Comment: Ban on flavored tobacco would only hurt retailers

By Tammie Hetrick / For The Herald

Lawmakers in Olympia are advocating for a misguided proposal that would ban flavored smoke-free nicotine products, including e-cigarettes and nicotine pouches.

Historical evidence shows that such flavor bans are often counterproductive and lead to numerous unintended consequences. Instead of improving public health, these bans will create additional challenges for struggling businesses in Washington, making it even more difficult for local retailers to stay afloat.

According to data from the U.S. Postal Service, the downtown Seattle area lost more than 2,000 businesses between 2020 and 2022 due to the economic pressures brought on by the covid-19 pandemic. Throughout the city and across the state, local businesses and retailers, including convenience stores, are still struggling to regain their footing in the face of rising costs, increased crime and homelessness, and a range of other issues. The proposed flavor ban could shutter the doors of many retailers at a time of economic uncertainty for small businesses and workers.

Hard-working, responsible retailers in Washington and nationwide rely on the sales of flavored nicotine and tobacco products. Pulling these products from their shelves will only exacerbate the financial challenges many Washington businesses are working to overcome. Moreover, these kinds of bans do nothing to eliminate the appeal of these products. Rather, they just create incentives for consumers to travel across state lines to purchase their preferred nicotine and tobacco products or find them on the black market.

Washington retailers and small businesses will bear the brunt of state lawmakers’ attempts to dictate and control consumer behavior. Local convenience stores will lose out on a tremendous amount of business; not strictly due to the lost sales of flavored nicotine and tobacco products, but also the lost sales of other goods such as gasoline, food and beverages that consumers often purchase when visiting their local convenience store.

Threatening local businesses this way will slow job creation and, as more retailers are forced out of state or out of business entirely, undermine the strength of local communities and economies throughout the Evergreen State. Additionally, Washington will lose substantial tax revenue tied to flavored nicotine and tobacco sales to the black market or other states. With legislators still trying to figure out how to fill a multi-billion-dollar hole in our state’s budget, a flavor ban will only worsen an already dire situation.

Washington lawmakers should look closer at states that have already tried passing similar flavor bans and how these misguided policies have affected local businesses, the economy and tax revenue.

In Massachusetts, lawmakers enacted a flavor ban that continues to negatively affect businesses and the state’s economy. In the year after the flavor ban went into effect, 90 percent of lost tobacco and nicotine sales simply moved across state lines. In total, Massachusetts has lost nearly $150 million in tax revenue and has seen an increase in demand for illicit, unregulated versions of these products on the black market.

Similarly, California’s ban on most flavored tobacco and nicotine products resulted in a spike in foreign and illicit goods. One study found that 27.6 percent of discarded cigarette packs were smuggled into the U.S. illegally. Notably, the ban caused California’s excise tax revenue to drop by a staggering $192 million.

Flavor bans hurt local businesses, weaken the economy, and threaten vital tax revenue; all while failing to support a decrease in nicotine and tobacco use. Banning flavored vapes and other nicotine products may encourage adults to simply switch back to smoking cigarettes, which is the most dangerous form of tobacco and nicotine use.

Lawmakers in Olympia should seriously reconsider efforts to ban flavored nicotine products in the state. While their intentions may be good, the impact such a ban would have on local businesses, job creation, and our economy would all be decidedly bad. Our state legislators should avoid other states’ mistakes by rejecting this unnecessary, overreaching ban.

Tammie Hetrick is the president and CEO for Washington Food Industry Association, which represents independent grocers, convenience stores and their suppliers.