Lessons in Multiplication

Convenience stores can do more to cater to the tobacco polyuser

By Renée M. Covino

HAVE YOU DONE THE MATH? As the consumption of cigarettes declines, the consumption of other nicotine products increases, but often the consumer is the same, a so-called polyuser that convenience stores are in good position to cater to.

The latest “Global Trends in Nicotine” report noted that cigarettes shrunk from 88.9 percent of the total nicotine ecosystem in 2017 to 84.1 percent in 2020. This shift has largely been driven by the increase in alternative nicotine products in the market, with one of the main results being an increase in consumers who use multiple products.

Earlier this year, Mike Wilson, vice president of trade strategy and operations for Winston Salem, N.C.-based Reynolds Marketing Services Co., told Convenience Store News that this phenomenon is one of the category’s greatest untapped opportunities of 2023. “Many adult consumers are looking for potentially less risky products and as these consumers continue to navigate away from combustible cigarettes, polyusage continues to rise,” he said.

The decline in cigarette usage over the last decade has led to a proliferation of more novel and alternative nicotine products, driving growth of more dual and poly product use, agreed Don Stuart, managing partner at Cadent Consulting Group, based in Wilton, Conn. Because of this, the industry is experiencing a slightly different consumer shopping for tobacco these days than 20 years ago, he explained.

“This consumer is more willing to cross over between product groups and try alternative tobacco products than ever before,” he said. “These aren’t buyers of your father’s pipe tobacco or cigars.”

The Particulars of Polyusage

Don Burke, senior vice president of Management Science Associates Inc. (MSA), a Pittsburgh-based company focused on analytics and informatics, has also been watching the polyusage trend take shape, with what MSA defines as the two largest nontobacco nicotine product forms — vapor and modern oral — often winding up in the baskets of cigarette users.

“The trend is very much expected to continue as tobacco use restrictions have practically forced the cigarette consumer, who chooses to consume nicotine regardless of their location, to find an additional product form that is allowed/acceptable at that location,” Burke explained.