“Move fast and break things” was the ethos of James Monsees and Adam Bowen, the founders of Juul. They did that, with their revolutionary electronic cigarette that took the world by storm in 2017 and 2018, generating billions in revenue. However, the good times did not last and director R.J. Cutler's Big Vape: The Rise and Fall of Juul, a four-part Netflix docuseries (Oct. 11) based on the book by Jamie Ducharme, details the misjudgments and mistakes that led to Juul's transformation from a company whose value peaked at $40 billion to one that is now worth less than 5 percent of that total. It was a rocket that crashed hard and, apparently, came apart due to the least surprising of factors.
Juul was the brainchild of Monsees and Bowen, two brilliant Stanford students who came up with their big idea during one of their many daily smoke breaks. What if, they hypothesized, they could reinvent their habit so that users would not suffer the harmful effects of combustible cigarettes, but could still maintain the habit. physical and social pleasure? aspects of smoking? If that were possible, millions of adult addicts could quit smoking traditional cigarettes, saving their lives in the process.
Star: Allen Gladstone
It was a notion with the potential to change the world, and from all indications, Monsees and Bowen were initially driven by this noble mission of providing a healthy alternative to smoking, not to mention one that did not require breaking any dependency, as users would still receive your coveted dose of nicotine.
Their initial concept was the Ploom, a slim but clunky electronic cigarette that needed to be filled with butane. Even though most venture capital firms did not invest (due to “vice clauses” requiring them to stay away from industries like pharmaceuticals), they received enough individual venture capital money to keep going.
When Ploom didn't work, they turned to a loose-leaf tobacco device known as the Pax, which became a huge hit among cannabis users, thus providing Monsees and Bowen with a blueprint for what would be their greatest achievement. That was Juul, a sleek device that Wired's David Pierce called the “iPhone of e-cigarettes,” a phrase that, regardless of its accuracy, now gives you pause. Minimalist, discreet, easy to use and reinforced with flavored cartridges, it was a long-lasting, odor-free substitute for smokers that promised to change the entire tobacco landscape.
Big Vape: The Rise and Fall of Juul features interviews with numerous past and present Juul employees who expose Monsees and Bowen's virtuous intentions to help smokers avoid inevitable doom. However, whether true or not, the reality (according to virtually everyone who appears in Cutler's docuseries) is that the duo treated Juul like a technology company rather than a pharmaceutical (or public health) company, which he avidly pursued sales and profits. To do so, they hired Richard Mumby and Steve Baillie to sell Juul, resulting in a "lifestyle" advertising campaign filled with young, beautiful people dancing and having fun with their new favorite e-cigarette. Baillie defends himself on camera by saying that he did what he was good at, but, as many experts point out, his strategy used almost exactly the same imagery and tactics as traditional Big Tobacco marketing efforts.
The first impression of Juul, then, was that it was a notorious wolf in sheep's clothing, and a year after that campaign launched (and was abandoned, after widespread criticism), Juul suddenly took off as a national phenomenon. , with social media users and influencers driving its popularity to the point where demand far outstripped supply. This was great news for Monsees, Bowen and those who had drunk their Kool-Aid, although more concerning for FDA officials like Center for Tobacco Products Director Mitch Zeller, especially once new data indicated annual increases.
Catastrophic changes in the use of electronic cigarettes among high school students. (80 percent) and high school students (50-60 percent), with Juul being the most popular brand by far. There was a backlash from parents and the FDA, which declared it an “epidemic” and warned that the potential benefits provided by Juul and its ilk were outweighed by the harm it was causing by hooking nicotine on a new generation, which had largely avoided cigarettes.
This seemed the opposite of Juul's stated goals, and the company's subsequent decision to partner with Altria, the parent company of Philip Morris, reeked of hypocrisy. In Big Vape: The Rise and Fall of Juul, several Juul employees talk about their feelings of betrayal by this move, as well as their reasons for staying—that is, they thought they could effect change from within. They also made $1.3 million each from the sale, while Monsees and Bowen became multimillionaires overnight.
The evidence laid out in Cutler's docuseries suggests that the driving force behind most of Juul's moves was greed. Unfortunately for them, a series of e-cigarette-related ailments (which were eventually attributed to cannabis products) further cemented the growing public and political sentiment that Juul was a danger to children's health and safety, and that this danger had to be eliminated. vigorously fought both legislatively and in the media.
Cutler is giving equal time to those on both sides of the Juul divide, including moms who joined forces to stop the device's spread among pre-adults. We also hear from a group of young Juul users discussing why they found the product appealing and the (often traumatic) medical consequences of its use. The director refuses to unduly slant his material, but there's still no mistaking the elephant in the room: For all the pro-Juul talk about how it could save people from premature death from smoking cancer, there's no telling. presents not a single piece of evidence or data. to support that statement. Although they sound good anecdotally, Juul's positive aspects seem unverified, while its negative aspects are easy to see.
In late 2019, Juul CEO Kevin Burns was replaced by K.C. Crosthwaite, and any pretense that Juul wasn't an arm of Big Tobacco (versus a competitor) more or less disappeared. Big Vape: The Rise and Fall of Juul has no shortage of talking heads who continue to believe in vaping and the pursuit of Monsees and Bowen. Ultimately, however, there is nothing very confusing about the damning portrait he paints of the invention and its recent legacy.
Watch Big Vape: The Rise and Fall of Juul 2023 Tv Series Trailer
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