Tobacco companies are big e-cig players - PostBulletin.co Local

Answer Man: Tobacco companies are big e-cig players - PostBulletin.com: Local

I've been curious about this point myself. Clearly, it's no accident these cigarette-like devices that provide cigarette-like nicotine has some connection to the cigarette companies, and glory! It turns out they do. A story in Forbes magazine just a few days ago says this:

"With revenue from e-cigarettes expected to double this year to over $1 billion and up to $1.7 billion by some estimates, the makers of these plastic addiction sticks are gradually burning away at the $80 billion sales of tobacco, with e-cigarette sales predicted to pass traditional cigarette sales by 2047, according to Bloomberg Industries." 

Personally, I don't expect to be around in 2047 to witness that moment, and predictions of consumer trends going out 34 years are crazy. If you can predict a consumer trend going out more than one year, you're a genius and will someday be featured on a program such as "Mad Men." But the trend toward e-cigs has caught the attention of the not-exactly-sleeping tobacco giants.From Forbes: "E-cigarettes are hooking customers with low price tags and increasingly pervasive advertising campaigns – for the first time in 43 years, cigarette ads will return to TV as second-largest tobacco U.S. manufacturer, Reynolds American, plans a national rollout of its Vuse e-cigarette." 

Lorillard Inc., No. 3 among U.S. tobacco firms, now owns a company called Blu ECigs and peddles them in 80,000 stores, the Wall Street Journal says, and the kingpin of U.S. tobacco companies, Altria Group Inc., now has a line called MarkTen e-cigs. 

There is a lot of money to be made in e-cigs, which as Mayo's Dr. Richard Hurt said the other night is a "drug delivery system" for a highly addictive drug — nicotine. So, it defies credulity to believe that Big Tobacco won't grab a huge piece of this, and if there's one habit I choose to avoid, it's to defy credulity. I'm a big believer in credulity. 

Now, from the emailbag, I received this one Saturday morning and just couldn't wait to get it in the paper. The subject line was, "Greatest Newspaper Column Ever."