Features of disposable e-cigarettes and their association with pricing and consumer preference: Evidence from web data of US online stores.

Abstract

Background and aims: Disposable e-cigarettes designed for one-time use are the most popular option among youth users in the United States (US). Product-level data (e.g., sales prices, flavors) of disposables in the online market are lacking. This study aims to identify key characteristics of online disposables and estimate their association with pricing and consumer preferences.

Design, setting and cases: Data analysis using detailed features of 2320 unique e-cigarette disposable products scraped from the websites of five US online vape shops.

Measurements: Product size was measured as volume in milliliter (ml) or number of puffs. Sales prices were standardized as price per ml volume and price per puff. Consumer preferences were measured by the total number of reviews for each product, and (when a product was reviewed) by the numeric rating it received, which ranged from 1 to 5 stars. Key product features included battery capacity (mAh), nicotine concentration (mg/ml), explicit marketing claims of nicotine salt and synthetic nicotine products, and product primary flavor (fruit, tobacco, sweet, menthol, alcohol, etc.).

Findings: Number of consumer reviews (3.92 [range = 0,72]) and numeric ratings (4.51 [1, 5]) were statistically significantly higher for disposables with higher nicotine concentration. While the average unit price of disposables in dollars (13.95 [1.99, 129.99]) sold in online stores was similar to those in brick-and-mortar stores, online products on average had lower price per ml (1.93 [0.07, 20.00]) due to volume discounts. Number of reviews and ratings were statistically significantly higher for fruit and sweet flavors (coefficient = 0.17, p < 0.05), compared with alcohol flavors (coefficient = -0.07, p < 0.05). Compared with products with a battery capacity ≤500 mAh, consumers gave 30% to 78% fewer reviews (p < 0.001) and 4% to 7% lower ratings (p < 0.01) for products with a battery capacity >500 mAh.

Conclusions: In US-based online vape shops, disposable e-cigarettes with higher volume sizes are associated with lower prices, suggesting that price discounts for disposables primarily take the form of volume discounts. Consumers appear to prefer disposable e-cigarettes with lower capacity batteries, high nicotine concentrations, no synthetic nicotine, and fruit/sweet flavours.