The Bristol man who walked away from a six-figure salary — and built the device the industry never wanted to exist
For 8 years, I helped design products to make you more addicted.
If you've tried every quit method and nothing has worked...
If you feel like the deck is somehow stacked against you...
If you've ever wondered why vaping is so much harder to quit than cigarettes ever were...
I can tell you exactly why.
Because I helped make it that way.
My name is Tom Redwood. And this is the thing I'm most ashamed of — and most proud of — in my life.
Tom grew up in Bristol. Rugby-obsessed kid. Decent enough to play semi-professionally in his 20s. The kind of bloke who ran everywhere, ate well, thought his body was indestructible.
He started smoking socially at university. The way half the country did.
"Pub cigarettes. That was it. I genuinely thought I could take it or leave it."
By 27, he couldn't leave it.
"I thought my body was indestructible." Bristol, early 2000s.
At 30, his knees gave out. Surgery. No more rugby.
"I lost the one thing that made me feel like myself. And I smoked more."
That same year, a recruitment agent called him about a new kind of job. A growing company in the vaping sector needed someone who understood sales, understood men, understood habit.
Tom took the meeting. Tom took the job.
"I genuinely believed we were helping people. The company line was that vaping was 95% safer than smoking. I believed it. We all did."
Tom rose quickly. Within four years, he was Head of Sales for one of the UK's largest vape brands. Meetings in London. Conferences in Amsterdam. Numbers that would make your eyes water.
And along the way — slowly, without quite noticing — he started to understand exactly how the machine worked.
"We had data on everything. How long users took between draws. What nicotine concentrations kept them coming back. Which flavours worked on which demographics."
"We knew that fruity flavours kept younger users. Tobacco flavours kept older switchers. Menthol kept the loyal ones."
"And we knew — we had the data — that our most profitable customers were the ones who'd tried to quit three or more times and failed."
— Tom Redwood, former Head of Sales, UK vape brand
"Nobody said it out loud. But everyone knew it."
"I'd started vaping to quit smoking. I was now on three pods a day. I worked from home. I'd tried patches twice. I'd tried cold turkey."
He didn't say anything in that meeting.
He drove home. Sat in his car on the driveway for 45 minutes.
And something broke open.
Tom had spent eight years studying why people couldn't stop vaping. Not to help them. To keep them buying.
But now, sitting in that car, he started thinking about it differently.
"The reason patches don't work isn't a mystery. We knew exactly why."
"Patches replace nicotine. But nicotine is only part of it. What we'd actually built — what made our products so effective — was the ritual. The gesture. The hand-to-mouth motion, 200 times a day."
"We'd eliminated every piece of friction that used to limit cigarette use. No going outside. No five-minute limit. Just — always there, always available, always satisfying the loop."
"The NHS tells people to use patches. Patches don't touch the loop. The loop is what we'd spent eight years deepening. I knew this because it was the competitive advantage we'd built the company on."
— Tom Redwood, former Head of SalesHe handed in his notice three weeks later. His boss thought he was having a breakdown.
"Maybe I was. But it was the clearest I'd felt in years."
Tom had one goal. Build something that targeted the real problem. Not the nicotine chemistry. The loop.
He found a researcher whose work on essential oils and the brain's craving centre had been peer-reviewed but largely ignored by the pharmaceutical industry.
"She'd proven that specific natural scents — mint, citrus compounds — interact directly with the brain's craving mechanisms. They calm the system. They reduce the urgency of the signal."
"Combine that with a physical ritual — a real draw, a real sensation, something in the hand — and you give the loop somewhere clean to go. No nicotine. No chemicals. No new addiction. Just a clean redirect."
34 prototypes. 18 months. "I tested it on myself first."
He built 34 prototypes. The airflow had to be right. The draw had to feel real. The device had to be worth holding — worth reaching for instead of the vape.
"I tested it on myself first. Took three weeks."
"Then my brother. He'd smoked since he was 17. He was 46."
"Then six of my former colleagues from the industry — all of them vapers, all of them stuck."
Five out of six were free within 30 days.
He called it HÜM.
"Because the breath out is the whole point. Slow. Deliberate. Through the device. That exhale — that hum — is the nervous system resetting. That's not a feature. That's the mechanism."
HÜM is not a vape. No nicotine. No vapour. No battery. Nothing to burn, heat, or vaporise.
It's a reusable device — stainless steel and wood — that you draw through exactly like a vape.
Inside: a natural botanical flavour core, infused with essential oils that calm the brain's craving centre directly.
The loop fires — stress, coffee, lying in bed — and HÜM gives it somewhere clean to land. Your hands are busy. Your mouth is busy. Your brain registers: handled.
Your body gets nothing to depend on. The pattern slowly dissolves.
| What the industry sells you ❌ | What HÜM actually does ✅ |
|---|---|
| Patches — replace nicotine, ignore the loop entirely | Targets the hand-to-mouth ritual and the trigger loop directly |
| Gum — same problem. Plus the wind. Nobody talks about the wind. | 100% nicotine-free — nothing for your body to get hooked on |
| Allen Carr — asks your willpower to do all the heavy lifting | Behavioural science + clinical aromatherapy — works with your brain |
| Cold turkey — nearly impossible when the loop runs this deep | 89% of users feel the urge fade within 30 days |
| Champix — prescription required, bad reactions common | Zero nicotine, zero diacetyl, zero formaldehyde. No side effects. |
feelhum.com · Free UK delivery · Ships in 3 days
Tom doesn't talk about HÜM like a product. He talks about it like a debt.
"I spent eight years understanding exactly how to keep men like you trapped. I made good money doing it. I'm not proud of that."
"HÜM is what I do with what I learned."
"The industry built the loop. I know how deep it goes — because I helped dig it."
"And I built the only thing I know of that actually gets you out."
Right now HÜM is offering 40% off the Feel Starter Pack — £49.99 down from £82.99.
Stock runs low when word spreads. It's spreading.
feelhum.com
"I always suspected vaping companies didn't want us to quit. Reading Tom's story confirmed it. HÜM made sense to me immediately — it's the first thing that treats the actual problem. Five weeks free."
"Patches, gum, cold turkey — nothing touched it. My GP said my vaping was worse than my smoking had ever been. HÜM sorted it in three weeks. I'm 49. Should have found this years ago."
"I work in marketing. I know when I'm being sold something. Tom's story is real and the product works. First thing I've tried that actually understands what the habit is."
You can keep buying from an industry that spent years studying how to keep you hooked.
Or you can use what someone from inside that industry built to get you out.
"They built the trap. I know every inch of it. And I built the way out."
— Tom Redwood, Founder, HÜMor 3 interest-free payments of £16.63 with Klarna
⚡ Spring Sale · Limited stock · Free UK delivery
(Very Limited Run — Please Check For Availability!)
Take Advantage of Our Exclusive Link and Also Get Free UK Delivery!
(While stocks last)