Recently, I purchased a box of CocoNara’s from a local market in my area. Unfortunately however, having never tried these coals before, I did not know what to expect when I purchased them. I grabbed the first box I could find and bought it. A couple of hours later, when I decided to open the box and have a smoke, I noticed that the coals were shaped awkwardly and not in a perfect cube shape like I am used to getting when I smoke Chronic Hookah coals. So, I took it upon myself to search around online to see if the coals I received were really CocoNara’s. After a little bit of searching and a couple of emails back and forth with a CocoNara representative, I found out that the ex-distributor for Canada started to import fake CocoNara’s and that is what I received.

So, how can this all be avoided?

CocoNara is aware of the counterfeit coals being distributed around the world and have set up measures to insure that their clients know that they are getting real CocoNara’s. Here are four simples ways to check if the coals you are receiving are in fact real CocoNara’s;

1. If the box you have received has a matte finish and is not made of good quality materials with a glossy finish, the box is fake. CocoNara uses only thick, good quality boxes for their coals and prints the boxes using a glossy finish.
2. Inside the flap of the top opening of the box, there should be a blue stamp. The stamp could say Lebanon or another location, but as long as there is a stamp on the inside, it is a good sign that you got a real box. CocoNara stamps every box with the country of origin and a serial number to track the date of production.
3. In every box of CocoNara’s, a flyer is included with instructions and such. A fake box, or at least the one I personally received, do not include this flyer.
4. Inside the box, the coals will be wrapped in a plastic bag. Within a fake box of coals, the plastic will be thin and clear. The plastic within a real box of CocoNara’s however is thick and blue.

Those are the four security measures that CocoNara has put into place to insure that the customer knows they are getting a legit box of CocoNara’s. A good way to know that you are getting a real box is to purchase directly from their website, www.Coco-Nara.us. Check out the flyer below to see in more accurate detail what a fake and a real box look like.