Many people and organisations are keen to reduce cigarette smoking-related harm – including regulators, public health, industry – and, of course, tobacco and nicotine consumers themselves.
Imperial Brands is no different.
We’re committed to improving the health of our consumers and have identified the public health strategy of tobacco harm reduction (THR) to help achieve this ambition.
Our Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) approach to Consumer Health therefore has harm reduction embedded at its core, built around three pillars – access to choice, scientific substantiation, and unintended use prevention.
Our consumer health commitment aligns with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal 3.4, which aims to: ‘reduce mortality from non-communicable diseases’.
To get even closer to our consumers, we’ve conducted almost a quarter of a million interviews with adult smokers and next generation product (NGP) users, learning that:
Adult smokers aren’t so different to consumers of other product categories.
Most importantly, many are seeking cigarette alternatives which are potentially harm reduced compared to smoking.
Consumers have varied preferences in their choice of NGP categories.
Vapes, heated systems, and tobacco-free oral nicotine pouches all have vital roles to play. Currently, there’s no ‘one size fits all’ solution to facilitate THR.
Consumers won’t compromise on product quality or sensory experience.
These sensory elements –
or ‘nicotine moments’ – include nicotine uptake into the bloodstream, taste, aroma, and various NGP usage ‘rituals’.
To understand our consumers’ evolving preferences, and help address their diverse needs, we’re continuing to develop our innovation and insights capabilities.
As a responsible manufacturer, we clearly also need to play our role in building broader regulatory and societal trust.
We’re achieving this by conducting and communicating robust and transparent scientific research – including our own close-to-real-world studies demonstrating how NGP have the potential to help transition adult smokers away from cigarettes.
Choice is also paramount, so we’re offering our vapes, heated systems, and tobacco-free oral nicotine pouches to millions of tobacco and nicotine consumers in a wide range of markets.
As an industry, we can be proud of the collective progress we have made so far.
However, there are still over a billion adult smokers globally who have yet to choose to either quit cigarettes or switch to NGP. So, we need to continue making the case for the availability of responsible choice.
Start with the Consumer
We apply a data-driven approach, informed by a deep understanding of adult smoker consumers and our markets.
Provide Choice
We’re aiming to provide broader consumer choice in existing markets.
Meet Market Needs
We’re looking to build differentiated challenger brands that meet untapped consumer needs.
Scientific Validation
We rigorously substantiate the harm reduction potential of our NGP through our scientific assessment framework.
We also need to recognise – and overcome – the growing threat to THR that stems from rogue actors who are deliberately targeting youth or selling illegal products.
Responsible manufacturers have a vital role to play in the co-development and enforcement of risk-proportionate regulation that balances the need to protect youth and exclude irresponsible players, while offering adult smokers and nicotine consumers a range of high quality NGP.
We also believe that insights, science, and innovation will be key to continuing to build trust among regulators and public health bodies.
The positive transformation of the nicotine industry over the past few years is an extraordinary accomplishment.
We’re still in the early stages of this journey but, provided we stay close to our consumers and act responsibly, our greatest achievements are still to come.
Find out more about our approach to consumer health on our corporate website and follow our progress.
Paola Pocci
Chief Consumer Officer
