Clone Wars the Bigger Picture

So this is going to get me flamed by a lot of people, but I going to try to point out a few things from a business point of view. If you read nothing else PLEASE read the last paragraph.

China Clones, love them or hate them, there is a huge market for them. Over the past few years many popular US (and Greek and other) mods have been replicated by manufacturers from china. The Empire mod becomes the K100, the Golden Greek becomes the KTS, the Apex Alpha becomes...well there are a few different names for that one. The GG was the pinnacle a few years ago, selling used for 5-6 hundred depending on serial number, add-ons and style. Then the KTS comes out and for a fraction of the price you can have a replica of a high price mod. Sometimes it’s like Coke vs. Pepsi, sometimes it’s like a Ferrari vs a Fiero with a body kit and Ferrari stickers. Now time has passed since the first wave and more and more top end handmade mods have come out. So it is only natural new clones are developed, The Carvella, Nzonic, a Juggernaut clone and an iHybrid clone are on their way. So how is this effecting the E-Cig/Vaping community and market?

There seems to be a clear line dividing people. Some people love being able to have a reasonable recreation for a reasonable price, it is not about anything but their vape needs, their preference, and their wallet. The other side seems a bit more passionate, and sees them as soulless pieces of cheap inferior metal made by an evil empire hell bent of selling cheap crap for profit and raping hard working mod makers and stealing their ideas. It seems to be about half and half and both sides are right on some points

It is theft. Plain and simple, they steal ideas and exploit them for financial gain. First for most modders hiring a patent attorney and paying out the nose for protection for their idea just isnt in the budget. Secondly trying to enforce a patent over international products is nearly if not completely impossible.

Now the part that will get me shunned, this is the natural order of things in manufacturing and production. For the majority of other US companies, staying competitive would impossible without outsourcing manufacturing to other countries. Im not supporting theft, I’m just stating facts. Why make a US made product that cost 5 times more when your competition is selling outsourced products and making millions. If us modders wanted to sell quality items in high volume and low prices then they would have to find a company that could meet those demands. Quality control, inventory control, distribution, these are the ways Walmart and McDonalds were built. Wal-Mart didn’t get as big as they are selling handmade furniture, and Mickey Ds doesn't offer free range, grass fed Angus beef. If you want those things you go to the niche shops that sell them.

But if your a mod maker which is worse, spending all that time and money to create your product, get it manufactured, get it distributed and sell thousands at 70$ a mod. Or make a well-crafted, great performing, expensive, top end mod for a couple hundred and sell them ever faster than you can make them, driving up demand and creating an upper echelon of customers that will fork over handfuls of cash for every color you make, then china take notice and clones your mod and sells a diluted copy for a fraction of the price while you still rake in customers willing to pay top dollar for the "real deal?"

So lets look at it minus the clear theft, your left with a choice between high dollar top performance, or bottom dollar reasonable performance. The K100 was pretty easy to clone, no major complexities or issues. Now hundreds of vapers have bought one. As an all-day device or a venture into mechanical mods. Quality is nearly identical to the original and I dont hear anyone screaming about the fact they are clones anymore. With more difficult mods there are more issues, some clones are made of cheaper weaker performing materials and with less intricate design. These are the mods most hated as cheap china junk and usually dont sell well after launch, or until they are revised to correct those issues. With a few clones recently I have even heard of china reps working with people from the US to make tweaks to their clones to make them more authentic or better performing.

In the end I agree that clones are theft, plain and simple, but I think most people that would buy a clone fall into two categories, those that would never have paid 500$ for the best performing mod in the world, and those that wanted to test the waters before making the jump to a high dollar mod.

So in the end there are two sides and millions of reasons to choose one. When it comes right down to it, until ecigs, or PVs, or ENDs, or NVs are fairly regulated in the US major US companies will not touch them. Nor will they spend the money to manufacture them like iphones or automobiles, until its a safe and stable product to make and sell. This is still an unregulated industry that is exploited from every direction including within. If we could get fair regulation then big pharma and big tobacco and maybe big Tech can slug it out in the market for who is going to deliver the best product at the best price and sue the life out of any one that dares to copy their product. Cloning is just another symptom of the BIGGER issue, Fair regulation of our right to vape.