Kingpen Carts Review of 2023
One of the big problems facing weed consumers in America: knowing who to trust.
Sure, if you live in a legal state and visit a licensed dispensary, you should be good to go. But the same issue that people have faced for decades — can you trust your dealer? — has been magnified by the hundreds of online vendors offering supposedly-reputable cannabis brands for sale.
Are they selling authentic products or counterfeits? Will they actually fill your order and ship it? For that matter, is it legal to buy from them?
You probably know the answer to that last question, but since we’re not lawyers, we’ll leave it unsaid. The other questions are very good ones and here’s the short answer: even if they do ship it, most aren’t selling “real” branded weed.
That issue plagues many reputable cannabis producers, including the company that makes the ubiquitous Kingpen carts you see everywhere.
Here’s the full story.
Who Makes Kingpen Carts?
Kingpen carts — the real ones — are produced by a company called Loudpack. It’s one of several brands owned by the company; the others include Dimebag cannabis and Smokies edibles.
All of their brands, including Kingpen, are available to California and Oklahoma weed users through distribution agreements with dispensaries in those states. Kingpen apparently sold its products through Shopify as well, but its online presence has been gone for some time due to a dispute with Shopify over the legality of the Kingpen website.
Loudpack entered the high-end California cannabis market in 2014 with its Kingpen cartridges, some of the first high-potency carts sold in the state. They remain the company’s flagship products and have won several High Times Cannabis Cup awards.
Kingpen also sells vape pens that accommodate their cartridges, high-potency pre-rolls coated in kief (known as King rolls), and live resin cartridges (known as Kingpen Royale).
Loudpack was acquired in late 2021 by the Harborside Group, which claims to be California’s largest cannabis company and operates retail stores as well as processing and manufacturing facilities; it acquired several of the state’s other major cannabis companies around that same time. The combined operation plans to change its name to StateHouse in the near future.
A Look at Kingpen Carts
Kingpen carts are designed to fit the company’s 710 Kingpen vape pen but will fit any standard 510 thread pen. Kingpens are well-manufactured vapes; they provide custom voltage and temperature controls, as well as a pre-heat setting that allows the user to warm up the oil before taking a hit.
The cartridges have glass tanks and a ceramic atomizer set into a medical-grade stainless steel housing, and they are produced in both 500mg and one gram sizes. The company maintains control over the entire manufacturing process for its vaping products, including oil and live resin.
No details are available on the sourcing of the hemp used to produce Kingpen carts, other than that it’s high-quality and from California farms. The company doesn’t make public the details of its extraction processes either but says the oil is filtered five times after it’s been extracted.
The Kingpen Cartridge Product Line
Kingpen Weed Oil Cartridges
Kingpen makes a very good cannabis cartridge. The oil is high-quality, and extra terpenes are the only added ingredients used during the manufacturing process. There is no PG, VG, or other liquids which are commonly added to nicotine vape products.
It would take up the rest of this review just to list all of the weed strains that Kingpen uses in its cannabis carts. Here’s a sampling, though.
- Sativa or Sativa-Leaning Hybrids: Amnesia Haze, Acapulco Gold, Blueberry Haze, Jack Herer, Orange Durban, Pineapple Express, Purple Tangie, Sour Diesel, Trainwreck
- Indica or Indica-Leaning Hybrids: Birthday Cake, Blue Dream, Fire OG, Gelato, Gorilla OG, Granddaddy Purple, Kosher Kush, Master Kush, Pure Kush, Skywalker, Wedding Cake, White Rhino
- Hybrid: Cali-O, Jack Frost, Rainbow
Most of the strains are available in both 500mg and one-gram carts, depending on what’s in stock at the dispensary where you buy.
Kingpen Royale Cartridges
These outstanding new additions to the Kingpen lineup contain 100% live resin cannabis oil.
Live resin is a potent concentrate extracted directly from the cannabis plant once it has been flash-frozen. This is done to preserve all of the plant’s native cannabinoids and terpenes; freezing the plant after harvest doesn’t give them an opportunity to become degraded and less potent.
The strength of these Kingpen Royale carts is almost as impressive as dabbing concentrate would be, but vaping is obviously much more convenient.
Since this is a relatively new product, there’s not quite as much variety in strain selection. What is available, though, is still a very nice mix of sativa- and indica-leaning choices.
They include Berry Haze, Blue Dream, Cereal Milk, Chem Dawg, Cherry Cake, Cookie Milk, GMO, Jack Herer, Magic Melon, Mango Brulee, Platinum Rose, Sour Diesel, Super Lemon Haze, Watermelon, and Wedding Cake.
The Kingpen Royale carts all contain one gram of live resin oil and fit the same 510 thread vape pens as the company’s regular weed oil cartridges.
Real vs. Counterfeit Kingpen Carts
Kingpen is well aware that its products are being counterfeited and sold on the black market.
As we’ve mentioned, it’s an issue that most producers of high-end cannabis products have had to face in the post-legalization world. Most of the fake products are manufactured in China to be purchased and resold in America, and Kingpen’s parent company has brought lawsuits against several Chinese companies allegedly involved in the scam.
There are ways that consumers can ensure that they’re purchasing real Kingpen carts, though.
The first is to look on the cart package for a scratch-off panel, which hides a six-digit code. After scanning the QR code next to the panel or going to the website KPValid.com, and entering the hidden code, the buyer will be told if their product is authentic.
The second may eventually be reproduced by the knock-off manufacturers, but hasn’t been as of this writing. There is a holo label on the cart box that displays the Kingpen logo, a picture of a king’s head. If you turn the box slightly to the right, the word “KINGPEN” can be seen; if you turn it slightly to the left, you can see the word “GENUINE.” And if you look at it upside-down, the logo will disappear.
Kingpen’s carts are worth finding and buying if you’re in California or Oklahoma where dispensaries sell them. If you’re elsewhere or you’re purchasing online — beware. Counterfeit carts definitely won’t be as good as the real thing, and they could even be contaminated.
Kingpen Carts: FAQ
Q: Does Kingpen produce flower or concentrates for sale in dispensaries?
A: Not as of this writing, but its kief-coated pre-rolls (King rolls) are quite potent and available in licensed California outlets. Its sister company Loudpack does sell flower and concentrates like badder, crumble and sugar through dispensaries.
Q: How would fake Kingpen carts be contaminated?
A: Anyone who wanted to sell on the black market could easily purchase the counterfeit cartridges and packaging from China, and fill them with whatever they’d like. Black-market carts have been found to contain oil contaminated with pesticides, heavy metals, and other chemicals, and some have contained cutting agents (which create a greater volume of liquid) that have been linked to lung damage in vapers.
