Category: News This Week

R.J. Reynolds Vapor Co.’s (RJRV) Vuse vapor cigarettes are now available in about 100,000 U.S. retail outlets.

Vuse is the No. 1 selling e-cigarette in the convenience store channel, according to a leading industry trade publication. According to RJRV, the brand continues to see high trial and repeat purchase, in part because of its high quality standards.

“With superior taste, consistent performance and ease of use, Vuse provides adult tobacco consumers a truly satisfying vapor experience,” said Fred Ampolini, president of RJRV. “We are pleased with the brand’s success to date, and are excited that this final wave of expansion will provide even more adult smokers with a quality alternative to traditional cigarettes in our continuing mission to transform tobacco.”

Ploom, a San Francisco, California, USA-based vapor delivery system company, has added two senior executives to its team. Timothy Danaher was named vice president of finance and Scott Dunlap was appointed chief marketing officer. Reporting to founder and CEO James Monsees, Danaher will play a critical role in developing and executing the overall business and financial strategy of Ploom to maximize sales growth and profitability.Dunlap will be responsible for crafting the strategic marketing vision and plan behind all of Ploom’s future products.

“We are excited to welcome Tim and Scott to the Ploom team,” said Ploom CEO James Monsees. “Tim’s broad experience in finance and history of building value in startup ventures will serve us well as we enter the next phase of Ploom’s strategic growth. In addition to success in growing new business platforms, Scott has the unique skills–ncluding expertise in mobile apps, gaming, data mining and social networking–that are needed in an envelope-pushing industry that relies on new and creative tools to build a customer base. Tim and Scott will be key factors as we continue to build our business with innovative products and designs.”

A leading US health expert has said that electronic cigarettes do not seem to be anywhere close to tobacco cigarettes in respect of their potential to cause addiction.

Writing on his Rest of the Story blog, Dr Siegel, a Professor in the Department of Community Health Sciences, Boston University School of Public Health, said that electronic cigarettes were probably much closer to nicotine gums, which were not particularly addictive.

Siegel was commenting on a new study published in the journal Drug and Alcohol Dependence (Etter JF, Eissenberg T. Dependence levels in users of electronic cigarettes, nicotine gums, and tobacco cigarettes. Drug and Alcohol Dependence 2015; 147:68-75.)

The primary reason for electronic cigarettes’ lower addictive potential is thought to be down to their ‘inferior’ nicotine delivery system, compared with that of tobacco cigarettes, a phenomenon that Eissenberg demonstrated in a previous study.

‘While use of electronic cigarettes by youth remains an important concern, it does not appear that there is major potential for huge numbers of youth to become quickly addicted to these products, despite the fact that they contain nicotine,’ said Siegel.

Find the story here.

Vapor Hub International has released its Limitless Mod.

Since its launch, the company has generated more than $182,000 in revenue from the product, with profit margins in excess of 60 percent. More than 3,600 units have been sold.

“This revolutionary new mod is affordable, high performing and customizable for larger shops, all of which increases sales for Vapor Hub,” said Kyle Winther, CEO. “The Limitless Mod is designed with minimal parts to make it cost-efficient for consumers, wholesale clients and distributors. By reducing the amount of parts, we are able to retail the Limitless Mod for $99.”

“Vapor Hub has developed a first-of-its-kind button design that rides on a rail system that gives consumers the smoothest button feel, as well as maximum conductivity,” said Jake Perlingos, president and chief technology officer. “This innovative button design can be patented to secure the intellectual property for an innovation that no one else in the industry has accomplished.”

“Not only is the Limitless Mod affordable, we have developed an interchangeable sleeve design where consumers can purchase new sleeve colors and designs at a $24 retail price point and completely change the look and feel of their vape mod, without having to spend $200 or more on a new vape mod,” said Winther. “We have had tremendous positive feedback from our wholesale clients, as well as retail customers.”

The Center for Environmental Health wants manufacturers to post Proposition 65 warnings on e-cigarettes and associated paraphernalia. Proposition 65 requires products sold in California to warn consumers of carcinogens and chemicals that cause reproductive harm. The center sent notices to nearly 40 companies on Thursday demanding they carry Proposition 65 labels and threatened to file lawsuits unless the companies post labels, recall products already sold, and pay fees based on civil penalties, which can run as high as $2,500 a day per violation.
Charles Margulis, a spokesman for the group, said, “The strategy is to get the companies to forego an expensive legal tussle by entering negotiations, and to secure agreements about marketing, labeling, and other things. The group wants to change how the products, in its view, appear to be marketed to children, with sweet flavors, and are not packaged securely enough to be childproof.”
The warning letters come as e-cigarettes are under increasing fire from the media and government officials. Late last month, the state Department of Public Health issued a statement warning that e-cigarettes are toxic and addictive.

“E-cigarettes contain nicotine and other harmful chemicals, and the nicotine in them is as addictive as the nicotine in cigarettes,” said the department’s director, Dr. Ron Chapman. “There is a lot of misinformation about e-cigarettes. That is why, as the state’s health officer, I am advising Californians to avoid the use of e-cigarettes and keep them away from children of all ages.”

Imperial Tobacco is due to launch a new electronic cigarette in France on Monday, a move that, according to a story by Martinne Geller for Reuters, will give the company a lifestyle brand to stand alongside its existing brand, Puritane, which is marketed more as a healthcare product.

The new brand, called Jai, will be sold in tobacconists, while Puritane is sold online and exclusively through a pharmacy chain in Britain.

“We believe there are different consumer groups with different needs,” Heidi Theys, head of vaping category development at Imperial’s Fontem Ventures unit, which sells non-tobacco products, was quoted as saying.

Fontem has an application pending with Britain’s Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency to have Puritane approved as a medical device, which would allow it to make claims related to health or smoking cessation.

Jai is due to be launched in Italy by the end of the month.

Oplus Tech has uploaded a live video of its latest e-liquid manufacturing process to its website. The video is intended to demonstrate the company’s confidence and transparency.

“The one thing that most vapers worry about is whether the e-liquid they are vaping every day is safe or not and how or where the e-liquid is made,” says Samuel Lau, vice president and co-founder of Oplus. “It worries us as well. Oplus has world-class manufacturing conditions and is committed to producing the best and safest e-liquid in the world, but the ‘Made-in-China’ label has made all that effort seem meaningless. That’s why we are broadcasting the real time manufacturing video. We hope this will bridge the gap between worldwide vapers and our products.”

Oplus has a Class-10,000 clean workshop that complies with China’s national GB50457-2008 standard for the pharmaceutical industry. The water and air-purification system guarantees a clean environment with constant temperature and humidity for e-liquid mixing and bottling.

California declared e-cigarettes a health threat and issued a 21-page report warning young people could become nicotine addicts if lawmakers don’t step in to regulate the fast-growing industry soon.

A record 60-plus bills designed to rein in the fast-growing vapor industry are being considered in 21 state legislatures spanning from Oregon to Virginia. This is a major increase from a year ago when 11 bills related to e-cigarettes were under consideration across 10 states, according to the Consumer Advocates for Smokefree Alternatives Association, an e-cigarette advocacy group.

E-cigarette legislative challenges include Oregon bills banning flavors and online sales, an Indiana bill that would require pricey permits for retailers selling liquid nicotine, and a California bill banning e-cigarettes in public places.

An EU ‘high level working party’ is due to meet on Thursday to discuss electronic cigarette taxation.

According to a note from the general secretariat of the Council of the EU, item five on the meeting’s agenda reads: ‘Tax treatment of new tobacco products and related products, such as electronic cigarettes and novel tobacco products’.

A representative of the presidency is due to make a presentation before there an exchange of views is held.

Imperial Tobacco Canada has entered the debate about electronic cigarettes, which are not approved for sale in Canada but which are available for purchase.

In a letter published in the Montreal Gazette, Caroline Ferland, vice president corporate and regulatory affairs, said Imperial fully supported the introduction of a regulatory framework that would allow the legal introduction of electronic cigarettes into the Canadian marketplace. ‘We feel it is of utmost importance that this framework puts product quality and consumer safety as a priority, while reflecting the unique nature of the product – that they are not tobacco products and should thus not be regulated in the same way’ she said.

‘Currently, any nicotine-containing e-cigarettes must be approved by Health Canada before entering the market. At this time no such products have received regulatory approval, yet nevertheless products are being sold across the country due to a lack of enforcement.

‘We encourage Health Canada to act quickly in implementing a regulatory framework that allows the commercialization of such products.’