President-Elect Biden has appointed Bechara Choucair as vaccinations coordinator of the White House Covid-19 response team.
Choucair is senior vice president and chief health officer for Kaiser Permanente and a board member of the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids (CTFK). Previously, he served as Chicago’s public health commissioner.
Choucair will step down from his board position at CTFK as he assumes his new position.
“In appointing Dr. Choucair as vaccinations coordinator, President-Elect Biden has chosen an extraordinarily experienced and capable public health and medical leader,” said Matthew L. Myers, president of the CTFK, in a statement. “We congratulate Dr. Choucair and look forward to working with him in the future.”
Xavier Becerra (Photo: State of California Department of Justice)
U.S. President-elect Joseph R. Biden Jr. has selected Xavier Becerra, the Democratic attorney general of California, as his nominee for secretary of health and human services, reports The New York Times.
As attorney general in California, Becerra has been at the forefront of legal efforts on health care, leading 20 states and the District of Columbia in a campaign to protect the Affordable Care Act from being dismantled by his Republican counterparts. He has also been vocal in the Democratic Party about fighting for women’s health.
In a tweet, Derek Yach, president of the Foundation for a Smoke-Free World, described the choice as a “serious missed opportunity.”
“At a time of public health crisis deep expertise in public health, medicine and science should matter,” Yacht wrote. “Sadly, this is not apparent in the pick of the lead cabinet health voice.”
The Food and Drug Administration, which regulates the tobacco industry in the United States, is a federal agency of the Department of Health and Human Services. It is currently led by Alex Azar.
John Dunne has been confirmed as director general of the UK Vaping Industry Association (UKVIA) after a vote by the trade body’s full membership.
Dunne was previously responsible for the UKVIA’s member recruitment activity, where he oversaw significant growth in membership levels. He is also the UKVIA’s primary media spokesperson on television, radio and in print.
Dunne has a long and well-respected background in European vaping and has held senior positions at some of the sector’s leading firms. In addition, he has advised industry analysts and financial institutions on the vaping industry, both in the U.K. and globally.
The new role has been established to support future planned growth of the UKVIA, as it extends its role and influence, while building its membership base significantly.
“I am honored that the UKVIA membership has put its faith in me.,” said Dunne. “The association is well placed to go from strength to strength, with membership growing consistently despite the challenges of the pandemic.
“The next 12 months are hugely important to the vaping industry, with the government review of the Tobacco & Related Products Regulations set to shape the future of our sector. It is crucial that we have a unified voice to influence these regulations, for the benefit of the industry and the public health of the nation. We have already started formulating our contribution to the government’s review, working closely with all our members.”
University of California San Francisco (UCSF) professor and anti-tobacco activist Stanton Glantz has retired after 45 years.
“I have finally retired from UCSF, ready to move to the next phase,” Glantz wrote in an email to colleagues that has since been shared by many, including Clive Bates, on Twitter. “I will also be continuing to work with my UCSF colleagues to complete work that is underway. From talking to colleagues who have already retired, I am confident that there will be more ways that I can keep contributing to fighting the tobacco industry and promoting public health.”
Glantz announced that he would be stepping down as UCSF Center for Tobacco Control Research and Education director in June of this year after previously stepping down as principal investigator for the center.
Glantz’s research on tobacco and vaping has been frequently criticized by vaping advocates. Recently, he was forced to retract a 2019 study that suggested a connection between vaping and heart attacks. It turned out that participants in the study had heart attacks before beginning to vape.
In 2018, Glantz was accused of sexual harassment by two different women, resulting in a university settlement of $150,000 outside of court.
Many of his critics are celebrating Glantz’s retirement. “Stanton Glantz’s long-overdue retirement is a win for taxpayers, consumers and public health,” said Taxpayers Protection Alliance President David Williams.
Clive Bates wrote on Twitter, “It should have happened years ago—many lives would have been saved. And much else.”
Boldt Runners Corp., the licensee of Cannadips CBD, a smokeless dip pouch with CBD, has appointed former tobacco executive Maura Scott as chief sales officer and chief compliance officer.
With more than two decades of experience as a business leader, in-house and outside corporate counsel, Scott brings expertise in sales and marketing strategy development and execution, along with a deep understanding of the legal and regulatory landscape.
Most recently, Scott served as vice president northeast region sales at Altria Group, where she led a team of 400 sales professionals across 13 U.S. states. In 2018, she was recognized by her peers in the convenience industry with the Top Women in Convenience “Woman of the Year” Award. Previously, Scott served as assistant general counsel at Altria where she led the sales practice group.
“I am excited to be part of the Boldt Runners team,” said Scott in a statement. “Cannadips CBD is a brand that has great potential in the marketplace for tobacco alternatives. Since its launch in 2018, it has quickly gained transaction with adult consumers and is poised to expand rapidly as the company ramps up production and distribution to more markets.”
Turning Point Brands (TPB) has appointed Brittani Cushman as general counsel, effective Oct. 31. James Dobbins, TPB senior vice president, general counsel and secretary, will retire that day following more than 20 years leading the company’s legal and governance functions.
Cushman currently serves as senior vice president of external affairs in the company’s legal department. She joined TPB as director of external affairs in 2014. During her tenure with the company, Cushman has been a key driver of initiatives related to the company’s policy strategy and regulatory filings along with advising on significant acquisitions, TPB wrote in a statement. Prior to joining TPB, Cushman served as general counsel at a privately held tobacco product manufacturer.
“James has been an invaluable resource for our growing organization during his tenure with the company, including the successful initial public offering in 2016,” said Larry Wexler, president and CEO of TPB. “The board of directors and executive team thank James for his leadership and service to the company. I am particularly pleased that he has agreed to remain with the company in a consulting role.”
Cushman will assume the role of deputy general counsel immediately, working with Dobbins to ensure a seamless transition ahead of his departure.
“Brittani has been a critical piece of our leadership team,” Wexler commented. “Since joining the company, her unique skillset and forward-thinking contributions have strengthened the business. Brittani’s ability to diagnose and respond to evolving legal landscapes will be a significant factor to our continued success.”
Respira Technologies has appointed Brian W. Quigley, a 16 year veteran of Altria Group, as its Chief Operating Officer effective July 1. At Altria, Quigley served as CEO of its smokeless tobacco business from 2012 to 2018, a $2.3 billion business with over 800 employees, according to a press release.
Quigley will be responsible for driving Respira’s operational strategy, regulatory strategy, and commercial efforts with a focus on disrupting the tobacco market, nicotine replacement therapy market, and developing pharmaceutical applications through partnerships.
Respira has developed two proprietary drug delivery platforms, RespiRx, a zero heat aerosol technology, and Wave, a low heat aerosol technology. Both technology platforms are designed for safe aerosol-based delivery of drugs to patients and end users, without the creation of harmful by-products and compounds.
The company’s device platforms have applications in nicotine replacement therapies, reduced harm tobacco products, and pharmaceutical drug delivery with a total addressable market opportunity of greater than $1 trillion, according to the release.
Brian Quigley/Credit: Altria
“We are thrilled to have Brian join the Respira team as we prepare to enter the commercial phase of our company’s growth,” said Mario Danek, Respira’s founder and CEO. “Brian’s vocal leadership for responsible industry practices and harm-reduction combined with his impressive track record of driving business performance in FDA regulated businesses make him the perfect leader for the next phase of growth for our unique product platforms.”
Quigley said he is excited to be joining Respira Technologies at this critical moment in the company’s journey. “I look forward to working with our team, investors, and partners as we prepare to commercialize our proprietary drug delivery platforms,” said Quigley. “My goal is to help improve public health and patient outcomes across a range of inhalable therapeutic applications, including tobacco cessation and the reduction of risk associated with tobacco use.”
Respira is backed by leading venture investment firms, including Evolution VC Partners, Poseidon Asset Management, and DG Ventures.
Mountain Service Distributors owner says vapor product sales continue to rise in convenience stores.
By Timothy S. Donahue
Refrigerators didn’t exist when Mountain Service Distributors (MSD) began operating in 1929. Situated in the Catskill Mountains of upstate New York, USA, the family-owned distributing company started as an ice delivery service that added candy sales to its portfolio by pure happenstance. Located near where the famous Woodstock Music Festival was held in 1969, Stephen Altman’s—MSD’s current president—father was operating an ice delivery company when a candy manufacturer in Brooklyn, New York, asked the older Altman if he would sell candy along with the ice.
The business was doing well. Then refrigerators started appearing in homes, and no one needed ice deliveries. Candy became the company’s new cash cow. The company kept adding on more and more products such as chips and soft drinks. MSD’s history reads much like the history of convenience stores themselves. As cars became more reliable, gas stations were closing their repair shops, and MSD started using the empty space to sell supplies to travelers and the local community. As the c-store market grew, so did MSD. Stores needed greater varieties of product, so MSD began to increase the number of SKUs it could deliver.
Stephen Altman
“When I was a kid, we sold candy and tobacco and a lot of potato chips. We also had an ice cream business that when my father passed away, his brother, who was a junior partner, had to make a decision [about] because we had all these insulated iceboxes that we would sell ice cream and dry ice [from]. Now he had to replace 500 iceboxes, and he didn’t want to invest in compressor-driven refrigeration for ice cream. He sold the ice cream business,” says Altman. “Twenty or so years later, I became a Slush Puppie distributor. And now I had to buy hundreds and hundreds of machines that made slush. So, it was an interesting turnaround.”
During the TMA digital conference “Unsteady Ground: Shifting Landscapes,” Altman discussed the c-store industry today and how vapor products have become best sellers.
Vapor Voice: How has Mountain Service Distributors faired during the Covid-19 pandemic?
Steve Altman: We’re a convenience store supplier; the reason is not the tobacco element, but we’re able to stay open because we supply groceries to convenience stores. We have had a few issues. Some of the stores that are customers of ours are not allowed to be open, and we have an [accounts receivable] problem where they closed up and didn’t pay their bills. And we’re working through that issue as well.
What we find interesting is that the c-stores that are open—and most of them are open because they carry food—they’re doing very well because a lot of shoppers are afraid to have their bodies in crowded supermarkets. So, they’re buying a lot of groceries in convenience stores where they never did that before.
What has the growth of Mountain Service Distribution been like?
Well, when I started out here full time in 1962, we didn’t do a million dollars in sales a year … There’s only three ways for my kind of business to grow, and it’s probably [the same] for many other businesses. You either get your customers to sell more product, which is very difficult to do, or you obtain new customers. But the biggest growth comes from when you can buy out another distributor and hope to obtain 75 percent of the business. Over [a] period of years, nothing lately, I’ve bought out seven other distributors.
Looking back, was acquisition the proper way to go about your growth?
Oh, absolutely. Some of these were competitors of ours that we always had a high, I guess, business ethics with each other. We didn’t cut each other’s prices. I gained their trust through keeping to that way of doing business … I just bought their inventory, and I helped them collect their accounts receivable. I hired their people.
How large is the complex where MSD is headquartered?
The complex is, at this time, about 100,000 square feet, with 30-foot ceilings, with forklifts and driving around. When I started, it was an icehouse. The walls were a foot thick, filled with sawdust. It was 40 feet by 100 feet, so, that’s what? 4,000 square feet. Now, it’s 100,000 square feet. We [are now doing approximately over $100 million in sales]. It’s not a lot. I am a medium distributor, but we have … one of the highest percentages of bottom line profits there is in the industry. Most distributors’ bottom line isn’t even 1 percent, and ours is over 3 percent.
How many different types of products do you distribute? How many different pieces?
Well, I think we have about 12,000 SKUs. Cigarettes and tobacco, and confectionery, and health and beauty aids, and sundries, and frozen beverage products and coffee products. And we sure sell a lot of water, which I’m not a fan of because retaining and getting drivers with CDL licenses is very difficult. And I don’t like breaking their back with heavy products like water.
We’re really heavy in electronic cigarettes. We have customers all over the country that my son has created because he’s become an expert in the category. And they range from wholesalers and vape shops and even retail chains. Those chains who buy from mega distributors, they don’t pay attention to the category and help the retailer grow it.
Are you only servicing c-stores and other traditional-type brick-and-mortar retailers?
We do prisons. We do vape shops. We do gift shops. We do pizza parlors. We do beach stores when it comes to frozen beverage. And we have six or seven wholesalers that are steady customers. And as I mentioned earlier, we have some chains, and I try to stay away from chains. I can never figure out how to make a profit on them. But we have some chains. We also serve the four casinos that are in the state of New York, not the Indian casinos, but the casinos that were licensed by the state of New York.
What is the state of the tobacco business in c-stores from your experience?
Well, starting with cigarettes, it’s been declining for years, as you are aware. The electronic cigarettes helped the decline. Lately, in the last few months since the pandemic, we’re selling more cigarettes and less vape. But different [rules] of the states we do business with has precluded the vape business a little bit because of the elimination of flavors … Overall, our vape business is up. Our tobacco business started growing a few years ago [when] roll-your-own became popular as the taxes in the Northeast went up dramatically. That’s still alive and doing well. So, overall, in the last 10 years, tobacco was 80 percent of our business; 80 percent of sales, not 80 percent of the profit. Today, it’s about 70 percent.
What types of vapor products are you selling?
We do very little e-liquid. We were selling both open and closed [systems], but now the closed systems have come under the eyes of legislators, and you know what happened with that. In New York state, it’s about to kick in [a flavor ban] on the 17th of May that only allows tobacco flavors. We found that even when we lost the Juul flavors of creme brulee … I had it take them off the market. I guess the steadfast consumer just switched to those [tobacco flavors]. They didn’t give up Juul. They just switched.
Have you seen an increase in sales of other salt nicotine closed systems, such as Leap and Njoy?
We carry them all. Juul has lost some market clout so to speak, but our Juul business is up because my son has created new Juul customers across the country. So, sometimes something happens in the country that doesn’t affect me, such as the flavor ban.
What are the challenges with distributing vapor products?
We constantly debate with United Parcel Service (UPS) that doesn’t like us shipping these things. Of course, they talk about the suit they’ve lost … but that was about cigarette sales to consumers. We don’t ship to consumers. So, we always have an issue with UPS constantly beating us over the head that we can’t be doing this. And we keep telling them we’re not shipping to consumers and blah, blah, blah. We only ship to people that have licenses to carry and sell the product. We are also having supply chain issues with products coming from China.
What have you seen or what do you believe is the issue with the supply chain? Is it mostly shipping?
Well, I think it’s [because of] the [Covid-19 pandemic] that some of these factories had to close up. But, to tell you the truth, Tim, I don’t worry about it. There’s no lack of some kind of product or a plethora of different brand products in my customers’ stores. There’s no shortage at retail. If they’re out of one brand’s orange, then they could a buy something else orange.
Vapor products are starting to overtake your tobacco products business, is that correct?
Oh, oh, it has. Well, when it started out—when Altria and RJ Reynolds went to [a large distribution company] and said, “We’re coming out with these things. What do you need for margin?” that fixed the margin on their products for us [too]. Of course, [the large distribution company] doesn’t have the expenses of most of the distributors. They have no sales force. They don’t have the expense of taking returns from retailers. But [the profit margins on vapor products] were better than tobacco items.
What is the current state of sales growth for vapor products in c-stores?
Other than the customers we have that we ship [to via] UPS Freight or UPS Ground in other states, I think, in my core, where my salesmen call on customers, it’s flat. There’s no decline. There’s no growth. Listen, different consumers get their news in different sources. And this business that happened a number of months ago where vape gets accused of poisoning kids, [the] recent lung disease outbreak found [it] to be caused by black market THC products when it turned out to be illicit home-packed marijuana sticks. The public got turned off. You know what I mean? They read about the problem, but they didn’t read about what the real problem was. Now you have a lot of apprehensive, potential users of electronic cigarettes that won’t go near them because they still think they’re poison.
How are you looking at future growth?
We are also improving [our technology]. If you get the retailer to put his order in with our app on his phone, then the salesman has more time to consult with him, right? And that’s worked. Half our customers place their own orders on our app on their smartphone, and we’re able to show them how to make more money, and then we become more valuable to them.
Broughton Nicotine Services has hired five additional toxicology specialists to strengthen its support for companies in the electronic nicotine delivery systems (ENDS) sector.
The new team members are: Yvonne Wilding (director, product safety and compliance), Emmanuel Minet and Frazer Lowe (principal scientists), Djeren Simitdjioglu (associate toxicologist) and Anais Kahve (toxicologist).
Wilding is a highly experienced toxicologist with more than 10 years’ broad regulatory toxicology experience and 20 years pharmaceutical research and development experience at companies such as GlaxoSmithKline and AstraZeneca.
‘’We’re delighted to welcome these highly experienced individuals to our existing team,” said Chris Allen, vice president of scientific and regulatory affairs at Broughton. “Toxicology is an essential element of the scientific and regulatory support we provide to ENDS companies submitting premarket applications in the UK, US and emerging markets.
“Having a large team of toxicologists in-house collaborating with our analytical team and external suppliers will help us leverage improved efficiencies for clients and accelerate compilation of scientific data for regulatory projects to advance a smoke free future.’’
Pax Labs, a supplier of premium cannabis vaporizer technology, has appointed Michael Murphy as its president and CEO.
Prior to joining Pax, Murphy was a managing director at AlixPartners and served as the local market leader for both the San Francisco Bay Area and Hong Kong practices. While at AlixPartners, Murphy led engagements both as a consultant and in management roles at companies including Nextwave Wireless, PacketVideo, as well as Diamond Foods and Home Depot’s Asia division.
“As the industry emerges from some tough months, I am excited about the opportunity Pax has to be the leading company in cannabis vaporization technology,” commented Murphy.
“Pax is already the recognized leader in providing premium products that prioritize transparency and customer safety. The brand is strong and the recently launched Era Pro is a testament to Pax’s legacy of producing the industry’s highest quality devices and commitment in continuing to provide customers with best-in-class technology.”
