Kevin Hoosier smoked two packs of cigarettes a day for 28 years. Sam Somerville started smoking when he was 16, and kept it up for 20 years. Andy Bader, an off-and-on smoker, once quit for a decade before falling off the bandwagon.

Today, all three say they’re repulsed by the thought of a cigarette. The reason — electronic cigarettes, or e-cigarettes, which contain nicotine that is vaporized and inhaled.

“If you go back — say your battery runs dead or you have a weak moment and have a cigarette — they’re horrible,” said Somerville, who quit in 2012. “They don’t taste like what you remember when you were a smoker. They’re disgusting, the taste hangs in your mouth, and they stink.”

Hoosier said he’d tried everything to quit — patches, gum, going “cold turkey” — until his brother, a registered nurse and fellow former smoker, brought him an e-cigarette from North Carolina.

“He had a doctor actually suggest to him that if was going to continue to smoke that he should switch over to vapor cigarettes,” he said. “He was successful with leaving the cigarettes behind. After a couple of months of vaping, he’d realized some health benefits that come along with it. He started breathing better, his taste and smell improved… he could tell it was doing some positive things for his body.”

Hoosier said he’s experienced his own health gains since quitting, but found one difficulty in the switch: a lack of “quality” e-liquids available in the Charleston area. That’s why Hoosier decided to open his own shop, and WV Mountain Vapor opened its doors in Cross Lanes in December of 2013.

“I opened with the intention of generally and honestly providing people with a healthier option to the Chinese oils that were on the local store shelves — your Go Marts and Smoker Friendly stores — the sort that aren’t American-made and don’t adhere to the same quality standards,” Hoosier said.

A standard e-cigarette includes a rechargeable lithium battery and a cartridge, called a cartomizer. It can cost between $50 and $100 to purchase an e-cigarette, but the Tobacco Vapor Electronic Cigarette Association estimates the cost of maintaining the equivalent of a one-pack-a-day smoking habit is $600 a year for e-cigarettes as compared to more than $1,000 for traditional cigarettes.

All of Hoosier’s e-liquids contain four ingredients: propylene glycol, nicotine, flavoring and vegetable glycerin.

According to the Centers for Disease Control, the Food and Drug Administration has classified propylene glycol as an additive that is “generally recognized as safe” for use in food. Vegetable glycerin is also a common component of skin care cosmetics, toothpaste and foods, and can be purchased in bulk at the grocery store. The flavoring most often used, Hoosier said, is the same as the small bottles sold in local pharmacies.

The FDA attempted to ban e-cigarettes in 2009, determining them to be “drugs or drug-delivery devices,” but a federal appeals court ruled that the agency did not have that authority in 2010. The agency is now moving to regulate them as tobacco products, which would subject them to the same taxes and laws as cigarettes, cigars and smokeless tobacco, although e-liquid does not contain tobacco and does not produce smoke.

According to Carissa McBurney, the Community Outreach Coordinator for the West Virginia Poison Center, the number of teenagers who have tried e-cigarettes is on the rise. She said the center is concerned that the e-liquid used in the device can be toxic if ingested or absorbed through the skin.

“Having these devices in a home poses a risk to any younger siblings who might find the flavored liquid and think it is candy,” she said. “Inadvertent misuse by your teenager can place them at risk for poisoning, as well.”

Dustin Boggess, a regular blogger on e-cigarettes at www.vaporchaser.blogspot.com and a representative of The Consumer Advocates for Smoke-free Alternatives Association, said the argument that e-liquid is toxic when ingested in large amounts should not preclude it from being sold to adults.

“Last year, there were twice as many kids poisoned by patches and [nicotine] gums than e-liquid,” Boggess said. “The highest reported instance of kids becoming sick was from consuming toothpaste.”

He said similar arguments that the range of flavors that e-liquids come in were also too broad and could be applied to many other legal adult substances.

“Even the gums and lozenges now come in flavors like ‘Tropical Fruit Sensation,’” Boggess said. “There are currently 103 flavors of vodka on the market, from Fruit Loops to vanilla birthday cake. Fruit Loops. You’re telling me that’s not marketed to kids?”

Nasandra Wright, director of environmental health services for the Kanawha-Charleston Health Department, said the KCHD has not included e-cigars and e-cigarettes in their clean indoor air regulations, and would need to review more scientific study to determine any potential health detriments to the public.

“It is something we would look to review in the future,” she said.

Hoosier said since opening he has seen a surge of interest in his wares. West Virginia has the second-highest per capita rate of smokers in the nation, and the average smoker in the state smokes 21.1 cigarettes a day.

“If anybody needs help, we do here,” Hoosier said. “My family has been impacted dramatically by cancer. My grandfather had lung cancer, and I’ve had a lot of family members succumb to cancer that was directly related to cigarettes.”

Although there are currently few regulations on the sale of e-cigarettes, WV Mountain Vapor requires customers to be 18 or older to enter. The store has testers with a variety of flavors that contain no nicotine, but Hoosier said he regularly turns away non-smokers looking to try e-cigarettes, because he hopes to sell them primarily as a way to help smokers quit.

“I’m not here to promote the use of nicotine,” he said. “If they come in and have never smoked before, I tell them to do themselves a favor and leave. I have different concentrations of nicotine in the liquids, too, and if someone has been a customer for a while, I’ll suggest they take a step down to a lower concentration.”