try

.circleci/config.yml

@@ -125,10 +125,10 @@ jobs:
       - run:
           name: Smoke Test
           command: |
-            HTTPCODE=`curl -s -o /dev/null -w "%{http_code}" https://$HEROKU_APP_NAME.herokuapp.com/`
             if [[ "$HTTPCODE" -ne 200 ]]; then
               echo "heroku app not responding, failing deploy" \
               exit 1 \
+              HTTPCODE=`curl -s -o /dev/null -w "%{http_code}" https://$HEROKU_APP_NAME.herokuapp.com/`
             fi
 
 workflows: