by Simon McGeady, Inishowen Independent
A BAN on the display and advertising of tobacco in
retail stores came into effect last Wednesday.
Across the peninsula, from large supermarkets to
small rural stores, businesses have been coming to
terms with the new legislation.
Most shops and supermarkets now have vending
machines for their tobacco products. These have been
modified by the operator to remove any branding.
However, in some of the rural shops around the
peninsula cigarettes are still stacked on shelves
and complying with the new regulations has not been
so straightforward.
In McClean’s shop in Malin Town, the cigarettes are
located not in a machine but stacked on a shelf
behind the counter. Here the proprietor’s solution
to the ban has been to drape two brown sheets of
paper the length of the shelf. The cigarettes are
unseen and the shop assistant parts the sheets to
retrieve the customer’s selection.
At another of Inishowen’s rural shops, Doherty’s of
Linsfort, things have been relatively
straightforward.
“We have had a cigarette vending machine in behind
the counter for the last number of years, so the
change hasn’t made all that much difference to us,”
said Mary Doherty, who co-runs the shop.
“The man that re-stocks the machine came here last
week and took out the signs for all the different
brands from all the slots and replaced them with
plain white sheets with the name Benson and Hedges
or whatever written on them. The big main
advertisement on the machine was replaced with a
plain blue sign with instructions for operating the
machine,” said Mary.
The changes have not inconvenienced her customers.
“Friday at the Post Office is our busiest day, but
nine out of ten people coming in for cigarettes, I
would know what they smoke.”
Mary is confident she is in compliance with the new
law but ‘will wait to see when the Health people
come around’.
The aim of the legislation is to protect children
from tobacco advertising and reduce the numbers of
teenagers taking up smoking. Mary is in favour of
anything that stops young people from taking up
smoking.
She stressed the need for young adults to bring
valid ID if they want to buy cigarettes at her shop.
“Children shouldn’t be able to buy cigarettes, but I
wouldn’t ban smoking. When they are adults they
should be free to make up their own mind about
whether or not they want to smoke. I am 51 years of
age and when I was young it was easy to tell who was
an adult and who was a child but nowadays a 14 year
old can look grown up for their age and an 18 year
old can look a lot younger,” she added.
Ireland is the first country in the European Union
to remove the advertising and display of tobacco
products. |
