New Snus, New Snus Sales, and New Snus Taxes in 2015
Gott Nytt Snus År from me, Moe Unz! I wish all of us a very Happy New Snus Year in 2015.
We Swedes take a lot of time off this time of year so getting information is not as easy as it will be in a few weeks. None the less, I do have some new snus news for you!
Goteborg's Rapé Hjortron is Back to Stay
Göteborg Rapé Hjortron (cloudberry) White Portion snus was released as a limited edition during the summer of 2014. I missed Hjortron when it was all gone.
Probably for this reason alone, Swedish Match has brought back GR' Hjortron as a regular in the Göteborg's Rapé line-up. We are expecting to have it in stock around 5 January.
If you missed GR' Hjortron this past summer, then you must try a can now. If you are a fan of the different Goteborg's Rapé snuses already, then buy a roll.
The Lab 3; what the hell is it?
Week 4 of 2015 will see the release of a new The Lab snus, Lab 3. I no idea until now what the flavor profile is, how much nicotine is in it, or even how many portions are in a can. I did know it has a number 03 on the can.
I could make an educated guess based on my encyclopedic knowledge of Swedish snus, but will not. If I, Moe Unz, am wrong, I would have to buy a round of drinks at my pub which could get very expensive.
Today I can tell you that The Lab 03 is a regular strength nicotine slim white portion. Since the 03 is green, one would believe it to be a mint snus of some sort. One would be wrong: LAB 03 has no added flavor, according to Swedish Match.
What Strong Effect means I do not know. Maybe it means you will either love or hate Lab 03? We will all find out on 12 January when Lab 03 is released.
Among the new snus rumors circulating around at this time, Jakobsson's may have some new offerings during the first quarter 2015.
The Vogel brothers of V2 Tobacco are driving their cars very fast and recklessly this holiday season so I've not talked to them about new releases yet. I will ask Patrick when they get back to the office as Marc will be in a bad mood since his car is not as fast as Patrick's.
Skruf has not been returning my calls since their Christmas Party in 2013. I don't remember what happened there but they certainly do and were not happy about it at all.
Sweden, the Snus Tax, UPS Shipping, and Snus Deals
As a Swede, I have continually been disgusted with how our leaders deal with snus. The EU snus ban should have ended decades ago but it's still here and worse than ever.
Effective today, Stockholm has now raised the snus tax in Sweden by 12%. Why would they do such a stupid thing? Don't they want people using snus instead of cigarettes?
According to their twisted logic, if they raised the cigarette tax by 12% instead, it would encourage black market cigarette smuggling. Since snus is made in Sweden, there can be no snus black market. Even drunk, I could make better health and tax policy than this.
We will try to absorb some of the tax if we can, but there likely will be an increase in snus prices both here in Sweden and through internet shops.
Over 97% of our customers will enjoy this savings. Sadly, 2.x% will see increases in shipping costs, some rather large.
With oil prices so low, even with the UPS Rate Increase we can all enjoy getting more snus for our shipping dollars well into 2015; at least if the zombie apocalypse doesn't arrive first.
Below is our first newsletter of 2015. If it is still New Year's Day (GMT) when you are reading this, you should jump on the Jakobsson's Mint and General Classic Extra Strong portion 24 hour sale while you still can!
As always, enjoy your fresh snus!
MOE UNZ
Snus Legend and Manager
The Snus Shop at SnusCentral.com
