San Francisco Nets Nearly $4 Million From Zyn Sellers in Crusade Against Flavored Tobacco

Zynners repent.

San Francisco secured a $1 million settlement with a retailer it accused of using online sales to flout the city’s ban on flavored nicotine pouches, the city attorney announced Thursday.

The agreement, reached in October, requires the Los Angeles-based Lucy Goods Inc. to stop shipments of its products to San Francisco. The company is the fourth — along with Rogue Holdings LLC, Swisher International Inc. and Northerner Scandinavia Inc., all of which settled last year — named in a 2024 lawsuit against online sellers accused of violating state and local law and appealing to young people with fruity, minty flavors.

“The popularity of flavored nicotine pouches has skyrocketed, and we cannot risk hooking a new generation of young people on tobacco products,” City Attorney David Chiu said in a statement. “Online tobacco retailers are not above our laws and cannot ship banned products into our city.”

The judgment also requires all four companies to prohibit the use of San Francisco addresses in shipping or billing address fields, and post clear language on their websites stating that flavored tobacco products may not be sold in San Francisco. Between the four defendants, the lawsuit netted the city nearly $4 million in penalties and fees.

Lucy Goods did not respond to a request for comment in time for publication.

The settlement is the latest in the city’s ongoing battle against flavored tobacco and other addictive products. San Francisco’s 2019 comprehensive ban on the sale of all flavored e-cigarettes and menthols included nicotine pouches in the legal definition of a “tobacco product.” A 2020 study found that the ban significantly reduced overall flavored tobacco use among people ages 18 to 34.

More recently, the popularity of Zyns and other nicotine pouches has grown as an alternative to smoking and vaping, especially among younger users.

According to the 2023 California Youth Tobacco Survey, most high school respondents who used tobacco reported using flavored tobacco products, and nicotine pouches were the second-most common form of tobacco use among eighth-graders. Experts say the proliferation of flavored tobacco products, which are more attractive to young people, has threatened decades of progress in reducing youth tobacco use.

Zyn, a Swedish brand of nicotine pouches that has dominated the market, has been around for a decade and was initially marketed to help users kick smoking habits.

The pillow-shaped pouches, which sit in the mouth between the gum and lip, deliver a head rush or buzz as the bloodstream absorbs the nicotine. The products come in round plastic containers that resemble Ice Breakers mints, and often in a variety of fruit or mint flavors.

Philip Morris acquired Zyn in 2022 as part of the tobacco giant’s pivot to smokeless products. Though the pouches don’t contain cancer-causing tobacco, nicotine is addictive, and experts have raised alarm bells about the consequences of nicotine exposure to developing adolescent brains.

Some of the hype has been attributed to the role of “Zynfluencers,” social media accounts that promote or meme the products’ use. The content, which skews to young men, links the products to masculinity, productivity and skepticism of the medical health establishment.

Right-wing media personality Tucker Carlson, who previously called himself a “Zyn power user” — recently launched his own brand of nicotine pouches, after Zyn said Carlson’s claims about the company’s products were not backed up by science.

The San Francisco settlement was announced the day after California unveiled a list of tobacco products that can be legally sold in the state, following a statewide flavored tobacco ban in 2020 that voters upheld in a 2022 referendum.

Supervisor Shamann Walton said in a statement that the settlement sends “a clear message that San Francisco will enforce its flavored tobacco ban and hold corporations accountable.”

“Flavored nicotine products are designed to attract young people, and we cannot allow online retailers to bypass local protections and put another generation at risk,” he said.