Sales of e-cigarettes and IQOS through tobacconists in France

In response to a planned increase in tax on tobacco, the French tobacconists association has launched a large-scale diversification strategy focused on the sale of other tobacco-related products. ECigIntelligence believes the distribution of vapour products through tobacconists will increase significantly.

We conducted telephone interviews with 331 tobacco shops in 12 French regions to get a clear picture of current vapour product sales through this channel.

Over 60% of the interviewed tobacco stores were selling vapour products. The majority of tobacconists not already selling vapour products are not planning to introduce them.

The channel is dominated by Big Tobacco and tobacconist-only brands. There were very few mentions of brands available in vape stores.

IQOS is still distributed in a limited number of tobacco shops: according to the official IQOS website around 3% of tobacco shops sell the product, while nearly 20% of tobacco shops in our sample offered it.