Vaping versus JUULing: how the extraordinary growth and marketing of JUUL transformed the US retail e-cigarette market
Level 4 - case-series / case-control
Observational retail scanner sales tracking and descriptive social media content analysis (by design analogy, not clinical CEBM).
OpenAlex W2806348441 · doi:10.1136/tobaccocontrol-2018-054382
What was done
The authors analyzed US retail store scanner data from 2011 to 2017 to track sales volume and market share for JUUL and other major e-cigarette brands. In addition, they identified and examined JUUL-related social media marketing and promotional activity across Twitter, Instagram (posts, hashtags, and accounts), and YouTube using keyword searches.
What was found
Between 2015 and 2017, JUUL grew from minimal sales to become the largest retail e-cigarette brand in the United States. In the fourth quarter of 2017, JUUL generated US$150 million in retail sales, representing approximately 40% of the retail e-cigarette market share. Despite moderate marketing expenditures, this sales expansion was accompanied by wide-reaching campaigns on Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube by JUUL and its affiliated marketers.
Why it matters
This study documents how social media marketing can rapidly drive market dominance for a novel nicotine product, illustrating why traditional advertising expenditure metrics and survey lag times fail to capture rapid shifts in tobacco use.
Limits
The abstract does not report the exact number of social media posts, videos, or accounts analyzed, nor does it provide quantitative engagement figures. Scanner data only captured retail store sales, omitting vape shop and online sales channels.
Cited by
- supports By 2018, Juul controlled 75% of the US e-cigarette market.