Why Can't Blends Have Nicotine Percentages

[olkofri]

I don't think it's a good idea at all. Considering this (emphasis mine):

Aside from cost, lack of demand, and the other great reasons stated, that inconsistence in levels would make it nearly impossible. I would imagine that the natural variations from crop to crop along with the processing methods, casings, etc, then the blending itself would result in a variation akin to trying to label apples with fructose levels on a per apple basis. There are so many variables as they are really minimally processed as compared to cigarettes, as Cosmic cited.

, it would be detrimental, chiefly in the sense that it would give agencies like the Foolish Douchebag Arses the perfect excuse to clamp down and ban left and right ("if you can't come up with numbers, we won't authorise your product and take it off the market!") The public's purported 'right to know' turns things into regulatory nightmares.

On the pipers' end, it takes away from the fun of exploration. The current guidelines of mild, medium, strong are just fine; there's no need for values with two significant digits.

 

[warren]

"Why Can't Blends Have Nicotine Percentages"

They can of course. No reason why they can't except there is no demand that I can ascertain.

 

[Casual]

There’s nothing stopping private citizens from doing the testing on blends they want to know about, except that they would rather distribute the costs of testing across people who don’t care.

 

[anotherbob]

Would it really be that expensive, though? I'm seriously asking, because I don't know. Swedish Snus manufacturers do this. Your average cannabis shop displays THC/CBD percentages for their strains, even the smallest microbreweries display the ABVs for their beers. I am generally in favor of consumers having as much information as possible, and think it would be a good idea if feasible. TR.com can only help you so much as people don't seem to have much agreement in terms of what they're referring to when rating a blend's "Strength."

yes but on those products it's an integral part of the experience. With pipes it's very secondary to flavor profile. Especially since if you want more nic get a bigger pipe or less get a smaller pipe. Also those are easier to measure accurately.

 

[perdurabo]

Shhhhh! Don’t give the Mob and their Masters anymore reason! Please!

 

[perdurabo]

Don't forget that the whole FDA thing was started by the cigarette industry. They did this to chewing tobacco too, and then when the small chewing tobacco industry couldn't afford to do all of the testing, the cigarette industry bought out the chewing tobacco companies. Look at the company name on the packs. They are all Phillip Morris now. And, we now have Camel branded dips and chews.
My horror is that Phillip Morris takes over most of the pipe tobacco companies and we start having Camel VaPers and Camel Virginias.

F**K That!

 

[shanez]

I'll echo @mikefu and @olkofri that cost and inconsistency are major factors.

Alcohol and cannabis aren't comparable.

Alcohol is regulated differently and the level can easily be controlled during production. Most beers are fermented to specific levels of alcohol and stopped. Most wines are produced and labeled differently every year so exact measurement and label costs aren;t a factor. Most hard alcohols are blended to a lower pre-determined level. There's a reason so much is at 40% and why drinkers of better whiskys and whiskies prefer higher levels. It's about taste.

As far as cannabis is concerned, they are specifically marketing and selling the chemical in it. Even when it was illegal people were still looking for specific growers/strains because of higher THC levels.

With pipe tobacco, we seem to be (and I'm generalizing here) pretty happy with "mild, medium, and heavy" nic-hit as descriptors. We're every bit about taste as we are nic levels.

 

[blues4goose]

Would it really be that expensive, though? I'm seriously asking, because I don't know. Swedish Snus manufacturers do this. Your average cannabis shop displays THC/CBD percentages for their strains, even the smallest microbreweries display the ABVs for their beers. I am generally in favor of consumers having as much information as possible, and think it would be a good idea if feasible. TR.com can only help you so much as people don't seem to have much agreement in terms of what they're referring to when rating a blend's "Strength."

This is part of the reason impending FDA legislation could be so damning for cigars. I haven't heard this in relation to the pipe tobacco industry too often (because my career is in cigars and pipes are just a hobby) but the FDA testing would add about a million dollars cost for each size of each new cigar they want to release.
It's so much more expensive for cigars than for the things you listed, because those things are homogenized, and you can control just about every aspect of manufacturing it. Except cannabis, but that's a whole other can of worms. Cannabis testing is as wildly inaccurate as tobacco testing would be. Basically, cannabis labs pull off the tips of the buds (the equivalent to the high-nicotine ligero at the top of the tobacco plant) so they can get the highest percentage possible so more people will buy it. With cannabis and with tobacco, you can fudge the result in either direction you like depending on where you pulled the tested material off the plant. Can't do that with a vat of beer or a cask of Snus, because the whole container should have even levels.
Although I'm not sure if it would apply the same way to pipe tobacco because, as far as I understand, the leaf priming isn't as important for pipe tobacco. Of course I could be totally wrong, but again, I've only been to cigar fields and factories

 

[Epip Oc'Cabot]

Back in the 70s and 80s when cigarette (and pipe tobacco) advertising was still common in print media, cigarettes DID report their "tar" and nicotine content. It was mandated in the print ads. Like Cosmic mentioned pipe tobacco is more natural in its makep and as such would have inherent variances that would make such numbers too variable and unreliable.

 

[musicman]

Would it really be that expensive, though? I'm seriously asking, because I don't know. Swedish Snus manufacturers do this. Your average cannabis shop displays THC/CBD percentages for their strains, even the smallest microbreweries display the ABVs for their beers. I am generally in favor of consumers having as much information as possible, and think it would be a good idea if feasible. TR.com can only help you so much as people don't seem to have much agreement in terms of what they're referring to when rating a blend's "Strength."

As others have said, I don't think you can compare it to cannabis or alcohol. With alcohol, the abv is measured by measuring the specific gravity of the wort before fermentation and comparing it to the specific gravity after fermentation. The difference between the two determines the abv. You can buy the tool to do this (a hydrometer) for just a few bucks. They are included in most homebrew kits. With cannabis, you're talking about a lab that is set up by the regulatory body of the state (well, in many situations. Each state has a little different laws about this, and some of the testing is done by the growers themselves). This isn't cheap to set up, but it was part of how legalization was sold to a sometimes dubious public. While I don't know the details, the cost for nic-content testing would probably be similar to the cost for THC testing, and there simply isn't the demand.

 

[danimalia]

It may very well not be worth the investment for blenders if it would require a huge testing infrastructure, which is understandable. I did notice that my tin of Carolina Red Flake lists the component leaf, with a very specific sugar content. So, presumably, some testing is already being done. That may be uncommon information to be passed on to consumers, but I do not know if it's common or uncommon information for blenders to have, or whether it's tested by the blenders or farmers, or brokers or whomever. Are we sure that blenders are not already aware of nicotine contents for the tobaccos they blend with to a level that can be quantified in greater depth than 1-5 scale or whatever?

 

[smudgersmissingleg]

Up until a few years ago cigarettes in the UK had the Nicotine, Tar & Carbon Monoxide amount (in mg) on each packet. This stopped when they brought in the all olive green boxes and they changed the law so they couldn't print this information anymore.

Here's an example from one of my old Dunhill packs.


Apparently this was the reason they gave:

Cigarette packs will no longer have warnings on the amount of tar and nicotine they contain.
While that might seem odd, the logic is very clear: whether or not a cigarette is ‘normal’ or ‘low-tar’, smokers still ingest the same levels of tar and nicotine when they smoke.
This is because ‘low tar’ cigarettes have perforations on the filter, which can lead to a lower tar yield score when tested by a machine.
But in reality, smokers cover these perforations with their fingers, lips, or saliva, meaning that the damage caused by a ‘low tar’ cigarette is no different from a regular one.

I don't think they ever printed this sort of info on pipe tobacco or cigars though, I've seen plenty of old tins for sale on ebay and never noticed it.

Chris.

 

[5star]

As others have mentioned, Tobacco Reviews is a good source. That said, there are many times when I've found that the consensus rating doesn't match my personal experience. This usually happens with baccys they rate on the stronger side of the scale. Body chemistry is a big factor.