Vapouround magazine Special Issue 01 | Page 52

F E AT U R E A BRIEF HISTORY OF RY4 TOBACCO FLAVOR By Kurt,Cafe Racer RY4 is one of the oldest e-liquid flavors for vaping with a rich history and a continues to evolve as e-liquid artists update this profile with new twists. RY4 is an umbrella term for a flavor profile that incorporates three basic component flavors: a tobacco base (usually mild and understated, but occasionally stronger and more up front), caramel, and vanilla. The caramels and vanillas are as varied as the tobacco bases. The trend has been to slowly evolve RY4 by adding other flavors to the mix, but those three are essential. The term RY4 comes from the original e-Cig produced by the Ruyan Group Ltd. Ruyan launched the first production electronic cigarette on the market back in 2004 under the Ruyan brand. Ruyan’s blend #4 e-Liquid was originally 50 VAPOUROUND MAGAZINE USA made by Chang Ning Dekang Biological Technology Co. for Ruyan Group Limited. The name 'Ruyan' was commonly shortened to just RY, with the blend number being placed after it, thus 'Ruyan blend #4' becomes just RY4. There is some controversy around this according to the Big RY4 thread on the E-cig Forum: Here's a snippet from the RY4 Forum: “The very first RY liquid was created in a single afternoon by two men: Ludo, one of the owners of Janty, and a Chinese flavor chemist, presumably working for Dekang. They started in the lab of a Dekang factory in China with some basic flavors they both agreed on and made various "test juices," tweaking the recipe along the way. After about four hours, they came up with the one they liked best, and they christened it Ruyan 4—" the name was abbreviated to RY4." FROM A Reddit THREAD ON THIS TOPIC WITH JANTY himself WEIGHING IN “Ruyan never had anything to do with an RY4 flavor. It was Janty who designed it with Dekang. They were the first to sell it and when other companies started buying it from Dekang and selling it Janty used to even write to them and ask them not to call it RY4 which is why you would see it called names like Riskee Yuice. Here's an interview with the founder of Janty: Ludo | Janty: "We were never in this for the money, we grew out of the vaping community in 2006 and the only thing that drives us is passion. We design and