understand purchasing expensive products can be a risk in our industry, or placing a pre-order for a 3D mockup/untested product that doesn't go as planned. Because of this, here are some of our policies to remove the risk from ordering through us:
- 100 Day Guarantee - To my knowledge, we are the only ball vape company that allows open box returns. We believe in what we sell, and will happily refund anyone who isn't satisfied with their purchase.
- Lifetime Warranty - I believe that once you make an investment in one of our products, you should be (almost) set for life. We will replace any issues you have with your PID or coil.
- Discounted Presale Pricing - Not only do we test all of our products for 2-3+ iterations before starting a pre-order, we also offer it at the cheapest discount possible for the first round. Most of our products will be listed at under retail pricing until we finalize retail packaging for them.
Final Thoughts
For anyone that has been a part of our journey so far, I want to thank you from the bottom of heart. I am grateful for the opportunity to make products that people enjoy using, and have a lot of exciting things in the works.
Again, I apologize if your expectations have not been met at any point during the past year. If that's the case, please reach out and we will do our best to make things right.
Moving forward, updates may be limited during the upcoming holiday season. We are working on a doing a rebrand and launching a new website before things get busier.
Cheers,
Cal
recommendedvapesupplies.co.uk
