How to regulate vaping products to advance cancer prevention: Evidence from online stores.

Abstract

e22502 Background: The use of electronic cigarettes has significantly increased in the past decade, and online stores are one of the most common outlets for e-cigarette users to purchase vaping products. The goal of this study is to examine the appeal of different e-liquid flavors to vapers, using a revealed preference method to estimate consumer demand. Methods: We collected data on e-liquid sales prices, volume (in ml), and a variety of product flavors, from online vaping stores using web data extraction. We standardized prices for e-liquid products and used the hedonic pricing model to assess the associations between standardized e-liquid prices and flavors, controlling for nicotine concentration (in mg) and product VG/PG ratio. In total, we collected data of 10,870 e-liquid products from four popular online vaping stores that sell nationwide across the U.S. Results: Higher e-liquid prices (standardized to $/ml) are associated with higher nicotine concentrations. E-liquid products with fruit tobacco flavors are associated with higher sales prices. E-liquid prices are higher when VG/PG ratio deviates from 70/30 except for 90/10: the prices of e-liquid products with a 90/10 VG/PG ratio are lower than the prices of products with a 70/30 ratio. All of the findings above are statistically significant at a 5% level. Conclusions: Higher nicotine concentration and fruit flavors are associated with higher e-liquid prices in national online vaping stores, suggesting that they are preferred attributes and are in greater demand among vapers in the market of heterogeneous e-liquid products.