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E-cigarettes gain traction

Published: 2010-12-23    Views:93 reads

As temperatures fall, John Lindaas expects sales of electronic cigarettes to rise.

Since Wisconsin's indoor smoking ban went into effect in July, tavern and restaurant customers have been stepping outdoors to smoke. Cold weather might encourage them to stay indoors, where e-cigarettes often are allowed.

Lindaas of the Cigarette Depot in Janesville said e-cigarettes have caught on locally since Wisconsin went smoke-free.

"I've had a very good response to sales, and people have been calling left and right inquiring about them," he said.

Since Cigarette Depot started selling e-cigarettes three months ago, Lindaas said the store has sold about 100 starter kits.

AirE8 Electronic Cigarettes operates a kiosk at Oakwood Mall in Eau Claire.

"In 1999, I had quit smoking cold turkey -- with a nicotine patch and hypnosis, neither worked -- and proceeded to gain 100 pounds," said company president Renee Giebink via e-mail. "After three years of not smoking -- and fighting the urge every step of the way -- I started smoking again as if I had never quit."

After months of research and development, Giebink said she was able to develop a product that was "the closest to real smoking available on the e-cig market." The company opened its first store in March and now has four locations.

Kits can be customized with varying levels of nicotine, Giebink said. The water-based vapor also is available with no nicotine.

E-cigarettes look and feel like real cigarettes but are odorless, flameless and unregulated. The U.S. Food & Drug Administration, however, wants them regulated. Dr. Robert Cook, a lung specialist/physician at Mercy Regional Lung Center in Janesville, said it's not always clear what e-cigarettes contain.

"It is a drug-delivery device, and because it is, it should probably be regulated or studies done to show it's safe without regulation. But at this point, the jury is out," Cook said.

Giebink said she is confident the FDA eventually will accept that the product is not a medical device to be marketed only by doctors and pharmacies.

"I completely agree that electronic cigarettes should be regulated somehow, in some fashion," she said. "Our same high-quality standards of quality must be met industrywide."

Because e-cigarettes are electronic, Cook said, young adults are more likely to be drawn to them.

Giebink said no one younger than 18 is allowed to sample or buy AirE8 products.

Copyright (c) 2010, The Leader-Telegram, Eau Claire, Wis./Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.

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