State Of Play (15th Nov 2010)

Display Ban

The UK Display ban, which for those of you who don’t already know. Was due to be implemented for Supermarkets and Large Chain Stores next year (2011)with little indes (like Gauntleys) in 2012. Both the Conservatives and Liberals said (pre election) they would look into this law, since coming to power the display ban hasn’t had much attention. The “STOP THE DISPLAY BAN” campaign saw the Department Health write to everyone who sent the postcards, explaining; The display ban is being proposed, to reduce the number of people who smoke. To protect the lives of British Citizens. So based on that I would say the department of health still back this legislation.

In the past few weeks we have seen Imperial Tobacco FAIL to have this legistlation stopped in Scotland. BUT we have had a year added to the England dates, giving us until 2013 till we have to go DARK!. Because we are a specialist shop, 95% of our trade is either Tobacco or Tobacco Accessories. We cant hide all of our wares from view, so we have to black out the windows and become an over 18’s shop.

Counterfeit Trade

The Industries biggest foe (believe it or not) isn’t the Government or even ASH (UK Anti Smoking Lobby) its actually, those dodgy guys who hang around pub car parks, works canteens or car boot sales. Selling either stolen, imported (without paying duty) or copied tobaccos. This is becoming an increasing problem. In Ireland 2005 saw 7% of tobacco being smoked being non-duty paid. Compared to 27% in 2009, the same year in which the display ban came into effect. So by removing tobacco displays in Ireland, the black market trade has increased 200%. Removing millions from the treasury, and making it easier for underage smokers to access tobacco products. Most retailers live in fear of making the mistake of serving someone underage, the guy in the car park doesn’t! No where has this been noticed more than in Canada. Since the implementation of the Display Ban, a noticeable increase in underage smokers has arisen. This has been blamed on the increase in black market tobacco.

Tobacco Quality is another issue with black market tobacco. I went on a trading standards “Under Age Products, Training Course”. Apart from the usual crap (laws etc) they gave us a quick talk on the Quality of seized, smuggled tobaccos. Many brands are only made by gangs for smuggling. Jin Ling is probably one of the most notorious brands, it is not produced BY ANY legal tobacco manufacture. It is instead produced by organised gangs in China. The packs, empty cigarette tubes and “tobacco” is sent out to small household rollers who fill the cigarettes, pack them and then the gangs ship them world wide. Many of these cigarettes seized in the UK contains some interesting additives, Grass, Plastic, Metal, Woods & Rubber to name a few. This is an issue world wide, Russia and Germany both have issued with Jin Ling.  If anyone offers you a pack, PLEASE PLAEASE PLEASE SAY NO! And remember that a lot of other “Cheap” black market tobacco products are produced this way and you have no idea what’s really in there. England banned Scottish tobacco a few hundred years ago, as a result of Scottish manufactures bulking up there crop with stained grass and straw. All this after a bad harvest one year!

The last issue with the use of Counterfeit Tobacco is the price, anyone would be willing to pay 30% less for the “daily fix” but by doing so, you are reducing the monies made in Duty and Tax by the Government which leaves them short. So they either increase duty higher (all smokers pay more) or they claw back this money through other means (duty on fuel or alcohol).

More to follow, im at the AITS AGM tomorrow so no doubt it will have a tonnes of “POSITIVE” (ha) news to report!