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Original research
Excise taxes and pricing activities of e-liquid products sold in online vape shops
  1. Shaoying Ma1,
  2. Shuning Jiang2,
  3. Meng Ling2,
  4. Bo Lu3,
  5. Jian Chen2,
  6. Ce Shang4
  1. 1 Center for Tobacco Research, The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center, Columbus, Ohio, USA
  2. 2 Computer Science and Engineering, The Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio, USA
  3. 3 College of Public Health Division of Biostatistics, The Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio, USA
  4. 4 Internal Medicine and Center for Tobacco Research, The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center, Columbus, Ohio, USA
  1. Correspondence to Dr Ce Shang, Internal Medicine and Center for Tobacco Research, The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center, Columbus, OH 43210, USA; ce.shang{at}osumc.edu

Abstract

Background Although e-cigarette excise taxes have great potential to prevent the initiation and escalation of e-cigarette use, little information is available on pricing activities of online vape shops, and how well taxation is implemented during web-based sales remains unclear.

Objectives We examine e-liquid pricing activities in popular online vape shops that sell nationwide in the USA and present how those stores charge excise taxes based on shipping addresses in states and local jurisdictions that have e-cigarette taxation in place.

Methods We collect e-liquid sales prices from five online vape shops using web data extraction, standardise prices for e-liquid products, and present e-liquid price distribution in the whole sample and in each store, as well as variations of excise taxes across states/local jurisdictions and between stores. The price data were scraped from the store websites from February to May in 2021.

Results We collected data on 14 477 e-liquid products from five stores. The average price of e-liquids is $0.25/mL, and the median price is $0.20/mL in our sample. E-liquid products sold online are very affordable and the average prices are lower compared with price estimates using other sources (eg, self-reports, sales data). In addition, online stores charge state excise taxes inconsistently and fail to comply with county-level or city-level excise taxes.

Conclusion E-liquid products sold online are priced low, and stricter enforcement of e-cigarette excise tax is needed in online purchasing channels.

  • Price
  • Taxation
  • Electronic nicotine delivery devices

Data availability statement

All data relevant to the study are included in the article or uploaded as supplemental information. The data are included as supplemental file.

This is an open access article distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited, appropriate credit is given, any changes made indicated, and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/.

https://doi.org/10.1136/tobaccocontrol-2021-057033

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    Data availability statement

    All data relevant to the study are included in the article or uploaded as supplemental information. The data are included as supplemental file.

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      This web only file has been produced by the BMJ Publishing Group from an electronic file supplied by the author(s) and has not been edited for content.

    Footnotes

    • Twitter @ShaoyingMa

    • Contributors Conceptualisation—CS and SM. Methodology—JC, SJ, ML, BL, CS and SM. Software—SJ, ML, CS and SM. Validation—CS. Formal analysis—SM. Investigation—SM and CS. Resources—CS and JC. Data curation—SJ and SM. Writing (original draft preparation)—SM. Writing (review and editing)—CS, JC, BL, SJ and ML. Visualisation—SM and CS. Supervision—CS and JC. Project administration—SM and SJ. Funding acquisition—CS and JC. All authors have read and agreed to the published version of the manuscript. CS is responsible for the overall content as the guarantor.

    • Funding This study is funded by the Ohio State University Comprehensive Cancer Center (OS-UCCC) Center for Tobacco Research Pilot Grant (Contact PI: Ce Shang; 1/1/2021-06/30/2021). CS and SM are funded by the National Cancer Institute (R21CA249757; PI: Ce Shang; 9/16/2021-8/30/2023).

    • Competing interests None declared.

    • Provenance and peer review Not commissioned; externally peer reviewed.

    • Supplemental material This content has been supplied by the author(s). It has not been vetted by BMJ Publishing Group Limited (BMJ) and may not have been peer-reviewed. Any opinions or recommendations discussed are solely those of the author(s) and are not endorsed by BMJ. BMJ disclaims all liability and responsibility arising from any reliance placed on the content. Where the content includes any translated material, BMJ does not warrant the accuracy and reliability of the translations (including but not limited to local regulations, clinical guidelines, terminology, drug names and drug dosages), and is not responsible for any error and/or omissions arising from translation and adaptation or otherwise.