Does The Ecig Present Predict Our Vape Future?
Can we look at current events and envision a future for vapers?
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by Dave Cross
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The upside for vapers, drinkers, smokers and eaters is that although Britain is bent on curbing your enjoyment – it could be worse. You could be living in Finland. The country is “the worst place in the EU to eat, drink and vape” according to Epicenter, a free market think tank initiative set up by the European Policy Information Centre and the Institute of Economic Affairs.
Laws that impact on consumers are strictest in Finland, then Sweden, with the UK and Ireland coming in third spot. With the Tobacco Products Directive (TPD) being rolled out across Europe, vapers will find little motivation to live abroad to enjoy a more relaxed vaping environment.
Plans to tax eliquids and equipment by the European parliament have already been leaked. Some states have taxes in place already – action that is now being mirrored across the pond in America. The state of Vermont is considering throwing a NINETY-TWO percent tax onto vaping products.
It was a proposal that drew fury from speakers on both sides of the debate and proved that, regardless of common sense or science, there are those bent on imposing crippling sin taxes like the ones in Italy that killed their nascent ecig industry overnight. The arguments that making the safer alternative as or more expensive than tobacco was lost on the anti-lobby: “The e-cigarette tax is a really good idea for a lot of many reasons,” Jill Sudhoff-Guerin of the American Cancer Society said. “The primary reason is that kids are very price-sensitive.”
So as the country readies itself for the impact of the TPD, news that a vape café has closed might be a harbinger to the stories to come. The Vaping Café claimed to be the very first of its kind in the UK. It set up in Tunbridge Wells in 2013 and quickly drew in a range of clientele who enjoyed a vape with their coffee.
Set up by Paul Clift-Lands after he left his post as a police trainer, the café sold liquids and devices alongside traditional café fare. But the doors are now locked, the Facebook page closed and the owner on his way to Crete. How many more will follow in The Vaping Café’s footsteps before 2016 is out?
Dave Cross
Journalist at POTVDave is a freelance writer; with articles on music, motorbikes, football, pop-science, vaping and tobacco harm reduction in Sounds, Melody Maker, UBG, AWoL, Bike, When Saturday Comes, Vape News Magazine, and syndicated across the Johnston Press group. He was published in an anthology of “Greatest Football Writing”, but still believes this was a mistake. Dave contributes sketches to comedy shows and used to co-host a radio sketch show. He’s worked with numerous start-ups to develop content for their websites.
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