Cigargle was started by Liam King and his two partners, Scott Carr and William King. The group of friends shared a love for cigars, but not so much the cigar-mouth aka bad breath and lingering taste the next day, that came with it. Their wives were also not fans of said cigar breath. As a group, they tried many remedies prescribed by others, mints, mouthwashes, gums, etc. But nothing worked to their satisfaction, so what did they do? Start their own company to solve the problem of course. Cigargle was born.
Between the three of them, they shared 60 years of ecommerce and product development experience. After spending about a year on formulation, they launched direct to customers about 8 months ago. Since then, Liam tells Blind Man's Puff that they've seen good traction and feedback on the product and are ready to ramp up production and build out with their partner network with retailers, influencers, and other various channels. Just last month, they launched two new flavors of the product, Power Mint and Cinnamon, to go along with the original Spearmint flavor.
Info – Cigargle
Interestingly, the active ingredient in Cigargle is hydrogen peroxide. I had not, until now, ever heard of this as a solution for mouthwash, but upon further research there are some commercial mouthwashes that use it as an active ingredient. It should also be noted that hydrogen peroxide is often used for teeth whitening, so I suppose if you used this every day, you might see some teeth whitening benefits. The product comes in 1oz bottles, and the directions say to pour the entire thing in your mouth, swish for 60 seconds, and spit. That's it.
The obvious comparison for the purpose of this review is the product Smart Mouth, which we talked about previously in this article: How to Stop Smelling Like a Cigar. It is a two part solution that uses Zinc that when you mix together is quite effective at killing cigar breath.
Look & Feel
Presentation isn't exactly a key element for this product, as the function is what everyone will be interested in, but branding and looks do play a part in any product. I like the black color scheme of the bottle, and doesn't really look like your typical mouthwash at all, more akin to a bottle of butane from Xikar. The presentation of the product in its own bottle is quite nice, although I do have to wonder how much of the cost of the product is due to the bottle. Pricing per bottle, which is a single use, goes from $2.00 – $3.33 depending on the quantity you buy. And that doesn't include shipping, which is free if you spend more than $75, but any less that that and you are looking at an extra ~$15.00 – $25.00. Yikes. Compare this to Smart Mouth which you can get on amazon with free shipping at ~$1.00 per use if you get the individual packets, or much less by the bottle, and the cost difference is quite stark.
Performance
When it comes to killing cigar-mouth, Cigargle does a pretty darn good job. Better than your traditional grocery store mouthwash without a doubt. It doesn't burn when using it, which is important as your tongue and mouth can be a bit more sensitive after smoking a cigar. This is what makes most alcohol-based mouthwashes unpleasant for cigar smokers. My biggest problem with Smart Mouth is that the product itself leaves a bit of an aftertaste that lasts for hours. Now, granted, that taste is much better than an ashtray, but still can be a bit annoying. I found that with Cigargle, there is still a bit of an aftertaste that lingers, but not nearly as much as Smart Mouth, while still being just about as effective at killing cigar-breath. So, a winner from that standpoint.
As far as actually using the product, you really do need to give it the full 60 seconds of swishing and gargling to take full effect. Compared to Smart Mouth, the directions say to use for 60 seconds, but I've found it is effective in much less time. The flavor options are a nice touch and check in the positive category for Cigargle, there are no such options for Smart Mouth. I think the flavors could be a bit stronger, but that's just personal taste, my favorite of the 3 flavors is the Power Mint. None of them are offensive in any way, so don't be afraid to try them, unless you really hate mint or cinnamon.
Overall
Overall this is a really nice product, specifically designed for cigar smokers, which I appreciate. It does what it claims to do, which is get rid of cigar-mouth after an evening of smoking. Your significant other will thank you. Cigargle gives you some nice flavor options to try, which definitely give it a leg up on some other options. I do think that the price holds is back a bit compared to other options like Smart Mouth, ending up at 2-4x more expensive per use. This product is still in it's relative infancy, so hopefully in the future Liam and team are able to find ways to reduce costs and maybe come up with some other packaging options like the tear-open packets you can find elsewhere. But if you want to kill cigar-breath effectively and support a cigar-focused small business and help them grow and scale production, I can easily recommend picking up some Cigargle on on Cigargle.co.