Walmart Cigarette Cabinets at Kid Height

Known as “power walls”, these cabinets are found in Walmarts and convenience stores across the country. Displaying dangerous tobacco products at children’s eye level persuades children to consciously or subconsciously use cigarettes.

Even when the walls only display cigarettes, studies have shown that these marketing displays influence youth to also use e-cigarettes. A study done by RAND Research found that, “Adolescents who were exposed to the power wall during a shopping trip were about 15 percent more likely to say they would be willing to use electronic cigarettes in the future as compared to adolescents who were not exposed to the power wall.”

Removing power walls from stores like Walmart would indeed help future generations from becoming addicted to nicotine and tobacco products. As stated by RAND, “Our findings provide evidence that hiding the tobacco wall in convenience stores might reduce the number of adolescents who try e-cigarettes,” said Michael S. Dunbar, the study’s lead author and a behavioral scientist at RAND, a nonprofit research organization. “This is evidence that the tobacco power wall helps influence the attitudes of adolescents toward not only combustible cigarettes, but vaping products as well.”

Read the full research article from RAND corporation here.

15 years ago, the RICO verdict in the Department of Justice case against Big Tobacco ruled that the tobacco industry violated racketeering laws and were thus ordered to make corrective statements at the point of sale.

However, Big Tobacco is STILL interfering with public health policy. They are STILL stalling on and combatting against providing these corrective statements at the point of sale. Avoiding this ruling means that Big Tobacco is shamelessly targeting children with their addictive nicotine products, including these power wall displays.

Read more about how Big Tobacco fights against public health policy and targets kids.