In a previous blog entry about Bravo Smokes, the faux cigarettes made of lettuce, I compared the price of Bravo to traditional tobacco cigarettes. One of my blog readers, Marti, emailed me about this:
Hi Dossy.. just read your article on the Bravo Smokes and I agree with
you over 100%. Why should I pay more to quit when I enjoy smoking.
[…]
John Chappell, the President of Safer Smokes, Inc., makers of Bravo
Smokes, actually took the time to write me an email about this very
issue. Here is the relevant excerpt of what he wrote:
My name is John Chapel and I am President of Safer Smokes, Inc.
soon to be name changed to Bravo Smokes Corporation.[…]
Concerning your comments regarding our product and its pricing,
please realize that this is a first class pharmaceutically
produced product that requires extensive manufacturing quality
controls and clinical processing to result in a high quality and
consistent smoke.[…]
Unlike the tobacco co.s BRAVO is trying to attract customers so we
can then lose them! A great deal of the margin goes toward
educating, informing our customers, and branding our product so
that first, people will try our product and, second, they will
shortly quiting smoking all together including BRAVO.While the tobacco co.s hook you to a label in hopes of long term
use, we are constantly turning over customers as they use our
product to “kick the habit”. There is a real cost to this.
This does make sense: since the success of their product results in loss
of customers, the mark-up has to cover the cost of continued operation
and recovery of their research and development. It’s an interesting
business problem to solve, really. How do you create a company around a
product whose success results in losing customers, but still generate
enough sustained business to grow your company?
However, I still imagine their product would be profitable enough if
priced lower than traditional cigarettes. Doing that might result in
more smokers to at least try the product, too. But, the downside is
that smokers may turn to their product as a cheaper source of cigarettes
and just continue smoking, instead of quitting. Either way, I think
even that would be win-win for smokers and their company: some folks
will try the product and quit, others will simply smoke a (presumably)
healthier cigarette and continue smoking. However, then they will be
seen as a real competitor to traditional tobacco cigarette companies
which I’m sure they want to avoid. It’s a delicate situation, I’m sure.
What do you think about this? Does it make sense? Share your
thoughts in the comments below.
Tags:
cigarette,
smoking,
Bravo Smokes,
economics,
tobacco,
cessation
Programmer, husband, father, singer, guitarist, tinkerer, reverse engineer, strange, and living in New Jersey. 
The largest portion of the price of cigarettes is taxes, at least here in California. As this is a non-tobacco product the profit margins must be quite healthy.
I’m looking to try these. I’ve found that there’s the nicotine addition, and also the “habit”. As I tend to use smoking to relax and step outside for “me” time (easy here in CA since smokers are social outcasts) the habit part is what I’m slow to give up. The nicotine isn’t much of an issue for me. I’ve tried the gum but curbing the chemical depedancy is very unsatisfying… I still want to kick back and have a smoke, even when I’ve overdone it with the gum and have the hiccups.
Basically, I want a “healthy” narcotic-free smoke to enjoy until I don’t want to smoke anymore. Without the nicotine ‘timer’ to remind me when to go light up my usage is likely to drop over time.
Even if I keep smoking for another year or more, it makes sense to minimize the health effects and remove the chemical dependancy as a factor.
Thanks all,
Have a great day!
-Xul