Hi everyone,
I recently made my first thread and was ranting about my experience with local B&M stores. I was hoping that people in the same area could share about some stores in San Jose area that are really worth spending money with, and can correct my perception that B&M stores are pretty much useless except for buying juices and small items. Too high markup and staff that are either "know-it-alls" or too aggressively push their own stock disregarding customer's actual needs.
I understand that part of the high markup is necessary for the B&Ms to stay in business and I sympathize with to a point, but the level of markup I see in comparison to online (eBay, various online retailers, and bulk places like fast-tech) is outrageous, regularly being 2 or 3 times what I can find online. I think that these shops should either adapt to the reality that people price-shop or learn by people speaking with their wallets. I am not paying out my money to vape shops for charity.
Out of my list I would say for vaping stuff completely ignore Smoke Shop, I know it is a head shop, but for vaping stuff pretty much they don't know squat and have crappy overpriced no-name devices
I went to several stores in the area, but these are the ones that I could remember off-hand:
I recently made my first thread and was ranting about my experience with local B&M stores. I was hoping that people in the same area could share about some stores in San Jose area that are really worth spending money with, and can correct my perception that B&M stores are pretty much useless except for buying juices and small items. Too high markup and staff that are either "know-it-alls" or too aggressively push their own stock disregarding customer's actual needs.
I understand that part of the high markup is necessary for the B&Ms to stay in business and I sympathize with to a point, but the level of markup I see in comparison to online (eBay, various online retailers, and bulk places like fast-tech) is outrageous, regularly being 2 or 3 times what I can find online. I think that these shops should either adapt to the reality that people price-shop or learn by people speaking with their wallets. I am not paying out my money to vape shops for charity.
Out of my list I would say for vaping stuff completely ignore Smoke Shop, I know it is a head shop, but for vaping stuff pretty much they don't know squat and have crappy overpriced no-name devices
I went to several stores in the area, but these are the ones that I could remember off-hand:
- Vaping Buddha in South San Francisco. This is actually out of my list, the one that is my favorite store, but the bad thing is it too far away from where I live. (40 minute drive). It's actually a chill environment, you can taste juices and there is no pressure to buy something immediately or leave. The markup is still high, but the staff is friendly and pretty knowledgeable (actually most knowledgeable out of all stores I've been to). I did have one female employee who basically ignored me after she realized I was not going to be one of their overpriced mods, but I do like one other employee, who is a teenage guy and gave me good honest advice on building coils. He actually offered to show me how to build the coil, of course as long as I supply the materials. I did notice that he did go into hard selling mode when another employee showed up, so definitely not perfect. I still like the shop overall, they do sell some nice juices.
- Smoke Shop on 3269 Stevens Creek Blvd San Jose. The store's name is literally "Smoke Shop." This shop sucks, and the experiences here is what was driving most of ranting in previous thread. Here is where I had a guy sell me a kanger double-coil for my kanger single-coil tank, when I didnt know any better. Here is where a guy was trying to sell me an Aerotank when all I wanted were replacement coils for my Aspire and when I told him that I thought the Aspire was better he wouldn't shut up about it. Here is where a guy refused to show me the variable mods because he thought mechanicals were better. Don't even get me started on the overpriced no-name crap they sell here... I saw a vamo-like device with just brand Ego (have no idea who actually made this) and they were selling for $100, Aerotank for $50 Why do I keep going back here? It's only 5 minutes away from where I live and they do sell fumi juices, which I like
- It is Vapor 7 in San Jose. This place is setup with a bar and you can taste juices. It seems ok, again the prices are way high. I bought some jolly rancher apple juice from Indigo Vapor (it's called Crouching Apple) which was too acidic for my taste.
- Atomic eCigs Vape Shop. I called them to find out what they had in stock. I was asking for mod they had in 40-60 range, and they said all they had in that range were "vape pens." Sigh, too high markup I didn't bother going in.
