Good article by Jeff Stier in Forbes. The upshot is, Obama is still trying to quit smoking and would have been successful by now had he used snus; meanwhile, his FDA is on the offensive to limit access to snus.

Even better for Obama, in a matter of days — if not hours — he could go from this:

To this:

I was going to use Roda, but since the General Original Pursuit blog is very active right now, I figure I might get some play over there if I use General White instead… And play = traffic. And traffic = snus. And snus = happiness. (See Obama picture for proof.)

(transition)

Clubsnus.com is having a new contest. You send a t-shirt design and get a bunch of snus swag and snus. Get the details in this video.

I’m going to win.

Why?

Because I’m going to submit one image per day, all of which will be awesome.

Here’s my first submission:

As you may have surmised from my twitter page, I got a gaggle of snus in from Northerner yesterday and went bar hopping to celebrate. I also brought out a retro Roda from my stash:

A few words about two types of snus that I may or may not do in more detail later:

Offroad Coffee Vanilla: Best Offroad snus. I had it years ago and either it changed or I did. It still has a wonky sour tobacco taste after the coffee vanilla runs dry, but it’s very nice up to then. Well worth trying.

Northerner Energy Snus: Wife is hooked. I’m not much for the purified snus, but she’s in love with it. Check it out if you haven’t.

You’re Famous
I also noticed that my invoice had a promotion for Thunder Frosted. Buy five, get one free. Then above the picture of Thunder, it read: “Voted ‘Best Overall New Product 2009′”

They should have added: “By the Readers of DrSnus.com…”

In Other Snus Shop News…
Clubsnus.com got a bunch of new products in, including offerings from Ettan, Roda, Goteborgs, N&J, and Grov, which are, IMO, some of the best snus on the planet. They’ve also got the Ettan football over there if you buy 20 tins.

Getsnus and buysnus now have the General coasters… Still haven’t seen the baseball cap. Maybe this week… I’ve been wearing mine often these days as it has warmed up here in Central Texas considerably over the past few weeks.

Spring is coming.
Also, my birthday is next week.
In lieu of flowers, send snus.

XOXO,

DrSnus

Sadly, this did not show up in my mail box today. Nor will it be available as a giveaway the next time you buy two rolls of your favorite General snus. It was over at the Original Pursuit blog, which I now think is written by the General himself. However, whoever does have this thing should send it over, and I’ll be happy to do a thorough review.

I’ll even figure out a way to fix (ruin) it by removing the government warnings by haphazardly applying paint remover and spray paint to the infected areas.

Well, this stuff looks interesting. It’s Thunder in a portion that somewhat resembles Lab Series. It’s 12 mg, and this stuff will probably taste like Thunder Frosted, although we’ll have to try it to make sure… since the word Frosted doesn’t, apparently, describe a flavor…

Anyway, looks cool, except one potentially big problem. See the word “long+” on the tin of the pic I stole from Northerner (where it’s available for pre-order)?

Swedish Match has a trademark pending on the word “Long” that sits on the side of their Lab Series. It looks like, from what I can tell, that mark isn’t going to be approved unless they go through an appeal process since some other marks are too similar. Will this mean that these other trademark holders will go after Swedish Match, if there’s doesn’t get approved, and V2? And what if Swedish Match’s mark does get approved? I can’t know for sure since I’m not a lawyer, just a doctor… no wait I’m not that either.

Best regards,

Dr. Snus, Esq.

P.S. If there’s a trademark lawyer in the audience, feel free to set the record straight.

Some more cool stuff coming out with the General logo on it pretty soon…

Coasters:

And a baseball cap:

Both with the obligatory health warnings… Although you can scratch off the one on the hat. But it takes some doing… here’s about five minutes of work:

I figure if I put in five minutes a week, It’ll be ready to wear by mid summer.

It’s strange to admit, but these all these logos actually make me want General… They’re getting into my brain… aaaaaaaaahhh… Luckily I have about 25 tins of General Original waiting for me in reserve… that should be enough… No. The logos are telling me I need to order more… They’re taking over…

To get this stuff, you’ll probably need to buy a few rolls of General at one or all of the online stores or go over to snus auction and pay an arm and a leg for them.

There’s also this Ettan football:

Update: Mrs. Snus just came home, got a hold of the hat, and removed the warning in under two minutes.

She charged me $5…

Disclaimer:
Products discussed in this blog post were provided by Swedish Match.

Review: Now I’m sure many of you have tried Offroad Frosted already. I’ve had mine lying around here for a while… It’s not bad, but I think it was done wrong.

Let’s say, I had a snus that was the second best-selling snus on northerner… Since it’s a strong snus, I suppose I would eventually reason that I should make a weaker version for the masses so that if they decide to use a milder snus, they use mine. Good idea, right? But then, instead of making it taste as similar as possible, I use another recipe I’d been messing around with…

Why would I do that?

I wouldn’t. You’d have to be crazy, stupid, or hate being able to pay your bills or something to change that recipe…

Still, that’s what our homies at v2 did.

Now, there are other considerations, I suppose… but none of them seem to make up for this in my mind. Maybe they want these people to use the thunder minis and fear cannibalization there… Maybe there’s some difficulty because they use two different trade names. I don’t know.

Anyway, aside from not being what I expected, the stuff isn’t half bad…

Smells OK. It’s minty, not sweet at all, and boy does it burn. In fact, it burns so much it makes me sneeze.

All in all, decent stuff… Probably the best Offroad product I’ve had, although it’s been a while.

Dominant Flavors:
Mint

Buzz Factor:
Regular

The Prognosis:
Pretty good stuff. Still kind of a disappointment that it’s not like Thunder.

Dr. Snus Rating:
++++ (Not like Thunder Frosted)

Grats to Frank B., winner of the Goteborgs contest… Only took three to win.

Didn’t get too many entries on this. Next time, I’ll choose either a more popular snus or more exciting swag…

And Frank, I’ll be sure to have your stuff to you before, say, summer… just ask our Best Snus Contest winners how long it took Mrs. Snus to go to the post office…

Also, is that a miniature mail box? What the hell?

Review: Trying so much strong snus over the past year has pushed up my tolerance, a bit. Still, not for something like this…

Is the strongest snus title something even worth pursuing?

Probably…

Skruf Xtra Stark is said to be 20 to 30% more powerful than Skruf Stark, which I have taken a liking to in recent months. The white variety, though. Something about original portions turns me off. I’m a little racist when it comes to snus, I guess. Although the lab series I really dig. That’s more of a halfling…

Anyway, I like the white Skruf products a lot. These look a little rough, but that’s part of what you get when your making something so damn strong. Have a look:

It’s not the prettiest portion I’ve ever seen, but still not quite cat shit…

The flavor isn’t quite as nice as Xtra’s more mild cousins, either. Again, you start packing in power, and perhaps the rose flavors get pushed aside. Not to  say, however, that this doesn’t have some signature skruf flavor. It does, it’s just less distinct.

Still, I don’t know why you stop here. Why not take it to 20mg, 25mg, 45mg? Perhaps it has something to do with this.

I’m sure that later this year Thunder will come out with something stronger for me to poke fun at…

Alright, I’m taking this stuff out. And replacing it with a skruf original white… much better.

Dominant Flavors:
Sledgehammer, hints of Skruf

Buzz Factor:
Mind Bending

The Prognosis:
While I’m not a fan of this particular snus, I do like the innovation… even if it’s the kind of innovation you get with a bulldozer.

Dr. Snus Rating:
+++ (LD₅₀)

Disclaimer:
Products discussed in this blog post were provided by Skruf Snus.

So, I’ve gotten a couple pictures in, and I’ll tell you this: Nothing that can’t be beaten by a casual Goteborgs user… Go here to read about it, and send a pic of your Goteborgs stash to drsnus@gmail.com…

In non-Goteborgs contest news, as you’ve probably seen, most the snus sites are giving away a cool  hat if you buy 2 rolls of General. Most shops have a restrictive definition of what General is: General Original. If you’re a whack job like your good doctor, you probably already have a truckload of General Original in your stash. So, Clubsnus let’s you pick any of the General lines it carries to get the hat…

Right now, they’re also giving away 2 tins of General Ekstra Stark for every 5 tins you buy. So you get 8 tins free and a cool hat when you buy 2 rolls.

Pretty cool, huh? Check it out here.

This one is pretty easy. You send me a picture of your Goteborgs collection (any variety, empty or full). The person with the most tins get my Goteborgs Rape swag, which includes the ipod cover, iphone cover and the little rockin’ speaker. email photos to drsnus@gmail.com. Be sure to tell me how many are in your pic.

Oh, and you don’t have to be able to beat my magic number: 17

Contest ends Feb. 19 at 11:57 PM Central U.S. Time.