Big Tobacco following the flow of electricity

Altria, who are the parent company Marlboro, are entering the Electronic cigarette market. Marlboro is the worlds best known and largest tobacco brand. It is available across the whole world, and is synonymous with the Marlboro Man and other rustic images of freedom. It is featured as the cigarette of choice in countless Hollywood movies over the years and retails as a premium brand, in a market that has many discounted lines.

With this strong history of top brand, it comes as no surprise that the Richmond Virginia based Altria has entered the electronic cigarette market. Such a move is likely both protect the cigarette smoking culture in the US and around the world as well has help to bolster the profits of the company. Cigarette sales are slumping across all the cigarette manufacturing companies, especially in the western, more health aware countries.

Altria is using a subsidiary, NuMark, to development the new brand of electronic cigarette. Altria have not gone for using the Marlboro brand name for their electronic cigarettes, but instead went for a new name – call MarkTen.

The product range is not going to be available in shops until September this year, but some information about it is available. Firstly, there is going to be the classic flavor of tobacco available, as well as menthol. It does not appear at the moment that they are going to go down the route of many other electronic cigarette resellers, and have the fun flavors to go with the traditional ones.

The MarkTen is going to be available in both disposable and rechargeable formats. There will be a full range of accessories and rechargeable batteries and replacement cartridges available.

It is manufactured in China, but the liquid contents of the cartridges will be manufactured in the US. They will come with a new trademarked “Four Draw” technology which promises to give users a more consistent vaping experience. Details of what this will exactly consist of are not yet available.

As with all electronic cigarette product, the packaging will contain a product warning that the devices are not considered to be a smoking cessation device, such as nicotine patches, as well as warning that the product is intended for healthy adults and not children, pregnant women or people with high blood pressure, diabetes or heart issues.

The market for electronic cigarettes has grown significantly in the past couple of years. It is estimated that in 2013, sales will top one billion dollars. Up until now, the Big Tobacco Companies were not too interested in the devices, but with sales like that, it is no wonder that they are sitting up and taking notice. A major advantage that the big tobacco manufacturers have over the existing e-cigs companies, is their distribution network. Most of the current market players are specifically focused on internet sales. But the big tobacco companies have substantial and well established distribution networks for sales within stores across the country. This can only be an advantage for them.

It will be interesting to see how a company as big as Altria, with the experience of such a large brand as Marlboro, can establish itself in the electronic cigarette market.

Article Credit: http://cigarettee.com

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