PUBLIC ANNOUNCEMENT

[DougP]

*** PUBLIC ANNOUNCEMENT ***
It has come to our attention that a stall at the Boksburg Flea Market has some of our juice in stock that is being sold as an "International Juice" at R200 a bottle.

This stall is not a registered vendor and reseller of our product.
We have no knowledge, or record, of where this juice was bought from and it's authenticity.

Please refer to our website to find a list of approved RETAILERS that stock and sell the Blends of Distinction range of products.

Blends of Distinction WILL NOT be held liable for the quality, and/or contents, of any product purchased through any RETAILER, not listed on our WEBSITE
http://www.blends-sa.co.za/retailers/

#BlendsofDistinction #BlendsRetailers #VapingCommunity #BoD

 

[Schnappie]

Wonder if it can be linked to any of the vape shop robberies?

 

[DougP]

Nope because our stock was not in those shops

 

[DougP]

*PUBLIC ANNOUNCEMENT*
- FOLLOW UP -
*** Blends of Distinction ***

We visited the stall at the Boksburg Flea Market today. All the local juices stocked looked legitimate and the owner admitted to buying off shelves and reselling with a markup. Our friends from SAPS had a quiet discussion with him...long story short we left with our stock in hand.
We unfortunately have no guarantee that this won't happen again so will be popping in at the flea market periodically to ensure our product is not stocked there again.
#BlendsofDistinction #VapingCommunity #LegitimateRetailers

 

[boxerulez]

Why not offer them to resell at a higher price? I mean business is business. At least you know they are selling real stock and if they inflate the price it is their business.

I mean nothing stops anyone from buying something at retail price and selling it on once again for a higher price.





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[boxerulez]

A simple way to prevent it being sold as international is a Proudly SA sticker on the label.

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[Soutie]

I agree with @boxerulez on this, why confiscate the goods if they are legitimately bought and paid for at full retail price.

Their marketing and sales pitch could use a little work for sure but having those bottles on their shelves isn't doing anything illegal surely? Aren't they are just capitalizing on the consumer market of buying low and selling high?

 

[RichJB]

Our friends from SAPS had a quiet discussion with him...long story short we left with our stock in hand.

I sincerely wish I hadn't read that.

 

[boxerulez]

I sincerely wish I hadn't read that.

Unless a refund was in order.

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[craigb]

A simple way to prevent it being sold as international is a Proudly SA sticker on the label.

Sent from my Serpent Minikin

On a detour, the proudly South African thing is a registered trademark and last I heard you had to pay license fees to use it.

Buy something along the lines of "made in SA" costs nothing... And means you can sell it as local here and in South Australia

 

[Noddy]

I hope you refunded them for the legitimately purchased goods, which is his property...

 

[DougP]

Gentlemen we did not want to turn this into a storm but let me share a little more with all for purposes of putting this to rest :

This shop firstly is not a authorized reseller of our product and we have:
A. no information on them
B. no control on the environment where our juice is kept
C. no knowledge of their health and safety processes with regards to storing and selling our product, hence our visit

On arrival there we found :

1. All their juice is available in the open public side of store on shelves that are totally open and available for anybody to touch and not safely kept behind the counter in a safe area from public. Bear in mind this is juice containing nicotine. There was also nobody standing there to keep an eye on the juice as the store owner was busy serving a person with his back turned to the juice shelves.
2. Shelving started from knee high with juices fully available for anybody to touch and remove including kids
3. Juices were totally open to public who by the way were opening bottles and smelling juice as we stood there watching
4. We looked at numerous bottles and the anti tamper seals were all broken not just in our range. When I asked Owner why the tamper seals were broken he commented that people open the bottles to smell the juice. These bottles were actually the bottles being sold so would have left the shop with tamper seals broken.
5. There was no sign depicting that u had to be 18, or older, to buy juice
6. They were selling to anybody regardless of age
So in essence there were public safety issues here that came into play

Given the cuttwood fiasco where people landed up in hospital I am sorry but I am not going to expose my company to something like that where our juice leaves a retail with the tamper seal broken
My juice sitting on a open shelf in a general public area with anti tamper seals broken and people opening it and smelling it is something I will not accept regardless because let me tell u if that juice is implicated in a medical situation I will have the department of health slam the book at me

 

[DougP]

I do not have a problem with "flee market" stores I have a problem with public health and safety issues with any shop selling my juice and would do exactly the same to any shop selling my juice under the same circumstances

Gentlemen let's not forget that as juice Manufactorer's that sell nicotine we have a fiduciary responsibility to the public to ensure our product is sold in a controlled environment
That today was the issue

 

[daniel craig]

Excellent response @Blends Of Distinction I agree that the product should be sold in a controlled environment and to persons over the age of 18. The fact that those anti tamper seals were broken is definitely something to be worried about. Since the juice is out in the open (not away from direct sunlighy; correct temperature etc) if a customer buys it and the juice is ruined because of this, the customer will have a bad experience and stay clear of the Blends of Distinction juices.

 

[boxerulez]

I do not have a problem with "flee market" stores I have a problem with public health and safety issues with any shop selling my juice and would do exactly the same to any shop selling my juice under the same circumstances

Gentlemen let's not forget that as juice Manufactorer's that sell nicotine we have a fiduciary responsibility to the public to ensure our product is sold in a controlled environment
That today was the issue

I did miss the bit where you answered on the matter of a refund? Also which vendor sold it to him?

That is paramount to stealing the stock back from them. Whether they sold it with your consent or not... they paid for it and it is their property.

Not trying to be a douche but that is a bit of a douche move on your part if you did not buy tue stock back from them.

You can force them to stop selling it... but you cannot just confiscate someone elses stock without the courts intervention on a matter ie. It was stolen goods etc.

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[Noddy]

Did you have a court order to confiscate someone elses property?

 

[PSySpin]

I did miss the bit where you answered on the matter of a refund? Also which vendor sold it to him?

That is paramount to stealing the stock back from them. Whether they sold it with your consent or not... they paid for it and it is their property.

Not trying to be a douche but that is a bit of a douche move on your part if you did not buy tue stock back from them.

You can force them to stop selling it... but you cannot just confiscate someone elses stock without the courts intervention on a matter ie. It was stolen goods etc.

Sent from my Serpent Minikin

I agree here with @boxerulez if the bought this legally then they can basically do with it what they want to. Only the department of Health can determine if there was wrong doing with the display of the stock and if the where not following any laws that we might have regarding the distrabution of nicotine products. Where as the stock has been confiscated it should have remained with the police for destruction.

I feel that there was some wrong doing from both parties in this matter


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[boxerulez]

I agree here with @boxerulez if the bought this legally then they can basically do with it what they want to. Only the department of Health can determine if there was wrong doing with the display of the stock and if the where not following any laws that we might have regarding the distrabution of nicotine products. Where as the stock has been confiscated it should have remained with the police for destruction.

I feel that there was some wrong doing from both parties in this matter


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Yeah dont get me wrong. I do not condone what stall was doing at all and I do understand the risk for the brand name... but there is a right way and a wrog way of doing things.

Taking your cop friend along to strong arm a probable immigrant into giving his stock back without any compensation is kind of sick.

Lets wait though because blends has not yet answered on the matter of reimbursement to the stall owner.

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[DougP]

@ boxerulez we have openly been here of our own free will to respond to peoples comments regarding this issue
As you have read above we did not arrogantly walk into said shop and just remove our juice. Given the circumstances we had to act in a certain way.

We are not prepared to turn social media into a public court of people's personal opinions where we are put on trial and have to answer individual people's questions and a public lynching

Your comment of "stealing the stock back from them" is grossly unfounded and has no facts to substantiate it and quiet contrary to your next statement where you say "not trying to be douche".

We are prepared to say that we stand by our decision of today given the facts and evidence facing us.
Once again this is not about stock ownership it's about public health and safety issues and the handling of our stock

Any discussions held between us and the store owner is a private mater that we are not prepared to comment on

If somebody got sick from a bottle of our juice that was bought from this store given bottles were open and various people were handling them would you rush to our support when the negligence and public liability claims hit us in support of us in the same way you have rushed to criticize us and literally accuse us of stealing

One that note we are now going to refrain from commenting further on this issue

 

[boxerulez]

@ boxerulez we have openly been here of our own free will to respond to peoples comments regarding this issue
As you have read above we did not arrogantly walk into said shop and just remove our juice. Given the circumstances we had to act in a certain way.

We are not prepared to turn social media into a public court of people's personal opinions where we are put on trial and have to answer individual people's questions and a public lynching

Your comment of "stealing the stock back from them" is grossly unfounded and has no facts to substantiate it and quiet contrary to your next statement where you say "not trying to be douche".

We are prepared to say that we stand by our decision of today given the facts and evidence facing us.
Once again this is not about stock ownership it's about public health and safety issues and the handling of our stock

Any discussions held between us and the store owner is a private mater that we are not prepared to comment on

If somebody got sick from a bottle of our juice that was bought from this store given bottles were open and various people were handling them would you rush to our support when the negligence and public liability claims hit us in support of us in the same way you have rushed to criticize us and literally accuse us of stealing

One that note we are now going to refrain from commenting further on this issue

I cannot say that I take kindly to those words.

I did not accuse you of stealing... i told you that IF you did not refund the man you were stealing his stock.

I guess the shoe fits.

I am out of this thread before there is any strong feelings. Just again stating here It is not my intention to accuse anyone of anything.

We are a bunch of good people and I sincerely hope that whatever happened out of sight was not detrimental to the business owners involved either way.

No hard feelings to @Bleds of Distinction just a bit of pity for the man that was selling local juice as international.



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[Jakey]

Your comment of "stealing the stock back from them" is grossly unfounded and has no facts to substantiate it and quiet contrary to your next statement where you say "not trying to be douche".

This is possibly the first time ive seen a vendor calling a forum member a douche lol,

i dont know the exact laws behind the way in which this was dealt with but to me confiscating these goods could possibly just have taken food out of the mouths of his family.

Ive had very reputable vendors on this forum crack open bottles in store for me to have a smell, and this has been on numerous occasions

*and was the store owner spoken to before hand to give him a chance to rectify his bad practices

 

[boxerulez]

This is possibly the first time ive seen a vendor calling a forum member a douche lol,

i dont know the exact laws behind the way in which this was dealt with but to me confiscating these goods could possibly just have taken food out of the mouths of his family.

Ive had very reputable vendors on this forum crack open bottles in store for me to have a smell, and this has been on numerous occasions

*and was the store owner spoken to before hand to give him a chance to rectify his bad practices

They didnt. They actually quoted me saying I am not trying to be a douche. A technicality yes but I do see what they did there.

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[Jakey]

They didnt. They actually quoted me saying I am not trying to be a douche. A technicality yes but I do see what they did there.

Sent from my Serpent Minikin

lol exactly, it wasnt a direct statement but might as well have been

 

[Derkster_122]

On a detour, the proudly South African thing is a registered trademark and last I heard you had to pay license fees to use it.

Buy something along the lines of "made in SA" costs nothing... And means you can sell it as local here and in South Australia

Or San Antonio


I'm just here here to soak up knowledge... Basically I'm a sponge.

 

[Polar]

I don't really see a sign saying that it's an international e-juice and this might be simple miss information. I see some one with a stall that had a look at the market and realized people don't just want to buy twisp etc (which you can buy off the shelf at dischem). He went to the trouble of sourcing a bigger variety to draw more customers to his stall. He could probably charge R500 a bottle if he wanted to, if anyone would buy it is upto the consumer then.

Can we sell e-juice we are not fond of personally in the private market? It would also have been opened and stored in a variety of conditions.

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