On October first, the NHS’s Stoptober campaign kicks into gear again. The theory goes that if you don’t smoke for 28 days, you’re five times more likely to quit for good.
It’s a noble cause, and one that sees smokers around the UK splash out on pills, patches and gum – or dive deep into those reserves of willpower to try and kick the habit for good. But here at KiK, we think that if you don’t think you can go cold turkey, the next best thing is to pick up a vape.
Here are our five reasons for switching from smoking to vaping this Stoptober.
Reason One: Cost
Let’s imagine for a minute that you smoke 10 cigarettes per day, buying a packet every two days or so. As a rough estimate, that will cost you £150 or more in October. More after that big Saturday night where you smoked a whole pack after a bottle of wine. It happens. We don’t judge.
If you were to buy the best-selling nicotine patches from a high street chemist, a month’s supply of nicotine would set you back £56. That’s a huge saving compared to the cigarettes, but we think you can still save more.
An entry-level vape pen and a week’s supply of eliquids will set you back £16.99. Adding two more multi-packs of ecigarette liquid to that order only brings your total up to £38.99.
That’s pretty simple maths:
Cigarettes: £150.00
Patches: £56.00
Vaping: £38.99
But Stoptober isn’t about saving money. It’s about saving lives.
Reason Two: Health
We’re not doctors, so we can’t make huge promises about vaping. So let’s hand this section over to the experts:
“Ecigarettes are less toxic and safer to use compared to conventional cigarettes. There is no evidence that ecigarettes harm bystanders.” – Cancer Research UK
“Vaping is far safer than smoking.” – NHS
That seems clear!
Reason Three: Effectiveness
Ok, vaping’s affordable and it’s not as bad for you as smoking. But why would you choose vaping over the two main ways people choose to quit smoking – patches, and cold turkey.
Let’s start with patches. For decades, the nicotine-laced sticking plaster has been the quitting aid of choice for smokers. And according to a trial undertaken by cancer researchers, less than 20% of patch users managed to stay off the cigarettes for 12 weeks.
In fact, 19.4% quit smoking, while 15.8% had to quit the patches because the glue made their skin itch.
When we switch to cold turkey as a quitting method, we get reports of up to 25.5% of smokers giving up for good – a far higher percentage than for patches, pills or gum. Other reports place this figure as low as 10%, so the truth probably lies somewhere in the middle.
Then we come to the vapes. According to the NHS, 2.9m adults vape. 1.5m of those have completely stopped smoking cigarettes. That’s 51.7%.
Vaping is over twice as effective as cold turkey when it comes to quitting.
Reason Four: Taste
Ok, here’s something every smoker realises at some point. Cigarettes taste, well, awful.
Think about it. If tobacco was as tasty as we all pretended, there’d be tobacco flavoured ice cream, tobacco flavoured drinks, tobacco flavoured sweets. And yet, apart from tobacco eliquids to help smokers transition to vaping, there’s nothing.
When you vape, you’re opening yourself up to a whole array of new taste sensations. Fruit eliquids, sweet eliquids, even ones that taste like a chocolate biscuit dipped in cold milk.
Reason Five: Enjoyment
So let’s recap the smoking v vaping comparisons. Vaping is cheaper than patches. Vaping is better for you than smoking. Vaping makes it easier for you to quit. Vaping lets you try all sorts of flavours.
When we asked some of the team here at KiK what their main reason for switching to vaping was, we had an outright winner.
They switched because they enjoy it. Sure, not everyone is a cloud chaser or wants to build a custom dual coil tank, but vaping is a hobby. There’s a community. People have fun.
And if you’re serious about quitting smoking for Stoptober, a little fun might just be what’s needed to help you give up on the cigarettes for good.