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How Will New Cigarette Warning Labels Affect Shop Owners?
Despite the graphic new labels, local business owners don't think the FDA's attempts to deter cigarette smokers will hurt sales.
Posted 6/ 22 11 at 6:30 PM | News, Advertising & Marketing, Sales, Consumer Products & Services
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The Food and Drug Administration released nine new graphic warning labels on Tuesday to be displayed on cigarette cartons beginning next year. The labels, which feature images such as a cadaver and a man exhaling smoke through a tracheotomy hole in his neck accompanied by warning text, will cover at least 50 percent of the packaging.The new label -- the first change in over 20 years -- is the result of The Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act, which was passed in 2009.
AOL Small Business took to the streets of New York, curious to hear the opinions of the small-shop owners who sell cigarettes. Will the new labels deter smokers from buying cigarettes, as the FDA hopes, and if so, how will it affect business at the local corner store? We showed them the new labels and got their reactions.
Lafayette Smoke Shop owner Hemal Sheth was quick to dismiss the effect of the graphic labels on his sales. "[Cigarette sales] are already down because of the price," he said.
Sheth highlights another ill-received tactic by the government: high cigarette taxes. In an effort to deter smokers by hiking up prices, the national price average sits at about $5.50 per pack. To the dismay of New York smokers and business owners like Sheth, cigarette prices in New York run anywhere between $11 and $13 per pack, the highest in the nation.
The D&D Deli is trying to do its part in deterring smokers from purchasing cigarettes, displaying a large graphic poster with the warning "Smoking Kills" above its cigarette case. Manager Jeakwan Park reflected on the labels, saying, "I don't think it will stop them. We have a poster above the cigarette case and that doesn't stop them, so I don't think this will either."
And while most shop owners are worried about losing sales from smokers, some, like Jubilee Marketplace manager Jin Choi, are more concerned with the labels' effects on non-smoking customers. "Personally, I don't think it is suitable for the store," said Choi. "The cigarettes are on the counter and the images will make other customers lose their appetites."
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Comments (Page 1 of 2)
No it will not hinder sells at all addiciton is addiction, What idiots. dose making drugs illegal keep the addict from buy and using them, hell no. If you want people to quit smoking why are the new devlopments so expensive to buy, chantex at 250 a percription. why is the goverement not giving them away like they did condems if its such a problem. hell you seen in the supreem court even those feels today were scared to rule against the drug companies. why because they pad our senators and congressmen and our presidents with large contrubtions. we are so damn worried of second hand smoke well people you better take heed of your air that you suck down your lungs each day copd is the 3 highest killer in america today and many have never puffed on a cig nor lived with second hand smoke.come on lets make the cig companys pay for the medicine to help all quit smoking. what are they spending on there package???????
No. They cannot "affect or effect" the sales of cigs.
Smokers are going to smoke irregardless of the photos. Smokers are not brain dead. They know the effects of smoking. However, I pause to wonder how it is smokers are all but hung on a cross and crucified, yet alcohol is free to buy without such photos! I could smoke a carton of cigarettes, get in my car and cause harm to no one. Another can buy a fifth of liquor, get in their car and wipe out an entire family coming back from Disney World. You want to put pictures on something? How about strapping them to every liquor bottle and every beer can? Talk about harmful! Oh, but no one would dare to do that! Too many judges, lawyers, CEOs, and regular joes enjoy sucking down the sauce ... without reprimand ... without steadily rising prices ... and without photos on their favorite alcoholic beverage! I had an aunt who died dead as a doornail who never smoked, dipped, or chewed tobacco! Why don't they talk about cirrhosis? Why don't they talk about how a cigarette has never been the cause of someone stabbing their wife, husband, or child, but alcohol certainly has. Or is it that the state(s) or government makes far too much profit off of liquor to try and snuff that little habit out? And then we could go on to pharamaceutical drugs. Want to discuss a real addiction? A deadly addiction? But I suppose those in power can't find anything better to spend their time, energy, and money on ... and in all likelihood, they all glug-glug the sauce on a regular basis [and] pop those pills, but that's okay ... right?
I think that is stupid how the government is doing this with cigerettes, it just says that more people will be drinking more alcohol and causing more deaths on the road, I think they should focus more on that issue than the issue of smoking, and I dont believe necessarily will everyone that does smoke wind up dying because of cegerettes because most illnesses that occur like that is because its in their genes, and whether or not you smoke or not the chances of you having a stroke or some other form of illness can not be determined from smoking!
New labels won't hinder sales.................NEW PRICES WILL!!!!!!! I quit 13 years ago...........when cigs were $1.75 ---- In the machines......Thank god I did............
$5.00 a pack isn't enough to make people Quit... $50.00 a bottle will not make people stop drinking. It's not about health...people know smoking, drinking too much, drugs, over eating are all BAD for their health... BUT they want something that seems pleasurable to take them away from whatever seems stressful... or unpleasent... So if smoking is their thing..they will smoke.........Personally I'd like to see them quit because it's so unpleasent to be around a smoker.. Even if they are not smoking the smell is with them all the time...
If they continue to raise the prices in an effort to control the smokers (while forgetting about the alcoholics) someone will find a way to start selling cigarettes under the table at an affordable price. As with drugs (which include those pharmaceutical drugs that are padding pockets), and as with alcohol, you can always get them ... legally or illegally. Has anyone gone to North Carolina and told those hard working tobacco farmers that their livelihood is at stake ... where they still make moonshine? I wonder if anyone would "dare" go to California and snuff out the grapes that makes the whacky sauce that causes a person to see crosseyed. They're beating a dead horse here. Do you think Central and South America, etc. are not selling cigarettes? Making them so unaffordable here will only cause them to be smuggled in ... you know, like they smuggle Cubans into South Florida.
This is likened to saying .... "Sally, you can have a candy bar ... but Johnny, you can't have a donut!"
In the spirit of fairness, they should strap deadly photos of mangled people in vehicles to all alcholic beverages so when the Judges and lawyers, after a long day in court, go home or to their favorite restaurant and glug down liquour/wine, they can think more clearly about the drunk driver they just defended. Clearly whoever is making these decisions regarding cigarettes is a nonsmoker (but I bet they suck down the sauce) and they lack the ability to reason. Why aren't they handing "free" medication(s) to help a smoker stop smoking? They hand our prophylactics to our young children/adolescents so they can have safe sex, and adults have the freedom to put alcohol into the hands of children/adolescents. Don't those liquor bottles and beer cans warrant some type of vomitous photograph as well? Cigarettes will always be around ... just like the drugs and alcohol.
We need to add labels to alcohol:
Warning may cause VD and/or unwanted pregnancy, may kill others in traffic, may make you think you are interesting in conversations, may cause loss of employment, may embarrass your family, may make you dependent on government hand outs to sustain yourself.
We also need to add to the ID of those that voted for this act:
This person has a strong need to control the lives of others.
A word from you government: Don't smoke because we want you obey us and be submissive, but while you do smoke we want part of the proceeds. We need the money to funnel to our contributors, who in return will keep us in power.
Ny wife has a trech. and she don't smoke, it took the hospital 3 weeks to find out she had pneumonia and by that time they had to take the ventilator out and slice ther throat, I am 70 years old and have been smoking since I was 8 years old and am still walking around
Most of the people I know who smoke. They have serious issues in parts of their lives we have little or no awareness of. Lord have mercy.
The government on every level sued the cigarette companies and won massive sums years back. They, the government promised that the money would be used to educate the ignorant to the dangers of smoking. They lied! Not a single penny of the many millions went towards education. Theyused it for every thing but.
The first act by Obama as president was to slap a one dollar tax a pack on top of the already high taxes on cigarettes. Sin taxes they are called. I have read my Bible and no where does it say that it is a sin to smoke. To smoke anything for that matter. Who in the h--- do they think they are? They will tax us and tax us. In point, The Congress is now, right now considering increasing income tax.
Smokers are always the target. They've jacked up the price, put FS papers in cigarettes, made it to where you can't even smoke outside.. now this. Why don't they put heart attack pictures on big mac wrappers, junk food, liqour etc. The only way they are going to stop people from smoking is to stop selling them. Actually, even then I think people would still find a way to smoke.
How about pictures of car accidents, broken homes and drunk-butt people on bottle containing alcohol? Think that would stop people from drinking. Not likely. They have to be able to celebrate everytime they take away the public's choices - and not just smoking. I don't smoke, but it is still a legal product for people over the age of 18. Many cities and states have outlawed transfat and other items, but the alcohol flows freely.
TOO MANY PEOPLE HAVE SUFFERED OR DIED BECAUSE OF CIGARETTES AND ALCOHOL! WHEN YOU SEE A LOVED ONE SUFFERING AFTER YEARS OF SMOKING AND THEY CAN HARDLY TALK OR THEY WONDER HOW LONG THEY HAVE . WHEN YOU SEE A LOVED ONE DESTROYED BECAUSE OF YEARS OF ALCOHOL AND THE HEARTACHES LEFT BEHIND . WE HAVE YO MAKE OUR OWN DECISIONS -- ISN'T IT TIME -- WE ARE THE ONES PAYING THE PRICE !
I quite smoking over 30 years ago! It was tough, but I'm glad that I did. I'll probably live a few years longer now.
Why would they? We have a President touting himself as the "coolest" President ever with young Community Organizers across the Country struggling full speed ahead for the young people's vote - that is their role model - with a cigarette hanging out of his mouth. Which would you say would have the greater impact?
Oh! I now better understand the differentiation between tobacco and alcohol. While apparently it is totally wrong and a mortal sin that President Obama smoked cigarettes, it was perfectly acceptable and presidential that George Bush was/is a freakin' alcoholic, which addiction was ultimately handed down to his children, which led to fakes IDs so they could buy booze! WE NEED LABELS AND GUT WRENCHING PHOTOS ON LIQUOR BOTTLES AND BEER CANS WHICH DOES FAR MORE DAMAGE TO HUMAN BEINGS THAN ANY CIGARETTE EVER COULD. Why not put restrictions on those who indulge in alcohol as they have on smokers? Can't smoke in a restaurant, can't smoke at work ... How about no alcoholic beverages served in a restaurant since often those who drink alcohol become loud and obnoxious and let's end those bottles of liquor at office parties! Drunks kill people with their vehicles, drunks have no judgment, drunks can't walk or stand straight, or speak without slurring. Cigarettes don't seem to have that effect. Let's go on to the eggs, milk, chocolate, coffee both decaf and caffeinated is not good for you, and so on and so on ... let's put labels on all those too! Pretty soon someone will be dictating how many times a day you are allowed to use the bathroom in your home. People need to get educated. Everyone has an appointed time to leave this world and the Good Book doesn't say anywhere ... providing you don't smoke, drink, or eat chocolates. This is ridiculous. Just like you'll never stop the alcohol, drugs, prostitution, gambling, crooked lawyers and judges, all the price raising, photos and whatever else some fool can think of is going to stop people from smoking if that's what they want to do!
They are dealing with addicts i.e. a cash cow. many of these people know PEOPLE who have suffered and died as a result of smoking. They will buy a carton look at the variety of photos while they frantically ripping open a pack walking 15 feet from in front of whatever building they are in in the artic cold, gasp OMG a couple of times until they get one lit and take that first drag. the only thing that will happen is the cig czars have a fancy disclaimer that they know will result in nothing but the justification for hiking the price even more They play on addicts. Gamblers and drinkers the same way.
A picture Obama smoking would hurt sales just like he is hurting the economy!!!