Waitrose has delisted all single-use vaping products as it announces a “complete withdrawal” from the burgeoning market.
The supermarket had already decided not to stock “brightly coloured, fashionable, single-use vaping devices” but this week announced it was pulling single-use ‘cigalike’ products sold under the Ten Motives label from its range.
The move was a result of concerns around disposable vapes’ appeal to “young non-smoking vapers attracted by the colour and sweet, soft drink and dessert-based flavours” the supermarket said, as well as “growing environmental concerns” around the lithium used in the devices’ batteries ending up in landfill.
“We are a retailer driven by doing the right thing, so selling single-use vapes is not something we could justify given the impact on both the environment and the health of young people,” said Waitrose commercial director Charlotte Di Cello.
“We had already decided it wasn’t right to stock the fashionable bright coloured devices which are seeing rapid growth – so this decision is the final jigsaw piece in our clear decision not to be part of the single-use vaping market.”
Through 2022 the vape market more than doubled its value to £793.2m, driven chiefly by growth of disposable brands. Leading disposable brand ElfBar is the most valuable e-cig brand by a considerable margin, worth £322.1m in grocery, having shifted an extra 55.8 million units. Other disposable brands also grew considerably, with ElfBar rival Geek Bar boosting volumes by 613%.
Despite the overall category growth, some vape brands suffered – among them BAT-owned Ten Motives, which Waitrose has delisted – stagnant in value and falling in volume by 1.8%.
The rise of disposable vapes has sparked environmental concerns, with a joint investigation by Material Focus and the Bureau of Investigative Journalism in June last year finding more than 50% of single-use vapes get thrown away – some 1.3 million every week.
With each single-use vape containing on average 0.15g of lithium, and with over 1.3 million single-use vapes thrown away every week, this accumulates to 10 tonnes of lithium a year sent to landfill, the equivalent of the lithium in the batteries of 1,200 electric vehicles.
Waitrose is the first supermarket to move against disposable vapes, with the majority of its rivals having begun listing the products or expanded ranges over the last year.
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