This is surprising and even disturbing news for the vaping market! While China represents a market of several hundred thousand vapers, online sales of e-cigarettes have just been suspended. Faced with the “health scandal” surrounding vaping products, the government has indeed decided to take measures.
A PROHIBITION TO PROTECT MINORS?
As an article from Bloomberg published November 1er 2019, China has suspended sales of e-cigarettes. The government of the country has declared above all protect physical and mental health minors.
All websites and apps selling e-cigarettes should be shut down and all online marketing campaigns stopped, the administration said.
The directive also ordered e-commerce platforms to remove vaping products from their sites. The Chinese e-cigarette market has grown from 451 million in 2016 to 718 million in 2018, according to LEK estimates
The ban imposed by China is the latest restriction imposed on an industry whose fortunes have rapidly deteriorated in recent months. RELX Technology, a Beijing-based start-up that claims to own 60% of the Chinese e-cigarette market, said in a statement that it “ strongly supported the ban Online sales and did not serve minors. It will end all sales and ads online.
However, this may be a temporary measure, although no date has been announced. In concrete terms, the authorities asked the online sales sites and other marketplaces to stop their sales. However, there is no doubt that these will resume as soon as light is shed on the current scandal in the United States. In the meantime, most of the Chinese wholesalers that are flooding the market have put up banners asking for age confirmation on their platforms.
