Tobacco Business

[ 62 ] TOBACCO BUSINESS [ MAY / JUNE | 21 ] According to a MarketWatch report published in December 2020, there are big business opportunities in nicotine pouches. Nicotine pouches are smoke-free, spit-free, and often times tobacco-derived nicotine pouch products that come in a variety of strengths and flavors. As more consumers begin to go smoke-free, nicotine pouches are becoming the preferred means for someone getting their nicotine fix without having to use combustible tobacco products, such as cigarettes. Nicotine pouches contain a finely ground neutral cellulose base that is flavored and has nicotine added to it. During the final production steps, the base is wrapped in paper. When the user puts the pouch inside their lip, the saliva in the mouth activates the flavoring and nicotine. According to MarketWatch analysis, the global nicotine pouch market is projected to reach $32,770 million by 2026. The nicotine pouch category is dominated by products from various manufacturers, including SwedishMatch, Altria, Swisher and R.J. Reynolds Vapor Co., and companies like NIIN hope to further disrupt the growing new category of products. At NIIN, the company’s motto is “nicotine innovated,” and it has set out to create an entirely different nicotine pouch than what has previously been available. NIIN’s story dates back to 2019, when Patrick Mulcahy, CEO and founder of Streamline Vape Co. and NIIN, and his team met with one of his company’s distribution partners in Poland. In the middle of the meeting, a member of the distribution team stopped the meeting and left the room briefly, later returning with a stack of cans in every color of the rainbow that he went on to pass around the table. The distributor told Mulcahy and others at the meeting about how the pouches in the colorful cans were popular in Poland and demanded that Mulcahy and his business partners at the meeting try them immediately. “The flavor was OK, the nicotine strength was ungodly high, and the branding was, how do I say this, interesting and vulgar for those who know the Polish language [Kurwa],” says Mulcahy. “As we sat around the table looking at each other, our lower lips on fire from the 50 mg Eastern European pouches, we looked at each other, and everyone had a lightbulb over their head. We immediately saw the correlation between nicotine pouches and our company.” Before this meeting, Mulcahy’s company had been involved in nicotine through the vapor products it manufactured. As his company and the vapor industry matured over the years, its focus broadened to harm reduction from combustible and oral tobacco and offering people alternative choices to the nicotine products that were already on the market. Mulcahy saw potential in the nicotine pouch category, but he knew that if his company was going to bring their own take on the product to the market, it had to be done differently. An Opportunity Realized Mulcahy, a former smoker and tobacco chewer, experienced firsthand the opportunity that vaping and nicotine pouches presented consumers who were in search of alternatives to more traditional tobacco products. “In reality, there is no reason for people to use tobacco products as they have for over a century when there are solutions and products like NIIN on the market that offer a purer form of nicotine satisfaction,” he says. Mulcahy knew that creating a nicotine pouch that was truly reduced harm and tobacco- free was easier said than done. His company was going to be competing for market share against companies with market caps of $5 billion, so he knew that unlike what happened when his company entered the vapor category years before, As we sat around the table looking at each other, our lower lips on fire from the 50 mg Eastern European pouches, we looked at each other, and everyone had a lightbulb over their head. We immediately saw the correlation between nicotine pouches and our company. — Patrick Mulcahy