Vape Shop Owners Fighting Back Against New Hampshire Flavor Ban

Vape shop owners in New Hampshire came out in force Wednesday in opposition to a proposed flavor ban on vapor products. They argue the ban would shutter shops and force former smokers back to deadly combustible cigarettes.

Rep. Jerry Knirk, Freedom, wants New Hampshire to ban the sale of all flavored vaping products, except tobacco flavors. A recent Trump administration ban removed all but tobacco flavors from closed systems.

“We need to place children’s health and public health over the profits of the vaping industry,” he told the House Commerce Committee, an article on ap.com states.

After several speakers who support the ban, vape shop owners who followed rebutted those arguments stating that adult vapers like flavors too.

“I’m 34 years old. Cap’n Crunchberries and pineapple grapefruit, these two things are keeping me off cigarettes,” said Steve Kaltsis, who said he smoked a pack of cigarettes a day for 10 years before taking up vaping five years ago. He opened a vape shop in Pelham in November after sales dropped from $1,800 to $150 per day at his store in Dracut, Massachusetts, where the governor announced a four-month moratorium on the sale of vaping products in September, according to the article.

“Anything that is opposing adults getting their hands on these flavors that help them quit would be a tragedy for the state of New Hampshire,” he said. “Just look what it did to Massachusetts. Look what it did to me.”