Joe Kline / The BulletinCody Kite, left, and Nicolai Spring blow vapor formations while vaping at a friendís house in Bend.

When Nicolai Spring was not looking, Cody Kite leaned over and blew a fat ring of vapor at his friend’s head. Spring, the more accomplished “vaper” of the two, returned the volley by tapping his cheeks and lofting a series of “Cheerios,” or cereal-shaped ringlets, across the room.

This was a typical afternoon spent among vapers, the common term for people who vaporize nicotine solutions the way smokers drag on cigarettes. More peculiar and specific names for vapers are “cloud bros,” “flavor chasers” and “maintainers.” Kite, 24, began as a maintainer hoping to stay off cigarettes; he has since become a flavor chaser for the connoisseurship he applies to his hobbyist habit. Spring, 20, by contrast, competes in vaping trick competitions and is sponsored by several vape companies. Spring is an unequivocal cloud bro.

“You can definitely tell which O’s are his,” Kite said, admiring the rich variety of vapor rings Spring pulled from the vaporizer he won at the first vaping contest he entered in Santa Rosa, California, in 2015.

The two are a handful of vapers who frequent the five vape shops in Central Oregon, stoking a marketplace worth more than $2 billion in the United States. The Food and Drug Administration has deemed vaporizers and its accessories and juices as tobacco products; it began regulating them this year.

While the vape landscape may change in coming years, a visitor at Vape Game 3, which was opened in 2014, would think it is was business as usual. On any afternoon, a number of vapers hang out on tall stools at the lounge, which features a wrap-around counter, leather couches and a flat screen. Prices have been carefully written in Old English calligraphy on a chalkboard, and a nearby wall is filled with one-ounce jars of “e-juices,” or nicotine solutions.

Here Kite, who lives in Tumalo, kills time between morning gigs with a moving company and evening shifts as a sound engineer at local music venues. A former smoker and recovering alcoholic, Kite said vaping helps him maintain his nicotine fix while avoiding the tar and additives of cigarettes. Elizabeth Rainwater, who has vaped for more than two years, shares Kite’s enthusiasm. She often sidles up next to him at the lounge during her lunch breaks from her job at a car wash.

Rainwater, 20, said she first tried a lemonade-flavored juice when she was a high school senior. Rainwater switched to vaping, which she first glimpsed on social media, when she worried she was becoming addicted to cigarettes. She currently vaporizes a raspberry-flavored solution that carries a 6-milligram nicotine level — the second-lowest dosage available. She said she likes to have something in her hand, especially when she’s driving — her Tiffany-blue vaporizer fits perfectly. Rainwater said she identifies as a flavor chaser.

Flavor chasers

When vapers hang out together, they let their clouds dribble from their lips. When someone’s vapor brushes their neighbor’s face, they don’t recoil the way one might when engulfed in a cloud of tobacco smoke. This vapor is typically flavored to resemble fruits and baked goods. It fills the air like a heavy perfume.

“Vaping certainly smells a hell of a lot better than smoking a cigarette,” Kite said. “I never once had a woman complain about me smelling like strawberry cannoli.”

Kite was alluding to the flavor of e-juice he is currently enjoying with any one of his eight vaporizers. Flavor chasers suss out fully manual vaporizers that allow them to fine-tune the wattage output, which determines the quantity and heat of the vapor created. On this day, Kite carried his utilitarian $100 “mod,” or vaporizer, that, for its stout functionality, could have been filched from a science laboratory. Kite is a former Vape Game employee you would think still works there, given his Vape Game T-shirts and his professional demeanor. Kite speaks fluently about vaporizers’ power input and wattages; the multisyllabic e-juice ingredients “propylene glycol” and “vegetable glycerin” roll off his tongue. Kite goes through a $20 one-ounce pot of e-juice every four days. He currently vaporizes solutions that contain 6 milligrams of nicotine, which in the middle of the spectrum, ranging from 0 milligrams to 12. While some maintainers work to step down their nicotine intake, Kite said he has no plans to do so.

“Most vapers are people who need nicotine. I’m one of those people who is going to freak out at somebody in traffic if I haven’t had any,” Kite said.

Kite’s devotion to his preferred nicotine delivery device has prompted him to help moderate two Facebook pages — the Bend Vape Club and Flavor Chasers United. The groups enjoy nearly 300 and 150 members, respectively. In both groups, administrators make sure would-be members are 18 or over before they can log in to exchange information about vape legislation and swap products.

“Forums are a place for vapers to form friendships with like-minded people,” Kite said. “They allow us to ask and answer questions easily and quickly.”

Cloud chasers

The sometimes derisive terms cloud chasers and cloud bros are reserved for vapers who prize large clouds. While Spring qualifies as a cloud chaser, his genial demeanor and exceptional trickery exempt him from critique — he is one of the good ones.

Spring, who never smoked cigarettes, became fascinated with “cloud tricks” when he began smoking tobacco-based shisha from hookahs with friends. He switched to vapor when he began to worry about his health. After five months of practicing and studying others’ trick variations on social media, Spring mastered the ability to blow thick, rich rings. Spring works part-time at Vape Game while taking classes at Central Oregon Community College on his way to become an X-ray technician. Although he has never been a cigarette smoker, Spring vaporizes a juice with a 3-milligram nicotine level. He said he has not noticed any adverse health effects, something he monitors when he works out five to six days per week. Now that his contest performances have garnered him attention and sponsors, Spring stokes his following by making vape shop appearances and posting short trick clips on his Instagram page @Nicolaivapes, which has attracted 400 followers. Top vape tricksters have tens of thousands of followers. Spring, who lives in Deschutes River Woods, estimates he spends 10 hours a week practicing his tricks in front of a mirror. His girlfriend, Ashtynn Weber, 19, sitting at his side, quibbled with that figure.

With a laugh, she said, “It’s at least twice as much.”

— Reporter: 541-617-7816, pmadsen@bendbulletin.com