An study entitled “Exploring the e-cigarette e-commerce marketplace: Identifying Internet e-cigarette marketing characteristics and regulatory gaps” was published on November 1, 2015 in the journal Drug Alcohol Dependence.

Researchers from University of California, San Diego School of Medicine studied the internet as a marketing/advertising source for the sale of electronic smoking devices.  The team performed structured internet search engine queries and used inclusion/exclusion criteria to identify e-cigarette vendors.

Out of 57 e-cigarette Internet vendors, 54.4% sold excessively online. Vendors used a variety of sales promotion strategies to market e-cigarettes with 70.2% using more than one social network service (SNS), and 42.1% using more than one promotional sales strategies.  Most of the vendors displayed health warning in smaller fonts or in their terms and conditions. 20 of the vendors did not have any detectable age verification process.

The researchers concluded that e-cigarette internet vendors actively engage in promotional activities to increase the appeal and presence of their products online. In the absence of FDA regulations specific to the internet, e-commerce marketplace for e-cigarette is likely to grow.

Read the abstract of the study.