Today we’d like to introduce you to Billy Wilson and Paul Davey.
Billy and Paul, please share your story with us. How did you get to where you are today?
eCig Distributors (ECD) was started as a result of a friendship I had with my business partner Paul Davey. Paul had recently quit smoking traditional cigarettes and moved to electronic e-cigarettes (ecigs) as a method of harm reduction. Paul was so impressed with the life changing results that he started telling all of his friends and family about it.
After months of watching the continued success with users of the product, Paul contemplated opening a retail storefront to sell ecigs as a means of helping others quit traditional cigarettes. At the time, Paul was a manager at a generic pharmaceutical manufacturer.
He called me from time to time to ask advice about what the pros and cons would be about starting a business retailing ecigs. My advice to him was always give it a try, but told him not to quit his day job. That’s exactly what he did. After months of back and forth, Paul opened The Vapor Loft (TVL) in Orange, California. The store was only open at nights and weekends as Paul still had his regular full-time job.
Several months after opening the store, his company was sold and he was given a generous severance package. He decided to run TVL as his full-time business. He quickly ran into numerous problems, as there was no domestic supply chain. Paul was forced to wire large sums of money overseas to people he had never met before, in hopes that the product would show up in the next few weeks. Sometimes weeks turned into months so he wouldn’t have any product to sell to his customers.
Paul called me one day and asked me to come into the store to talk about all the issues he was experiencing. Having run a retail store myself, we were hopeful there would be an easy solution. After discussing this issue and many others he was facing, I became very interested in how I could help solve some of these problem. We spent several days thinking through the issues and quickly realized that the solution was to create a domestic ecig distribution business. Given this was a very new industry, we were concerned that there might not be enough demand to create a sustainable business yet.
That weekend we bought the domain eCigDistributors.com and built a landing page with a contact form and google voice phone number. The goal was to test and see if anyone would respond. No one called for several months. We had almost forgotten about the website we built and then, we got the first call.
We had nothing setup at the time and didn’t even have any products to sell. I called Paul to let him know that I received a call and asked if we could make a list of all the products he had in his store and buy some from him at cost. We were able to service this first customer and he soon became a repeat customer. This customer would tell me every time I delivered his order how much this service was helping him out and improving his business. Just a few months later Paul and I decided to partner up and form ECD.
Has it been a smooth road?
Anyone that says, “Owning a business is easy!” is not being honest. We have had a ton of struggles. There are too many to list but through hard work and perseverance, we have managed to continue grow the business and solve problems for the vape industry.
We continue to face numerous headwinds with regulation, changing market conditions and increased competition. Our focus is on solving industry issues and we believe that in doing this well, our company will be rewarded.
So, as you know, we’re impressed with eCig Distributors, Inc. – tell our readers more, for example what you’re most proud of as a company and what sets you apart from others.
Today ECD is a completely different business than when it was started. We have changed the entire business model, fixed systemic problems, scaled our systems, added a tremendous selection of products, created some of the strongest relationships in the industry, secured numerous assets that the company is able to leverage and we built and implemented process that have allowed this business remain profitable.
We have dedicated the last five years of our lives to ensure that ECD has the best chance possible of being a success. Because of the efforts listed above and many more, ECD is now a leading Online Retailer, Online Wholesaler, Online Distributor and Online Advertiser of vape products. Our goal is to ensure that we are able to make these harm reduction products available to as many people as possible around the globe.
Contact Info:
- Address: 1100 Palms Airport Drive, Las Vegas, Nevada, 89012
- Website: eCigDistributors.com
- Phone: 1-855-698-7110
- Email: billy@ecigdistributors.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ejuicesdotcom/
- Other: eJuices.com
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