Australia
If indeed the legislation is passed and bland packaging becomes the norm, tobacco companies are likely to see the inside of the pack as the last bastion of communication left open to them (until, no doubt, even this avenue is closed down by the nanny state).
Possible strategies could include coloring the cigarette papers and filters and changing the shape of the sticks.
“There are certainly companies around the world experimenting with different looks, colored filters and sticks,” according to Professor Simon Chapman from the University of Sydney’s School of Public Health.
“They could make cigarettes in the shape of joints, for example, or in fluorescent paper.”
For now, the government claims that introducing bland packaging and its imposition of higher taxes (a 25% increase in excise taxes) will generate billions of dollars in income for the government while cutting the number of smokers.
The arguments are no doubt being carefully considered by both sides, but one area that ought to be of concern to the government, as well as manufacturers, is the probability that a combination of higher taxes and bland, look-alike packaging will open the floodgates to much cheaper counterfeit and smuggled products, possibly costing the government billions in revenues and diminishing the commercial value of licit brands even further.
