Written | Wen Yehao
Edit the | Wu Xianzhi
Overnight, in the private channels of large and small e-cigarette stores, a message is spreading wildly.
"After May 1st, there is only the smell of tobacco, and those who can hoard it can be hoarded."
Shocks, not only in the circle of friends.
Yueke's parent company, Wuxin Technology, plunged more than 36.0%, and this is after it handed over its eye-catching financial report of 123.1% year-on-year revenue and 140.4% year-on-year gross profit in 2021.
All this stems from the "Second Draft for Comments on Electronic Cigarettes" issued by the regulatory authorities yesterday, which clearly states that "atomization should not make the characteristic flavor of the product appear other than tobacco".
And this also means that the sugar coating that e-cigarettes have been tightly draped in is about to be taken away.
Addiction and appetite
The story of e-cigarettes stems from the philosophy of a Chinese pharmacist who is plagued by smoking addiction.
In 2003, Han Li, the "father of e-cigarettes", was heartbroken because his father died of lung cancer and was determined to quit the "source of evil" cigarettes.
For old smokers who will be constipated without smoke, smoking is to obtain nicotine, and the other is to meet a habit of "picking up", "smoking" and "exhaling". In an era when alternatives such as nicotine patches and nicotine gum were constantly being invented, nicotine was easy to quit, but habits were difficult to quit.
The same is true of Han Li, after a brief attempt at nicotine patches, he felt deeply tasteless and determined to create a product that can not only meet the nicotine intake, but also "swallow the clouds and spit out the fog". A device for heating and evaporating nicotine smoke liquid was born.
Therefore, since the birth of e-cigarettes, they have been born to quit cigarettes. However, its original intention seems to have gradually changed under the impetus of the consumer market.
At present, in the e-cigarette stores in the streets and alleys, a variety of fruits, beverages, tea flavor atomization bullets emerge in an endless stream, and even beer, stinky tofu and other slightly strange flavors.
If it is not with the purpose of "supplementing rations" into the store, the clerk will often take out the trial cigarette stick placed on the shelf and remove the paint, and then remove the disposable muzzle and hand it to the customer, so that they can fully experience various flavors.
"Mango and lemon tea are all selling well, you can try them." "Girls, you can try this rose flavor, the little ladies love it." "The mint flavor is very cool, 5% nicotine content, two bites can be addictive."
The above dazzling tastes and words for different customer groups constitute the face of the current e-cigarette offline stores.
Among the many flavors, it is the non-tobacco flavor that can really support store sales. According to an industry media survey, the sales of non-tobacco flavored products in e-cigarette stores often account for more than 90%, while tobacco flavors rank outside dozens.
Although practitioners often still describe e-cigarettes as "reducing harm for cigarettes", most people also have to admit that a variety of good tastes are the biggest attraction of e-cigarettes to the outside world.
Looking at the atomized bomb products of the head brand Yue carved, "Summer Green Mango", "Banana Milkshake", "Peach Oolong", "Ice Brewed Lychee", "tempting" text, with elaborate packaging, the word "delicious" is always written into the minds of consumers.
Within the e-cigarette industry and among players, there are often discussions around the term "reduction". The so-called degree of reduction, that is, the degree of imitation of the taste of the atomized liquid during the suction process. In the recruitment market, the salary of senior atomization liquid oil adjusters is often started from 10,000 yuan.
A main strawberry flavor of the atomization bomb, if you can extract the sweetness of strawberry pulp and the freshness of strawberry leaves, and then apply the smell of strawberry at the olfactory level to restore, it can be regarded as superior by e-cigarette enthusiasts.
Not only that, in the slightly niche electronic cigarette DIY circle, players strive to match the values of back power and resistance, test the tuning between different atomizers and atomization liquids, in order to feel the full release of the top, heart and tail tones of the atomization liquid during the three-second suction process. It seems to be metaphysics, but it is enjoyed by players.
An industry media has created a concept of this - "taste addiction", that is, human beings are born with sweet, cool and other taste preferences, and the rich taste of e-cigarettes is mostly based on sweet and cool taste. As a result, a significant number of non-heavy smokers smoke not nicotine, but taste.
The preferences of the consumer market will naturally not be ignored by major e-cigarette brands. To this end, brands are constantly innovating, updating the taste array, and even binding the taste of atomized bombs with marketing.
Taking the head brand Magic Flute as an example, in the middle of summer last year, Magic Flute launched the "Cold Ice Strawberry" flavor, focusing on "cool feeling"; in autumn, the osmanthus blossom season, Magic Flute launched the "Guiyu Tea Fragrance", and once again linked the new products with the season.
When the market context changes from "smoking addiction" to "taste", the electronic cigarette that has been given the heavy responsibility of smoking seems to have become a tool to satisfy the appetite, and the electronic cigarette is also draped in "sugar coating".
Taking off the sugar coating, is that bad news?
Jiang Man, a self-proclaimed e-cigarette player, is a young man who has recently graduated, and his addiction to smoking is not heavy when he transitions from cigarettes to e-cigarettes. Originally, he smoked only two or three cigarettes a day, but now he smokes a atomized bomb every day.
"Cigarettes will have a sense of guilt, so generally only smoke when relieved, electronic cigarettes are easy to smoke, the sense of guilt is not so strong, when playing games one after another, unconsciously fainted."
The above phenomenon is more common among young people, and the American Tobacco Control Organization has also identified flavored e-cigarettes as the culprit for minors' exposure to e-cigarettes and addiction.
That is to say, if users follow the logic of "taste addiction" to use e-cigarettes, it is easy to lead to excessive use, and even from "non-heavy smokers" to "heavy e-cigarettes". This is clearly contrary to the global environment of "reducing the number of smokers".
On the other hand, there are also safety problems in the rich taste of e-cigarettes.
Brief introduction, at present, the mainstream electronic vaporization liquid is mainly composed of propylene glycol, vegetable glycerin, nicotine, fragrance agent. The first two act as "substrates" designed to dissolve nicotine and fragrance and produce smoke to irritate the throat, along with nicotine to provide a so-called "throat-pounding sensation"; nicotine focuses on "anti-addiction"; while fragrance is responsible for providing taste.
Compared with more than 5,000 kinds of chemical substances produced by the high-temperature combustion of traditional tobacco, the composition of e-cigarettes is relatively single, which is also the theoretical basis for "reducing harm for tobacco". But in fact, compared with propylene glycol, vegetable glycerin and other fixed materials, it is difficult to examine whether inhaling different combinations of flavoring agents has a negative impact on the human body.
In 2015, the internationally renowned brand backgammon was found to contain the ingredient "double acetyl" that can cause human respiratory diseases because of the atomization liquid. At that time, in the U.S. market, about 8,000 kinds of fragrance agents were added to the atomization liquid, and it was difficult to identify them one by one.
The US FDA issued a policy two years ago to remove all flavored e-cigarette products from the shelves and only allow tobacco and menthol flavors to circulate on the market.
If the new national standard draft previously issued by the state for e-cigarettes still has 122 additives such as coffee cocoa extract and citral for the industry, then the restrictions on the taste of e-cigarettes in the "Second Draft for Electronic Cigarettes" are more like the tailgating of the FDA's "taste ban".
The draft opinion also states: "The atomide should contain nicotine. And if this "atomization" refers to all atomization devices, then the industry's recent introduction of "herbal atomization" and "0 nicotine" and other small cleverness will also be cut off. In addition, for diy groups that have been free from regulation, relict and independent, the opinion draft explicitly prohibits the sale of open-ended, including oil-filled large smoke and small devices.
This also means that the logic of "taste addiction" will completely disappear, and the "sugar coating" of e-cigarettes will eventually be removed. After all, in the e-cigarette industry, the so-called opinion draft is almost equivalent to the norm.
"Every brand tries to imitate the taste of real cigarettes, but in reality it's either like nuts or like coffee, and it's not easy to smoke." An old smoker said. From the pessimism generally revealed by the industry, it can also be seen that e-cigarettes without rich taste blessings are likely to encounter a decline on the demand side.
The question is whether this slippery slope is good or bad.
For the industry and stores, the sudden decline in the attractiveness of e-cigarettes is obviously bad news, but turning the perspective to the whole society and even all mankind, the e-cigarettes born of "reducing the harm of tobacco" have gone to the standardization and regained their original intentions after more than ten years of wandering in the gray area, which is undoubtedly a good news.