In recent years, as e-cigarettes and vaping have grown in popularity, much has been said about the effect of the new trend on the tobacco industry. Market data from August 2014 shows that in the United Kingdom alone annual sales of e-cigarettes have reached over £90 million and all the evidence suggests those figures are set to rise. Similar patterns have been reported all over the developed world as vaping is recognised by ever more smokers as a viable alternative.
The world’s largest tobacco firms have been confronted, in a very short period of time, by a clear and present threat to their market share and are under pressure to respond. Many have recognised the value of vaping and taken the plunge, developing their own e-cigarette brands and using their own marketing and distribution capabilities to bring new products to market.
Yet the tobacco companies are not alone in feeling the squeeze. Tobacco use peaked in Britain in the mid-1970s and have been in steady decline ever since as people have become increasingly aware of the dangers inherent to smoking. In the early 1990s, big pharmaceutical companies began to develop a range of nicotine replacement therapy (NRT) products aimed at helping smokers kick the habits. Amid great optimism from government health departments and medical professionals, NRT soon had an impact on smoking and, as a consequence, on tobacco companies.
Firms like GlaxoSmithKline had built themselves a new market from scratch and were reaping the rewards. During the 1990s and 2000s NRT sales continued to grow but they now face exactly the same problem as the tobacco companies – the emergence of vaping as an alternative.
GlaxoSmithKline Chief Executive Andrew Witty has admitted to Reuters that there is “no question at all” that e-cigarettes have eaten into their market and even went as far as to say that the company seriously considered becoming an e-cigarette manufacturer themselves. With a large bite taken out of the sales of nicotine gums and patches, big pharmaceutical firms have been caught out on a strategic level by the rise of the e-cigarette and recent research published in Denmark suggests users of NRT are less than impressed.
The paper revealed that 88% of subjects reported dissatisfaction at the cost of their approved treatments, were sick of being addicted to them and were concerned about their longer-term health as a result of being on NRT. A significant majority of those questioned said they would rather cease their NRT treatment.
Historic research has shown that NRT products have only helped 17.7% of users say goodbye to tobacco and a study in 2014 confirmed that smokers turning to e-cigarettes are far more likely to quit or cut down than those plumping for NRT.
We all agree that widespread reduction in smoking is a huge public health priority and we welcome the broad range of approaches aimed at achieving that goal. That said, vaping has gone a long way towards changing both the cultural landscape and, many would argue, the terms of the wider debate.
Here at MultiCIG, we have enormous faith in our products – a faith bolstered by the feedback we receive from so many of our customers.
We hope that we can play our part in helping as many people as possible to bring about their own personal, positive outcomes.
