Marketing of vaporizing products

Television, radio and internet marketing are all being used to drive forward emerging vaporizing e-cig brands like Blu, VIP and V2 with celebrity endorsement used to ‘sex up’ and make ‘cool’ this new form of nicotine addiction, with some vaporizing products being aimed directly at a younger age bracket.

“Sponsorship, celebrity endorsement, social networking, television advertising and a bewildering degree of product innovation are all being energetically deployed.” (source)

Figures suggest that e-cig sales will surpass tobacco sales early next decade. With a remodelled product being launched in an existing, yet almost virgin market, what corners will we see cut in the rush to push products through and for the dominating brands to emerge?

Though not illegal, television advertising of e-cigarette and vaporizing products has caused controversy and led to thousands of consumer complaints in the UK. Viewer complaints suggest that e-cig adverts often don’t make age restrictions clear, they could be considered sexually inappropriate (particularly before the watershed) or that the amount of nicotine (or lack of) is not clearly and overtly stated.

In schools a rise in the amount of under age smokers taking up the nicotine habit has caused great concern. The days of the of the smoker kids coming back from lunch break and sitting at the back of class wreaking of stale smoke are gone. Instead the children are coming back into class smelling like cherry or energy drink flavoured e-liquid.

It is quite easy to see that once the odour of stale smoke has been removed and the taste sweet, that more children will likely take up the habit. Leading to a mass rise in nicotine dependence from an early age.

At present there are few measures to prevent the sale of e-liquid and vaporizers to minors, changes have to be made in order to control the rise of nicotine consumption. The linked health implications of vaping really haven’t been explored thoroughly and present day vapours are nothing less than guinea pigs in an industry designed for nothing less than profit.

With 2016 regulations looming it will be interesting to see what changes will be made, in order to tackle this problem and a problem that eduction establishments are greatly concerned about.