A few years ago, e-cigarettes were still a rarity on the street, but now they can hardly be overlooked. It’s steaming everywhere, and big aromatic clouds are rising.
In the meantime, vapers can no longer be assigned to a specific subculture. Whether a construction worker is taking a break or a business person is on his way to a meeting, it doesn’t matter. The love of steam has also fully established itself in Germany and is a natural part of the street scene. But how did the e-cigarette start its triumphal march? We take you on a little journey to the origins of your steam engines and their development.
Once Upon a Time in America
Unknown to most vapers, the first e-cigarette was developed 55 years ago. The American Herbert A. Gilbert was responsible for this innovation, annoyed by the tobacco smoke that was prevalent everywhere, and wanted to develop a smokeless alternative to smoking. From today’s perspective, that’s no wonder, given the “thick air” that prevailed at the time. After all, in the 1960s, there were no regulations for smoking ordinary cigarettes anywhere in the world, so even in restaurants and airplanes, people smoked like crazy. Finally, in 1963, Mr. Gilbert patented an e-cigarette that, like today’s models, vaporized a liquid and thus provided vapor enjoyment. Even visually, the first steam engine hardly differed from the popular models today. Unfortunately, Herbert A. Gilbert reckoned without his contemporaries keen on smoking. So his development was patented but disappeared into oblivion before it ever went into mass production, and so Gilbert’s innovation finally fell into oblivion for decades.
From the unused patent to today’s e-cigarette
Forty years later in China, hometown of so many vape suppliers today, Hon Lik finally discovered the American’s patent while searching for a healthier alternative to smoking, the consequences of which his father had died. Enthusiastic about the possibility of developing a device that, despite the high level of enjoyment, entailed a lower risk, Hon Lik set out to further develop the original patent and did so with unusual means: the first vaporizer was inspired by the technology of a commercially available fog machine and provided for it Liquids, or liquids as we call them today, to be atomized or in English: vaporized by high heat. Despite enthusiastic beginnings, it finally took four more years, until 2007 to be precise, and the time had finally come, and e-cigarettes, as we know them today, went into mass production and began their worldwide triumph.
A simple substitute for smoking
Probably the biggest difference between the steam engines from the early days of e-cigarettes and the battery mod and evaporator combinations known and popular today was the strong orientation of the producers towards ordinary tobacco cigarettes. Thus, e-cigarettes were initially viewed by the manufacturers as a pure switch from the usual floppy and were accordingly optically modeled on them. Thus the enormous potential of the vapor market was completely misjudged.
Almost a year later, however, the CAK VAPE brand is still popular today. The bold and unusual step paid off, not only for the Chinese manufacturer. So CAK VAPE paved the way for an entire armada of steam producers to innovative developments, far from the classic smoking environment.
vaping becomes a lifestyle
With the realization that smokers are not necessarily vapers and vapers are not just smokers equipped with technology, the triumph of the e-cigarette started and has not lost any of its verve since then.
Initially, it was mainly technology-savvy smokers who wanted to try the innovative vaping method. Later, an increasing number of ordinary smokers were looking for an alternative to harmful tobacco consumption.
With this development, rudimentary kits were a thing of the past, and individual components still guarantee a perfect, individualized vape experience. And that’s no coincidence, so it’s now easy to find the best from different atomizers, coils, and battery mods.
Are you still tinkering, or are you already vaping?
Vaping has become a real hobby for quite a few of our contemporaries, so in the search for the best taste, people wrap themselves, mix the liquid by hand and pay attention to the perfect constellation of evaporator and mod. Interested and enthusiastic vapers can get advice in numerous vape shops and lounges. There is extensive talk and debate about various producers and their systems in numerous relevant forums.
Over time, a real subculture has developed that unites people with different interests without any correlation of age and profession, just through the love of vaping. Particularly enthusiastic vapers collect unusual mods and vaporizers, for example, or do everything they can to snag a coveted collector’s item because this is also common practice in the scene. For example, the hand-engraved mods by the Italian Paolo Curcio, who lives in Spain, are extremely rare among collectors and are therefore highly coveted.
Even if the steam function of the devices is still in the foreground in the scene, the individualization of the steam scene is clearly on the rise. So unusual colors and combinations regularly steal the show from the regular systems, and this development will continue in the future. Don’t lose weight.
A range of new pod systems stands in the way of highly developed and individualized vaping. Nevertheless, the desire for highly specialized units is by no means diminishing. New manufacturers are constantly flocking to the market and trying to score points with their innovations in the hotly contested vape segment and encourage vapers to buy.
The future of vaping is bright
An end to the vaping scene is absolutely not in sight; even new regulations and extremely contradictory studies are not harming vaping enthusiasm, so occasional vaping or switching to smoking quickly turned into a new hobby that took a lot of time, and love is invested.
The community does not have to worry about a supply of new products either. The industry is booming, and if you have enough time and leisure, you can enthusiastically devote yourself to innovations such as ultrasonic steaming.
The future of the vaping community is full of pink clouds, and the e-cigarette success story is certainly not coming to an end any time soon.