In three days, the Mandatory National Standards for Electronic Cigarettes (referred to as the “Standards”) will take full effect, and the supervision of electronic cigarettes will also be fully implemented. At that time, all fruit-flavored electronic cigarettes will be removed from the shelves, and the relevant cigarette rods will also have child locks and eye-catching reminders.“Cai Lai” visited and found that on the eve of being taken off the shelves, the fruit-flavored electronic pods that can be purchased through regular channels have been reduced by more than half, many mainstream flavors have been sold out, and only a few niche fruit-flavored pods are still on the shelves. stand guard”.
Text by Zhou Wenmeng
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The Mandatory National Standard for Electronic Cigarettes will take effect on October 1. In offline physical stores in Beijing, mainstream fruit-flavored pods are often snapped up, and online micro-business channels plan to stock up and take the opportunity to increase the price.
In some online channels, sellers have begun to speculate on hoarding and raising prices. While launching the hoarding and stocking guide, an electronic pod with a current market price of 99 yuan is rumored to need to increase the price after the implementation of the new regulations. 200 yuan to buy.
Visit: Mainstream fruit-flavored pods are snapped up, and micro-businesses are “rising”
In the past year, the regulation of electronic cigarettes has become more and more strict.
In March this year, the State Tobacco Monopoly Administration issued the “Measures for the Administration of Electronic Cigarettes” and “National Standards for Electronic Cigarettes (Second Draft for Comment)”, proposing that from May 1, the sale of flavored electronic cigarettes other than tobacco flavors and flavored electronic cigarettes that can be sold on their own will be banned. Electronic cigarettes with added vaping. Subsequently, the State Administration for Market Regulation and the National Standardization Administration approved the mandatory national standard for “electronic cigarettes” in April, extending the ban on the sale of mixed-flavored cartridges with non-tobacco flavors such as fruit flavors to October 1. A transition period is given, and it is also clear that e-cigarette market participants need to hold licenses to operate, and e-cigarette factories, atomizers, and nicotine manufacturers and brands must start R&D and production in strict accordance with national standards.
Now, as the time to stop the sale of non-tobacco-flavored e-cigarette cartridges stipulated by the new national standard for e-cigarettes is approaching, e-cigarette agents have launched promotional activities one after another.
“On October 1, the country officially implemented the electronic ‘pharynx’ new policy management. Fruit flavors were discontinued, express delivery was discontinued, and taxes were increased by 36%. The last wave is now. Tobacco agent Zhang Jie, an e-cigarette promotional poster issued in his circle of friends.
Before that, Zhang Jie has been selling e-cigarette products through the micro-business channel for many years, and holds an e-cigarette agent license. According to him, in the past month, as some fruit-flavored e-cigarette manufacturers have stopped production, he has stopped buying new fruit-flavored e-cigarette cartridges, but has turned to clearing inventory.
In the RELX and FLOW pod product catalogs he provided, more than half of the products have been marked as sold out and out of stock, and there will be no stock in the future.
(On the eve of the ban, the sales list provided by the seller to Cailao)
Among the many offline stores visited by Cailao, the mainstream fruit-flavored pods have also been vacant and discontinued. When talking about the reasons for the shortage, many shop owners said, “These products will not be sold on October 1st. Some manufacturers have stopped producing such products, and they are out of stock from the source. After this batch is sold, the national standard will be changed. The prescribed tobacco-flavored pods are gone.”
For fruit-flavored pod products that have not been processed before October 1, they will not be displayed and sold on the counter after that. “These products will be taken off the shelves after October 1st. The new regulations should be strict for a while, and we don’t dare to take risks.” Zhang Jie told Caila that now express delivery has also begun to reject fruit-flavored pods , in the follow-up, even if the merchant has fruit-flavored pods, consumers can only go through face-to-face transactions if they want to buy.
According to Blue Hole New Consumption Statistics, as of August 6, 2022, more than 200 companies have obtained e-cigarette production licenses, and 55,000 merchants have obtained e-cigarette retail licenses. Under the new regulations, some manufacturers with electronic retail licenses are expected to continue to obtain new tobacco-flavored electronic cigarette sales qualifications under supervision. For manufacturers without e-cigarette retail licenses, with the further improvement of market regulation, it becomes more and more difficult to obtain new e-cigarette sales.
“The agent is no longer allowed, and I will not sell these stocks after I sell them.” A small agent who does not have an electronic cigarette business license revealed to Caila that after the new regulations, the new tobacco flavors are unified from tobacco The monopoly bureau purchases goods, which makes his agents who used to purchase goods from regional distributors of electronic cigarettes lose their purchase channels.
Of course, at the same time that some retail agents were forced out because of the new regulations. There are also some merchants taking advantage of the wave of fruit-flavored pods that have been completely removed from the shelves, and have started a hoarding and speculating business of fruit-flavored electronic cigarettes. Some merchants even posted directly in the circle of friends that a box of fruit-flavored pods, originally priced at 99 yuan, rose to 200 yuan after the 11th, and “refused to bargain, love to buy or not”.
In some areas, RELX fruit-flavored pods, originally priced at 99 yuan, have now sold for 150 yuan. Some merchants even predicted, “After the ban, the price will definitely increase. If the price does not increase, I will eat the pod.”
According to brand announcements such as RELX and FLOW, in order to implement the “Administrative Measures for Electronic Cigarettes” smoothly, the two companies have announced in August that they have successively discontinued some fruit-flavored pods. As e-cigarette brands have announced the cessation of production one after another, the shortage of supply at the source will further aggravate the withdrawal of fruit-flavored e-cigarettes.
Some e-cigarette dealers sighed, “If you want to enter fruit-flavored e-cigarettes in the future, you can only import them from abroad.”
According to a report released by the Electronic Cigarette Industry Committee of the China Electronic Chamber of Commerce, the domestic retail sales of electronic cigarettes in China in 2020 are estimated to be 14.5 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 30%; the export is estimated to be 49.4 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 12.8%. The industry association also predicts that in 2025, domestic sales of electronic cigarettes in China will reach 49.8 billion yuan, and exports will reach 169.7 billion yuan.
In terms of the supply of e-cigarette production capacity, China currently contributes 90% of the world‘s e-cigarette production. Given that the current penetration rate of e-cigarettes overseas is only 10%, there is still a strong market growth space for domestic e-cigarette products to go overseas.
In fact, after the promulgation of the new regulations, instead of blindly requiring that e-cigarette export affairs be managed in accordance with domestic regulations, it is more flexible to require only the requirements of the importing country, which leaves imaginative ideas for e-cigarette exports. policy space. “The new e-cigarette policy has little impact on exports. With the convenience of domestic e-cigarette brands and foundries to go overseas, it is not ruled out that some domestic retailers will continue to purchase imported fruit-flavored pods through special channels.” The dealer told Cailao. .
Say goodbye to savage growth, electronic cigarettes focus on the head
Under the new regulations, the withdrawal of fruit-flavored electronic cigarettes will inevitably lead to loss of profits for some businesses in the short term. beneficial.
According to Zhang Jianshu, president of the Beijing Tobacco Control Association, in fact, the core purpose of implementing the new regulations is to protect minors. According to him, tens of thousands of flavors of electronic cigarettes can be prepared through chemical substances. Among them, electronic cigarettes with aroma are more acceptable to minors who have never smoked traditional cigarettes. And some minors began to smoke traditional cigarettes after smoking electronic cigarettes. “Because of this phenomenon, the Beijing Tobacco Control Association once proposed to ban the sale of flavored electronic cigarettes other than tobacco flavors when the State Tobacco Monopoly Administration issued a request for comments.”
With the implementation of the new regulations, the decline in retail sales of e-cigarettes will become a fact. In many research meetings organized by securities companies, many industry insiders judged that after banning fruit-flavored cigarettes, the attractiveness of electronic cigarettes to adult users will inevitably decrease, which may cause the retail sales of electronic cigarettes to decline by 60%-90%, and shipments The volume has dropped by more than 50%-70%.
In this regard, Chen Boru, an analyst at Galaxy Securities, also said in the research report that the new regulations will raise the threshold for e-cigarettes, making the industry concentrated on the head. On the one hand, the policy directly stipulates the relevant parameter standards of e-cigarette products, which increases the difficulty of product development and production, and eliminates outdated enterprises; on the other hand, the policy restricts the experience of e-cigarette use to a certain extent by means of taste, nicotine content, and release amount. , how to improve the user experience as much as possible under the constraints of policy standards has become the key to testing the research and development capabilities of enterprises.
Smoking is harmful to health, especially for minors. It is not commendable for every family and individual if they eventually become addicted to smoking and become exposed to harmful tobacco through vaping. Behind the ban on fruit-flavored e-cigarettes, the e-cigarette market has been reshuffled, and the remaining players have also been reasonably regulated.