Are they worth picking up?
Wick Liquor’s flavours are all beautifully-crafted and the quality is better than you’d expect, even given the “boutique” style and fanciful descriptions.
Granted, it’s probably impossible to place the citrus in Contra as Sicilian vine citrus, but the over-the-top gourmet vibes aren’t completely unjustified: Wick Liquor clearly puts a lot of care into crafting their e-juices, and the effort more than pays off.
For £14.99 (about $19.60) for the 50 ml short-fill options, they’re well worth picking up in your juice order.
Full review
“Boutique” mixers aren’t for everybody. Sometimes you just want a straightforward fruit or tobacco e-liquid, rather than a compote lovingly-crafted from about 15 varieties of exotic fruit that you’ve never heard of. But boutique juices do have their place, whether you just want an occasional treat or you want to vape like a king all day, every day, and it’s still going to be cheaper than smoking.
UK-based Wick Liquor is definitely one of these mixers, offering five core flavours – with fanciful descriptions like “Mardi Gras fruit punch and fortified Malibu Loganberry pulp” – in a range of sizes and as a salt line-up too. To comply with the EU’s TPD, their juices either come in 10 ml bottles (£3.99/$5.20 or three for £9.99/$13.10) or 50 ml short-fill options (£14.99/$19.60) called “Big Block.” These come with no nicotine, but you top them up with a nicotine shot or base to your desired strength. We’ve tested out five flavours in Big Block form for our Wick Liquor review.
Packaging and Design
Wick Liquor has a distinct visual style, so the bottles look really cool. There’s a black and white patterned frame over the white background, with the “Wick Liquor” logo, the name of the flavour and the nicotine strength inside, and then the usual ingredients and warnings off to the side. Boulevard Shattered is the odd one out, with a black background and white detail, but the design for the whole line-up is really cohesive and well-executed.
The Wick Liquor juices come in the standard unicorn-style bottles, but they’re a bit better than the usual type used for short-fill juices. You don’t have to get something thin to pry the dripper top off the whole bottle, because the spot section has a hinge and essentially two layers. There’s a little ribbed section at the front to help you push the top section up, then the upper layer and spout flip back to reveal a little hole to put your nicotine shot in. This might not seem like a huge deal if you aren’t used to short fills, but it saves tons of time and it’s a great design choice.
Mixing Options
The PG/VG ratio and nicotine options for Wick Liquor depend on what size and type you’re buying. For the short-fills and the little bottles of ordinary juice, the PG/VG ratio is fixed at 80 percent VG to 20 of PG, but for the nicotine salt liquids it’s a 50/50 split. This is because salt juices are really intended for pod systems so a thinner mix is ideal.
For nicotine levels, the “Big Block” short-fills have no nicotine by definition. You can add a 10 ml nicotine shot of 18 mg/ml to bring the whole bottle up to 3 mg/ml, but you’ll need a stronger base if you want more nicotine in your juice. In the 10 ml bottles, you can get the Wick Liquor juices in either 3 or 6 mg/ml of nicotine. Finally, the nicotine salts have higher nicotine levels, with options of 10 mg/ml or 20 mg/ml.
This all works together really well, because you have a thicker, cloudier mix for the ordinary, low-nicotine juices, but something both stronger nicotine and thinner in consistency for people using pod devices or simpler pens.
Wick Liquor Review – The Flavours
Wick Liquor Flavour List
- Boulevard: Mardi Gras fruit punch and fortified Malibu Loganberry pulp.
- Boulevard Shattered: Boulevard, but with Matanuska Alaskan Crystals for an icy cool twist.
- Carnival: Santa Monica glazed dough rings and Cholo sugar skull cake.
- Contra: Sicilian vine citrus and Porta Fortuna fruit compote.
- Deja Voodoo: Santa Barbara coconut husk and Chula Vista sugar cane.
Deja Voodoo – Rating 4/5
Accuracy: This is a coconut and sugar cane juice, although the description says “husk” and that both are specifically California varieties. Of course you can’t tell where the coconut husk is from – unless you’re some sort of niche coconut connoisseur – but the result is pretty good in terms of the core flavours. The flavour is really carried by the sugar cane, which adds a distinctive sweetness, and the coconut falls into the background a little. You pick up undertones from the coconut, but the sugar cane dominates overall.
Overall: This juice goes down really easily and could easily become an all-day-vape depending on your preferences. Both flavour components might seem a bit boring, particularly the coconut, but the sugar cane is really well-executed and it manages to add enough character to the flavour to keep you coming back for more. The subtlety of the core flavours is part of the appeal as well – it isn’t one to really challenge your tastebuds but that’s what gives it the all-day-vape potential.
Carnival – Rating 4.5/5
Accuracy: This is the glazed dough-ring and sugar skull cake e-juice, so to be honest aside from a basic cake and doughnut-ish taste I wasn’t sure what to expect. The dough-ring element comes through noticeably, largely through the taste of icing sugar, which has a kind of doughy backdrop but really hits the nail on the head when it comes to the glaze. As for the cake, I struggle to really pick it out of the mix, although you do occasionally pick up a touch of fruitiness that’s hard to precisely pin down but strikes me as a faint banana flavour.
Overall: This is another really enjoyable juice despite a fairly subtle flavour overall. The gentle sweetness from the glaze on the dough-ring really carries the taste, and the fruity touches add a little bit of character every so often. It would have probably been a little better if they’d dialled up one of the elements or added a more robust flavour into the mix, but it’s still delicious and one I struggle to put down.
Boulevard – Rating 4/5
Accuracy: Dropping the fanciful details, this juice is billed as a fruit punch and loganberry juice. Fruit punch is admittedly a pretty vague description, but that element definitely comes through from the juice. Loganberry is a hybrid of blackberry and raspberry, and the blackberry tones in particular stick out from the mixture, with the sweet and slightly tart flavour hitting you on the nose as you inhale before being enveloped in the rest of the mix on the exhale. This one definitely hits the nail on the head in terms of accuracy, despite the vaguely-defined target.
Overall: This is a hard one not to like. The flavours really pop out, and the well-replicated fruity tones blend together nicely and offer a natural sweetness that stops short of becoming sickly or too powerful. If you like berry or fruit juices, this is definitely one to try and another potential all-day-vape. It might not be sweet enough if you like heavy dessert-style flavours or candy, but if you’re flexible or prefer lighter flavours, this is excellent.
Contra – Rating 5/5
Accuracy: Contra does a great job of capturing the advertised citrus and fruit compote flavour. The citrus is really easy to pick up, with the juice having a very lemony exhale and just enough bite to balance out the syrupy elements from the compote. The compote itself is a blend of fruit, and picking out individual components isn’t easy, but it has a jam-like sweetness and a layered, complex flavour.
Overall: This is the stand-out juice from the line-up for me. The fruit elements are perfectly captured, and the lemon keeps the whole thing bright without being overpoweringly sharp. You almost feel like you get different flavour components with each puff, which makes vaping Contra a pretty unique experience. The good news is that every combination of flavours that comes through works beautifully, and I’d recommend picking it up as long as you don’t actively dislike citrus.
Boulevard Shattered – Rating 4/5
Accuracy: This is basically Boulevard with the addition of icy menthol, and the description is very accurate. The flavour components from the original all come through clearly, all just as accurate and well-balanced as before, but with a strong, cooling menthol on top. The menthol comes through most on the inhale and gives you a pleasantly-strong icy hit on the back of your throat. It’s pretty gentle in terms of minty taste, but the cooling overtone is quite punchy.
Overall: This is the only menthol juice in the line-up, but if you picked it up with that in mind you’d probably be a little disappointed. This is more for people who enjoy fruity combinations like that offered by Boulevard but like their liquids to have a little kick, whether a menthol kick or just an extra component to the throat hit. For me it’s no more or less enjoyable than the original, but that’s personal preference, and the menthol does add enough to the taste to justify the extra edition.