Victoria Gullberg describes herself as curious. So curious, in fact, that when she found vejpningen and took a deep dive - it led all the way to becoming smoke-free, a job and a new social life. Online, she's known as 'Vixx' and ready to take on social media discussions when needed.
It is in Västerås, some ten kilometres west of Stockholm, at the Cigge shop that we find Victoria Gullberg. She lives in Bålsta and commutes to work, but that may be about to change. She is looking for an apartment here for herself and her two daughters.
Although she laughs when she describes things, you can tell that life seemed a little rough and tumble a few years back. Like when she describes how she became a recognisable name on various forums and pages about vejp.
- "I simply spent a lot of time on Facebook. I had no life," says Victoria with a laugh.
Hosted by first vejpen
But it's some way into her story that the forums and 1TP8 Engagement appeared. In 2017, Victoria was a heavy smoker and had become unemployed when a friend introduced her to e-cigarettes.
- There weren't disposables, pod systems, nic salts and all that. It was just nicotine straight into the juice bottle, because that was before the TPD. And I tried it, because I was a big smoker. But I was just coughing and spluttering. So I felt that I couldn't get away from cigarettes then, because at the same time it was too little nicotine for me. I needed more.
TPD – Tobacco Product Directive (på svenska Tobaksdirektivet) och skapades för att reglera handel och användandet av tobaksprodukter inom EU. Ramverket är anlednngen till att nikotinjuice endast säljs i flaskor om 10 ml samt att nikotinstyrkan är begränsad till 20 mg/ml.
Change with nicotine salt
More nicotine meant even more frustration and coughing for Victoria.
- I tried stronger. But the freebase nicotine - the most common variety at the time - scratched like hell," she says, gesturing towards her windpipe.
The solution for Victoria was the nicotine salt.
- Four and a half years ago I found juice with niksalt at Vejphuset in Stockholm. It worked much better for me.
Milder for the throat - but stronger
Nicotine salt is the form of nicotine that quickly became popular in the vejp world. Like regular nicotine liquid, it is extracted from tobacco leaves but treated with acid molecules to balance the usually high pH of the nicotine. In practice, this means that nicotine salts do not scratch the throat as much as traditional nicotine liquids. They allow vejp users to run on higher nicotine strengths without it becoming unbearable. This in turn means that you don't have to puff as much on the machine to get the amount of nicotine you think you need. E-juice with nicotine salt is usually recommended to vejp users who want a faster nicotine effect.
"Terribly grateful"
Once she found her way, Victoria was able to quit smoking for good pretty quickly. But it still took some effort.
- For three weeks I stayed away from kiosks and supermarkets. I sat and ordered food home just to avoid the cigarettes and I sat and puffed all the time. I was consuming several bottles of juice a month. But I got away from cigarettes in the end, and I am so terribly grateful for that.
Started hanging out in shops
From there, Victoria quickly became a full-fledged enthusiast. She started hanging out in both physical stores and on various online forums. That's where she earned her nickname "Vixx"
- I guess that's what I'm known as online. There were lots of different groups like vapeclub, vapefam and others before Facebook started shutting them down," says Victoria.
Acquired knowledge on their own
She started travelling in from Bålsta to Stockholm, where she is originally from, to shop in the various vejpshoppers there.
- But it became very difficult to travel all that way, so I found Cigge in Uppsala instead and became a regular and major customer there. I hung out there a lot when I was unemployed, and that's how I got to hear about the different groups online. I also gained an awful lot of knowledge about vejpning from it.
She says she has always been very curious and picked up new knowledge wherever she could find it.
- I did a lot of reading, and I read everything Stefan wrote on Vejpkollen and took it in.
(This is getting meta here, but Stefan is of course Stefan Mathisson - founder and resident here at Road studs and general e-cig guru).
Got a job at Cigge
The shopping, interest and reading would also lead Vixx to a new job, after a long time outside the labour market.
- I first saw it on Facebook, in one of these groups, that they needed staff at Cigge in Uppsala. But evening work didn't work for me because I have children. Then Mr Viktor, the manager at Cigge, said they needed staff here in Västerås, and that's how it is.
And that's where we are now, in the staff room inside Cigge, Västerås, which Vejpkollen also visited in the series on Swedish vejpshoppers - and met with the store manager Mathias Norman. As it turned out then, it is a store with a good hang within the staff. Victoria always has a sofa to crash on with store manager Mathias if needed. But she's still thinking about taking the plunge and moving here.
Became the face of the organisation
Victoria's online involvement was initially more about learning as much as she could about vejpning, but over time it has taken on a different character.
- In the beginning I was mostly curious about the devices, the machines, tips on good juices, shops with nice staff and all that. Tips on cheap places online and so on. It is more recently when there have been posts for the public, mostly from Vejpkollen, that you had to go out and meet people without any knowledge at all, who write that it would be more dangerous than cigarettes and such. Then you sit and try to explain in a good way, and then you still get only shit back and you feel like this: "I'll stop before there's a call from Mattias that I behaved badly on Facebook" haha. But I'm still the face of the company, so of course I have to keep a good face," says Viktoria.
Only in Sweden are the flavours left
A few years ago, Victoria was also involved in the demonstration train in Stockholm against a then impending flavour bans, but otherwise most engagement takes place digitally. In many countries there are highly activist, organised groups around vejp that controls everything from congresses to events. You don't see much of that in Sweden, but maybe it's not really necessary either, says Victoria.
- I don't think there is much of that. When there was a risk of a flavour ban, we went out on the streets and tried to stop it. And it actually went very well. It was probably very much thanks to the fact that we distributed leaflets in all the shops, got people to sign lists against it and send it to our politicians. If you look at the whole of the Nordic region, there is a taste ban in Denmark, there is a taste ban in Norway and there is a taste ban in Finland. It's like only little old Sweden has flavours left.
This is also noticeable in the shop, says Victoria. Although Västerås is located inland, quite far from any country's border, people from Denmark, Norway and Finland come to shop.
The kids got her to quit smoking
On a personal level, Victoria is a single parent with two daughters, aged 12 and 14. Her children were a big reason why she wanted to quit smoking.
- I can't stand there and smoke myself and say that YOU can't do it. So it was a lot of that, along with the fact that it's unhealthy - I want to live longer - and expensive, that made me quit.
Fakta: Victoria ”Vixx” Gullberg
Ålder: 42
Bor: Bålsta
Gör: Arbetar på Cigge i Västerås
Familj: Två döttrar
Favoritsmak: Några olika. Mycket fruktigt. Men det är juicen Powers, Sour Apple och Coca Cola som är mina favoriter.
Hatsmak: Tobak. Vi får ju in många testjuicer och jag provade någon creamy tobacco för ett tag sedan. Det smakade blöt fimp som legat på balkongen.
