Did smokers shift from small mixed businesses to discount outlets following the introduction of plain packaging in Australia? A national cross-sectional survey

Opponents of plain packaging (PP) in Australia and elsewhere have claimed that the legislation would create confusion for retailers attempting to locate packs of uniform appearance. This, it was claimed, would result in increases in pack retrieval and overall serving times, 10 impatience with queuing among customers, and a consequent shift in patronage, sales and profits from small mixed businesses to large discount outlets such as supermarkets. 11 Surveys of retailers funded by tobacco industry groups reported perceived negative effects among retailers shortly after implementation of the legislation. However, studies of retail outlets conducted across Australia over the period of implementation of legislation found no lasting effects on retail serving time and a study conducted in the Australian state of Victoria 1 year before (2011) and 1 year after (2013) introduction detected no changes among current smokers in usual place of purchase of tobacco products. We aimed to repeat and extend this analysis using a large national data set. We used data from continuous national cross-sectional telephone surveys conducted between 9 April 2012 and 30 March 2014 with about 100 respondents per week aged 18–69 years, described fully in Wakefield et al (this volume). All respondents were asked ‘Do you currently smoke factory-made (FM) cigarettes only, roll-your-own (RYO) cigarettes only, both, or neither of these?’ Cigarette smokers (FM and RYO) were asked, ‘Where did you buy or get the cigarettes or tobacco you are currently smoking?’ For analyses, we coded store types into seven categories: supermarkets, tobacconists, small mixed businesses (including convenience stores, small grocery shops, milk bars, delis and newsagents/newsstands), petrol stations, the internet, duty free or from overseas and other (including informal sellers, bars and pubs, bottle shops and liquor stores, vending machines and ‘given as a gift’). Data were weighted to the national smoker/recent quitter population by mobile phone status, gender, age by education and state of residence as described in Wakefield et al (this volume). We undertook logistic regression analyses to assess changes in purchase channel between pre-PP (April–September 2012, n=2193), the transition to PP phase (October and November 2012, n=765) and the PP phase (December 2012–March 2014,