Socialsmoke.com Reviews

[mushrat]

This is for posting your PERSONAL experiences with www.socialsmoke.com. Please restrict your comments to what you ordered, customer service, delivery, and over all satisfaction.

If you had a problem, was it resolved in a satisfactory way?

Please post here only AFTER your transaction is complete.
Comments and questions by others will be restricted to the regular discussion forum and deleted from this topic if posted here.

[Scheetz]

Social Smoke is an A+ company. Quick shipping every time I have ordered. Even gave me free shipping when my order was delayed one time.

I highly suggest using Social Smoke as your online vendor.

[web250]

Great vendor. Ordered from them 5-50g Layalina, 1-250g Havana Orange. Tobacco was fresh, shipped very quickly, and the prices are very decent.

[Erica]

A++

[DizzyGuy]

Got my first hookah from Social smoke... Great company, good prices, and fast shipping. The freebies were nice too When I got the hookah though, I soon discovered that there was a rip in the end on the hose right by the handle. They replaced it free of charge with a MYA

[SanguineSolitude]

great company, great shipping, great customer service. theyre one of the best. there egyptians are top notch too!

[skiracerj1]

I've order from them on several occasions and they are always very quick with order processing and make sure nothing goes wrong, never any problems.two of my friends have purchased hookahs from them and they are of extremely high quality, the nicest made egyptians I've seen in that price range.

[arjayfunkie]

A great store, bought my Jr Hookah there great deal, and was on sale so it was even better. A great place to start your 1st hookah internet buying =) kudos to Social Smoke.

[oriteku]

I ordered a social pack of Layalina and coals from them a couple weeks ago. The transaction went off without a hitch. Shipping was fast and I would happily do business with them in the future.

[Grommet]

I ordered a nice collection of stuff that totaled about $50 from them last week. Everything came pretty quick with the exception of my missing coals. I emailed customer support and the same day got a return email with them appologizing and letting me know they would ship them that day.

I'd definitely recommend them.

[d_apathy]

EDIT: Okay so heres an update for most of you. I called them up and got ahold of a very nice lady. She told me she would talk to her manager about it and call me back. About 30 mins later, She calls me right up. They're gonna be sending me a replacement bowl and vase within the next couple of days. I asked them if they wanted me to ship them out the faulty ones and they said no, so thats pretty cool of them. I have a spare vase now eeeeeeeeee

[Jermfrog]

Ordered: Medium Egyptian 3 hose hookah, all the accessories + some flavors and hoses.

very fast service, shipped next day, good customer service since the color base i bought was out of stock, got a call asking if i want to wait or pick a different color. Good prices and with my order the discount made it have free shipping and some!

10/10

[Yoner]

I have nothing but good things to say about Social Smoke. I have not purchased any hookahs from them, but just sheisha. This is not the first nor last time that I've purchased from Social Smoke.

This past time...

2 X 250 g Custom Social Smoke Blend SB
1 X 250 g Marlette SB
1 X 250 g White Peach SB
2 X 250 g Irish Cream SB
1 box of 3 Kings Quick Lights.

I originally asked for 1 X 250 g X on the Beach, but they called me up the next day (I ordered after hours) and told me that they were out. I chose another Irish Cream. Additionally I asked then for 3 day shipping. They charged me an extra amount. My shipment did come in 3 days later.

My only complaint...lack of tracking order, I had to call up to confirm that it was being sent out. Even then, that still isn't much of a complaint.

If you purchase from any online hookah store, seriously check out Social Smoke.

-yoner

[hookaheveryday]

Social Smoke is absolutely amazing. My base cracked when I was putting large ice cubes into it. I called customer service and they said they would send me another one. The hookah I got was a Sirius I and it is pure quality. I highly recommend this vendor.

[mgs0lid]

S.S. is one of the best hookah companys ever... period. I ordered a social smokes oasis and the ammount of quality extras that were included were great. I broke it in with a few friends who are both ordering hookahs now and I am definatlly reccomending them.

[Johnny_D]

Social Smoke have good customer services...yes
But they are fully pointless for international customers.

If you are from Cananda or the UK Do not use Social smoke. They refuse to put anything but tobacco on there
customs forms and are then surprised when the packages get caught.

Yes, yes, yes i realise everyone who just loves SS have anicdotal evidence SO DO I. All £271 of it.

So for internal US customers i'm sure there fine... International? Would not touch them with a barge pole.

JD

[Sir Tony]

Ordered four tins of Starbuzz from them. They shipped it out the same day I ordered it. It was packed very well, and arrived fast. There customer service is top notch, A++++++!

[cymptom]

On 12/28 I placed an order for 3 Cans of Starbuzz (White Peach, Irish Cream, Marlette) and later that night I received a phone call from Social Smoke informing me that White Peach was out of stock, so I decided to go with Blackberry instead.

A week went by and I hadn't received shipping confirmation -- I made some comment about this on the forum and I rather quickly received a PM from Social Smoke (Ali Nadimi) asking me for my order number so he could assist with my problem. About a day later he had investigated my problem and found that there was an error in processing my order which caused it to be shipped to someone else's address; he resolved the issue by sending out my package immediately with overnight shipping, including 2 free 100g samples of Apple Cinnamon and Pumpkin Pie.

I received my package the next morning (1/6,) but found that they sent me Raspberry instead of Blackberry. I immediately contacted Mr. Nadimi at Social Smoke and he was extremely apologetic, expressing disappointment with some of his staff and promising to send out the Peach after the weekend. The Raspberry Starbuzz he said I could keep as a gift.

Regarding the difficulties I encountered in my order, Mr. Nadimi stated: "All in all this is a very frustrating situation. We strive hard to provide professional, accurate, and timely service, however we have done an exceptional job of giving the impression of the exact opposite." Because Mr. Nadimi has been so quickly responsive and helpful in resolving the complications in my order, it is obvious to me that my experience reflects a rather irregular series of mistakes of a company that it is fact very professional and reliable. These kind of things can happen to any online vendor -- the difference is the way in which they are handled and resolved, and Social Smoke did an excellent job of demonstrating the quality of their service in this regard. Not to mention, I was well compensated -- this Starbuzz Pumpkin Pie smells absolutely incredible, I can't wait to try it. Look for a review in the tobacco reviews section over the next few days.

Much thanks to Mr. Nadimi at Social Smoke for being so helpful. In the end I am very satisfied with Social Smoke and (if I ever get the money to order more Starbuzz) I do plan to shop there in the future. A+ service!

A few notes about the products received:

Starbuzz Raspberry 251g .05 nic
Starbuzz Marlette 255g .5 nic
Starbuzz Irish cream 246g .05 nic

Weighed in the plastic bag, Irish Cream was a few grams under 250 -- nothing to get all antsy about. What I found interesting was that the Marlette is .5 nicotine while the other two flavors are .05. It certainly appears to be much darker than the other two, and I suppose I noticed a difference in buzz too. I wonder if this is a flavor specific difference or if it is just random (i.e. batch specific.)

[Social Smoke]

Thanks guys for taking the time to post about your personal experiences, both good and bad, with Social Smoke. We value all of your opinions and are always working on constantly improving our company in every aspect.

I would like to take a second to talk about international orders, as Johnny_D has brought up. The vast majority of international orders are sent and received without incident, taxes, or duties...

We value all of our international customers greatly and appreciate every international order we get. I do not know what the circumstances of Johnny_D's situation was so I am not attacking or questioning the truthfulness of his post. I am only using this opportunity to touch on some issues related to international orders.

International shipping is not as simple as boxing something labeling it gift putting a low value in and sending it out every time. With as many international shipments that we have going out on a daily basis, over time customs in certain areas have figured out the pattern and stop more and more of our packages.

We have found that some international customers are not willing to accept responsibility for choosing to order controlled products across international boundaries. In the past we used to always label the boxes as gift or molasses, but many times we have been blamed for the duties and taxes the customer is charged by their own governments. Most often when the boxes are searched and taxed, the customer refuses to pay for it and the tobacco is sent back ( at our expense in the case of UPS ) and the customer requests a refund, many times a full refund.

To make matters worst, recently countries such as UK but more often in certain provinces in Canada have started destroying tobacco when found to not be labeled tobacco. They wont even give the customer a chance to pay for it or send it back. This amounts to a total loss on the order, and almost every time this has happened the customer has put 100% of the blame on Social Smoke. In the end, since most customers do not specifically request "gift or molasses" to be on the declaration Social Smoke accepts responsibility and reships the entire order a second time for free. A few customers, however, have understood that we were only trying to help them and have agreed to pay half of the costs to reship the order. Obviously it only takes a few times reshipping a $100 or $200 worth of products plus paying $40-$60 for shipping, to get old real quick, especially when Social Smoke is being blamed for trying to help and told it is our fault.

Obviously we feel like sometimes we have gotten the short end of the stick. Almost like a damned if you do, damned if you don't. For that reason, when we are having problems with a certain area seizing tobacco or checking many orders, our warehouse will not label the box as a gift, since there is a good chance the order will be destroyed causing us a total loss. If Johnny_D had requested his order to be labeled gift and understood the risks, then I don't know why it was not done.

Any international customer can request a certain declaration, but we still sometimes limit the amount of tobacco that we will ship out in any one box to certain international countries or provinces where problems have happened in the past. Asking a customer to place a smaller order is an attempt to help him or her to limit the risk of taxes or seizure. By the way, if you have had problems with this in the past, UPS shipments are also statistically slightly more likely to have this happen, but not always. USPS shipments are statistically less likely to happen, but are rarely on time.

In the future, we are planning on requiring every international customer to specify what they want to declare on their order both description and value and agree to accept responsibility if the package is taxes, seized, or returned. Hopefully this should prevent surprises and hard feelings and allow for an overall better international ordering experience.

Best Regards,
Ali

[mushrat]

I am going to allow the above post to stay where it is because it brings up a valid point.

Don't ask a company to break the law. Whatever your order is can't be worth jepordizing their business for. And you sure shouldn't get upset if you get caught doing soemthing you shouldn't and it costs you extra.

No other posts about this issue will be allowed in the review area. Please feel free to take it to the general discussion section and keep it CIVIL.

[camelflage]

just received my first order from Social Smoke, and i have to say they will be getting my business again.

Ordered the 5x100g SB sampler pack and a couple regular clay bowls for spare. About a day after ordering i got a call and an email to let me know they were out of one of the SB flavors i ordered and wanted to know should they wait or did i want to substitute. I said wait since it wasnt a big deal, only about a week and ive got more than enough sheesh to hold me over. Package comes, and instead of 5 100g bags there are 5 250g tubs of the flavors i ordered as well as nicer bowls than what i ordered. above and beyond the service i could have expected, im switching to them as my main supplier of hookah merch now!

[DownZero]

SS is one of the best companies to order from. Extremly fast shipping and the best customer care. All my orders have been great. I once recieved a cracked vase, I called them up asking about it and they sent me a brand new vase, no questions asked. The replacement was recieved just as fast as any other order.

[cafesaden]

I just recently had a wonderful experience with this company. Only company, to my knowledge, that sells taqseem stargate natural coals online. I had been looking to buy these coals for some time so I decided to give in. I bought their 5 bag package. within 5 days I had my stuff, perfectly packaged, no coals damaged, and right on time.

A+++

Good job socialsmoke!

[ioannisds]

I just received an order from SS today, one day earlier than expected. Just some accessories, nothing really exciting, but I thought I should show you folks why SS is so awesome. First, the cleaning brushes. Now, if any of you have ordered brushes online before, you know how they usually show up: twisted up like a pretzel from the state fair. You bend them out straight, but they always retain some of the original abuse. Not the case with the brushes I got from SS today. They are sealed in a plastic shell, and in perfect shape:





I also purchased a couple of their bowls. I have always like the generic Egyptian clay bowls for solo smoking, just because they seem to hold the right amount of ma'assell for one of my sessions. BUT, they suck. If you use even the slighest amount of force when placing them on the stem, the neck of the bowl inevitably cracks. Not to mention they sometimes look like they were made by a retarded gorilla with a migraine. The Social Smoke bowls have everything I like about the regular clay bowls, but appear to be much, much, much sturdier, and nicely made. Here are some shots of the bowl:





The neck seems like it would hold up a lot better than the poopie bowls too:



AND, you get a nice, new, nubby grommet for your stem:



I also ordered some coals and some tobacco, and of course they showed up fine. It's hard to screw that kind of stuff up, I would think. I am just really pleased with the little details that SS puts into some of their items. To me, it's stuff like this that makes the difference between a good vendor and a great vendor, and Social Smoke is definitely the latter. Now go buy some stuff from them, why don't you .

[gvaz28]

Hi,

I recently ordered from Social Smoke:

Medium Clay Hookah Bowl
Basic Washable Hose - SMOKE PACK (2 Hoses)
Choose 50g Nakhla Flavor:: Double Apple - Nakhla
Choose StarBuzz Flavor:: Exotic X On The Beach
Large Single Hose Hookah Stem - STEM ONLY
Choose 50g Al Amir Flavor-Honeydew Melon
Choose 50g Al Amir Flavor-Peach
Choose 50g Al Amir Flavor-Raspberry
Choose 50g Al Amir Flavor-Strawberry
Choose 50g Al Amir Flavor-Watermelon

I am a first time hookah buyer (my cousin had a base thats why I got the stem only). I havent tired out the hookah yet, but the pacakge just came in today and everything was very well packed and it arrived exactly when they said they would. I even made the order more complicated by ammending my order after initially placing it but they were able to accomodate me and ship it all out together. The customer service was great and so was the website, it was easy to navigate and thanks to hookahforum for the 15% discount!

All in all, I was very satsified by my order and I'm not sure what a vendor could have done that would have made the transaction any smoother, so I give them 10/10.

Thanks,

Gaurav. Edited February 23, 2007 by gvaz28