No question there must be a paradigm shift of marketing on the street store retail market, as the video clearly demonstrates.
But is that where distillers go to source raw materials? Pay the retail prices? By my rough calculations, that farmed Kyen that is $800 would result in oil costing over $2000 per bottle. So if someone releases a good Viet oil for $700-800, for example, where can you get wood cheap enough to make that oil if 7 year old farmed stuff is $800/kg?
The video was shot at two totally unrelated locations. The bulk of the video, featuring Ensar talking, was filmed at one of the more established wholesalers in Vietnam. The opening scenes and the final bit show a retail shop in Ho Chi Minh. We added those to show that they confirm what Ensar was talking about in the rest of the video.
That said, even this street store isn’t just someone who buys from larger wholesalers and resells in his store. Rather, consider the street store as the virtual 'website' of a huge company with an army of hunters, a wide network of contacts, and large, organized cultivation and wood business located in Nha Trang, right near the forests. The brick-and-mortar store is merely their outlet. They do retail but sell their own wood. We asked him for 400 kg and he said he could have it ready in two weeks—and his prices match, in some cases beat, other wholesalers.
So, with this in mind, you hit the nail right on the head. Leave the authenticity of the wood aside for a second, and simply take in the prices. If modern Vietnamese oils distilled from this wood ought to cost at least as much as you suggest, that should tell you something. If someone is marketing oil made from black chips like these, and selling it for $700-$800, your question is very pertinent. Of course, the fact that the $800 wood is really cultivated adds to the mix in no small way. More than likely, they are using the 'by-product' Ensar talked about...
Although the pieces in the Facebook video are quite different, you make a good point. Truth is, as of now that wood remains undistilled because Ensar started to have doubts. Due to passport issues, I wasn’t able to accompany him on the trip where he collected the trial run we did. I was quite unnerved to hear him say we might not be able to sell it because it smells cultivated.
We did a trial run from wood purchased along with that and Ensar’s doubts were confirmed that this is indeed planted, although without chemicals, and that’s it. He’s keeping the trial batch. It’s nice, but not what we intended. When wood smells good on heat, but the oil turns out to smell cultivated or from young trees, we’re not just gonna go with the flow and repeat the story we were told.
So, the wood is unreleased and the oil will remain unreleased. Although, given some people’s reaction to similar oils on the market, I think you would be quite impressed to smell it.
Our job since day one has been to teach. If something is cultivated, you find it listed under Organic Oud, and it has its price tag. If something is wild, you won’t find it under Organic Oud unless the wood was, although wild, too young to meet our classification of ‘wild’. (With that logic, it is very possible for a tree that was planted by a human being to produce wood, and for that wood to yield oil which is as good as wild.)
Keep in mind that wild Vietnamese oil does not oxidize very easily. Ensar has samples which consist of roughly .1 gr to .15 gr of oil in a 1 gr vial. And he’s had them there for over two years. They remain unchanged, without the use of argon or any other such thing. (He gifted one such sample to Taha, who can confirm.) The oils that you find from 2017 harvests do not display the same resilience or resistance to oxidation. This is another factor that gave Ensar doubts, which led him to further dig and confirm that although they might smell very nice, the newer generation oils are not the same breed as the former generation. (Rather, they are the same breed as Oud Yusuf, Jing Shen Lu and Taigo Senkoh.)
Don’t get me wrong, anybody can price any oil any price they like, but if we distill something we have doubts about, 1) We won’t launch it, even if that entails a financial predicament for that particular investment (we have thousands of $$$ collecting dust on the shelf), and 2) We will get to the bottom of it, as to why the smell came out the way it did.
Ensar has had doubts about new generation Vietnamese oils which I believe he even expressed to you in private chats. Remember Betonamu Senkoh, which you were quite enthused about, but Ensar was hesitant and reluctant to give you? It will remain unreleased because of those very same doubts.
Where can I get this wood for $25/kg?
I don't see it listed on your website.
We don’t have any $25 wood for sale, but if you’re looking for some you can see it at around 8:42 & 15:01 in the video.
The problem I have is Ensar's original statement that upset people was the claim that another vendor was using wood that costs $20-$30/kg to make oil and selling it at $1500 a bottle. It wasn't simply a statement of not using true wild Vietnamese wood. This is a completely different subject than what he is saying in the video. He is saying this wood costs $800/kg.
I don’t know if you caught Ensar’s last post on that matter before it was removed, but you’d have seen that he wasn’t talking about a Vietnamese oil. So, this post isn’t an attempt to address that matter, although it does touch on related issues.
Also doesn't explain how Ensar had wild Vietnamese wood on a Facebook post in 2017 if it is so impossible to get. Also made a wild Vietnamese oil in 2014.
I am not angry. Just confused.
I addressed your first point in reply to
@kesiro above. But I will add that getting to a batch of wood by asking for ‘wild’ doesn’t get you anywhere. If you dig and dig, especially when you’re dealing with veterans who know as well as you do what the state of affairs is, it is possible to be shown a batch that you know—though experience—is ‘real’ wild. We saw that with the Sri Lankan batch we were shown, for example. Ensar’s point is that if you’re just going by recent harvests, and going on the word of the brokers, you’re in a pickle.
As for Kinam Rouge, that was distilled in collaboration with one of Ensar’s teachers (who sourced the wood), and we sent samples of the wood to most people who ordered a bottle. The scent is quite a departure from what we’re getting in oils now, and completely lacks the evanescent character that defines ‘modern’ oils.
Also, bear in mind that in the oud world, three-year jumps leave big gaps. Russian Adam had hardly bought a pot three years ago. Taha had hardly touched ground in Malaysia then. Nha Trang LTD was distilled ‘only’ three years prior to Kinam Rouge, at which time the China Market was just taking off. Within ‘just’ three years, even the cultivation scene in Thailand has seen a huge transformation. Three years ago we could still find the big solid black chunks. Three years ago, Kinam cost less than half of what it does today—at the big houses. I was wrapping up the first Sultan Series oils this time four years ago, and today we can’t find the same wood again. They can grow, infect, stuff a tree full of resin, harvest and distill it within a year or two now.
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On a personal note, please remember that much of the controversy was triggered by asking Ensar what he thought of a bunch of oils. Objectively. Everyone knows Ensar is a straight-shooter. If you show him a sample, he’s gonna tell you exactly what he thinks. If you’re going to have a problem with what he has to say, better not open the door. If you don’t want contentious issues in the future, perhaps don’t ask his opinion because it’s going to create a problem for you, and as we’ve just seen, blow up into a big deal for everyone. Just like it did when he said Mr. X’s oud contains muscone and the world hated him for it, even though he turned out to be right. If you think he should keep his opinion to himself, better not ask him for it.