E-Cigs Growing in Popularity in New York (1/14/13)

A New Jersey electronic cigarette company is boasting a 600 percent growth rate in sales between 2011 and 2012.

Logic is one of several e-cigarette companies, along with Blue, Njoy and Eonsmoke, that has targeted New York City as a main sales point for its product.

Azam Asaduzzaman, a SoHo newsstand clerk, said his shop had only started selling e-cigarettes about three months ago, but already sells about 12 a day for a total between $300 and $400, making up about 20 percent of its total sales of nicotine-delivery systems.

“Most people who buy are between 25 and 35 years old, and they get the rechargeable kind. They don’t buy regular cigarettes from me,” said Asaduzzaman.

A private company, Logic won’t divulge exactly how many e-cigarettes it sells, but a company spokesperson said that it has received multiple requests from tobacco companies and investors to buy it out or partner with it. A press release says Logic is an “eight-figure company with millions in revenue.”

A Wells Fargo analysis of the e-cigarette market has found that it is a $300 million industry, with Logic’s competitor Blu believed to have a 25 percent share of the market.

Although the Food and Drug Association says e-cigarettes are not a healthy choice, users of the product save a bundle in sales taxes in a city whose leaders are bent on citizens butting out.

But the government has not yet had the last word on whether e-cigarettes are totally safe, with the FDA finding in 2009 that one unnamed e-cigarette contained significant traces of a chemical found in antifreeze.

Source: New York Post