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SLIDESHOW: Mac’s Smoke Shop in Palo Alto expects to lose anywhere from 60-70% of sales due to a new ban on the sale of electronic cigarettes and flavored tobacco products in the city. Photo taken June 17 by Magali Gauthier. -
Aaron Mattu holds a jar of Gloria’s Blend, an in-house made pipe tobacco blend that is made up of a variety of tobacco, at Mac’s Smoke Shop in downtown Palo Alto on June 17. The shop says they may have to remove the added vanilla tobacco from this blend to adhere to new city restrictions on selling flavored tobacco. Photo by Magali Gauthier. -
Aaron Mattu smells a jar of Black Magic, a pipe tobacco that has naturally creamy aroma, at Mac’s Smoke Shop in downtown Palo Alto on June 17. Photo by Magali Gauthier. -
Hookahs on a high shelf behind bongs for sale at the counter in Mac’s Smoke Shop in downtown Palo Alto on June 17. Employee Aaron Mattu says the shop may start selling more glassware to make up for the losses in sales when the city’s ban on selling flavored tobacco goes into effect. Photo by Magali Gauthier. -
A selection of pipes and pipe tobacco for sale at Mac’s Smoke Shop in Palo Alto on June 17. The shop has asked the city to be grandfathered an exemption to sell flavored tobacco. Photo by Magali Gauthier.
Mac’s Smoke Shop, established in 1934 by Glen and Ruth McManus, has lived through almost every imaginable crisis over the past 86 years, from a world war to several economic recessions to a pandemic. And now, it’s facing another that could ultimately bring its demise: a city ban on flavored tobacco products.
In a 4-3 vote on Tuesday, the Palo Alto City Council outlawed the sale of electronic cigarettes and flavored tobacco products.
“It’s devastating,” said Neil Khoury, who owns the shop with Lori Khoury. “We keep going over it over and over in our heads and how we’re going to survive … my emotions are all over the place. We cried. Our employees cried.”
Following in Santa Clara County’s footsteps with the same type of sweeping ban that’s expected to go into effect next month for unincorporated areas, Palo Alto businesses will no longer be able to sell flavored pipe and chewing tobacco or any form of e-cigarettes. Based on data from the California Department of Tax and Fee Administration, there are 23 stores, including gas stations, that have an active license to sell cigarettes and tobacco in Palo Alto.
The Khourys had asked the city to be grandfathered an exemption to sell flavored tobacco, which Mac’s has been retailing since 1934. One of the shop’s own brands actually has a hint of vanilla flavor in it, Khoury said.
Khoury said sales from flavored tobacco, not including any vape-related products, represent around 50% of the store sales. With the ban, Khoury said he’ll be losing anywhere from 60-70% of his sales.
A cursory glance inside the store gives insight into how much the ban would immediately gut the business.
Entire shelves and cases of cigarettes, cigars, vapes and other tobacco and nicotine products would disappear leaving one side of the shop with nothing but glass bongs, cannabidiol (or CBD) products — the active ingredient in cannabis — and lighters.
The shop also sells newspapers and magazines, but those only make up 3% of his gross profits.
The rest of the store’s items include a wide assortment of drinks (no liquor), coffee, packaged pastries, candy and other miscellaneous items, like batteries, chapstick, mini-hygiene products, condoms and unique items such as branded Mac’s T-shirts and retro alarm clocks.
So for a product that’s literally rooted in the store’s name, Mac’s Smoke Shop, Khoury said it’s hard to see what other business model he can turn to, besides selling tobacco, that would make up for the lost revenue.
“I’ve been crunching the numbers and I don’t feel too optimistic,” he said.
For many former and longtime Palo Alto residents, losing Mac’s Smoke Shop represents losing a piece of history. The store is a reminder of an increasingly vanishing era of Palo Alto — a time when its streets were lined with independently-owned mom-and-pop shops and commuter traffic didn’t weave through residential neighborhoods.
“Mac’s is a cornerstone of the community — of old Palo Alto,” said Karl Kusnierczyk, 62, a former Palo Alto resident who now lives in Cocoa Beach, Florida. “Of course, we went to Mac’s, everybody did.”
For Kusnierczyk, Mac’s wasn’t just his go-to store for his favorite motorcycle magazines and underground comics. It was also one of many bridges of small businesses that linked a community together during a time when corporations such as Hewlett-Packard felt more accessible to the residents.
“Mac’s was a kind of place where you’d hang out and meet the guy from the bicycle shop or the lawn mower repair shop and get a conversation going,” he said. “Back then, it wasn’t big conglomerations, it was a network of small shops and small restaurants. I remember when you could walk over to Hewlett-Packard and say, ‘Hey, show me around.'”
Beyond tobacco, part of Mac’s allure is its focus on preserving a small piece of the past.
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SLIDESHOW: Mac’s Smoke Shop owners Glenn and Ruth McManus and their son, Al, in front of Mac’s original location across the street from where the shop is now on Emerson Street in downtown Palo Alto between 1935 and 1940. Courtesy Neil Khoury. -
Glenn and Ruth McManus in Mac’s Smoke Shop’s current location on Emerson Street in downtown Palo Alto. Currently, the shop still uses the same counter and shelves pictured here. Courtesy Neil Khoury.
Pictures of previous owners, old newspaper clippings from San Francisco Chronicle to the Palo Alto Weekly, and snapshots of athletes and artists such as Frank Sinatra and the Rat Pack, all smoking cigarettes, border the walls of Mac’s Smoke Shop,
“The shop has its own culture, it’s own community,” Mattu said. “Everything is a piece of history.”
But as Mac’s history is laid out in plain sight, Khoury is unsure of what the future of Mac’s will look like.
“We have about two months of (cash) reserve,” Khoury said. “After that, I’m sorry to say we might have a fire sale and we might not be in Palo Alto.”
I don’t usually comment on this forum – and I am not a smoker – but I find it abhorrent that our City Council is now dictating what adults can and can’t do with their lives. Do they think people won’t go elsewhere to buy flavored tobacco? And – certainly, if they think they are protecting children and teens, they are sadly mistaken. Los Altos isn’t that far away. What’s next? Mac’s is one of the old time places that make it bearable to continue to live in Palo Alto – and keeping it from becoming just another blah city. I’m sorry Council members Alison Cormack, Eric Filseth, Lydia Kou and Greg Tanaka have taken this step.
Posted by CLS, a resident of University South
>> I don’t usually comment on this forum – and I am not a smoker – but I find it abhorrent that our City Council is now dictating what adults can and can’t do with their lives.
Well, actually, we all navigate a world with tomes of laws that dictate lots of things we can and can’t do with our lives. I fail to see why “the state” (in this case city government) shouldn’t try to discourage teens from becoming addicted to tobacco products. It is a normal function of government to try to get teens on a healthy track instead of an unhealthy one. Why should “Mac’s” get special protection? Use of tobacco products significantly, measurably damages people’s health and longevity. Unlike, say alcohol consumption, which may have some benefits even as it has other drawbacks, there is no upside for tobacco use. So why should we bend over backwards for a tobacco shop? Because it is 86 years old or whatever? OK, let’s turn it into an anti-tobacco museum.
>> Do they think people won’t go elsewhere to buy flavored tobacco?
Of course they will. So what?
“I fail to see why “the state” (in this case city government) shouldn’t try to discourage teens from becoming addicted to tobacco products”
It’s already illegal for teens but you’re depriving ADULTS of their rights. How about prosecuting the teens who steal mommy’s credit cards and use false id’s?
“cannabidiol (or CBD) products — the active ingredient in cannabis “
Left for sale ⁉️‼️⁉️
> Well, actually, we all navigate a world with tomes of laws that dictate lots of things we can and can’t do with our lives.
Those tomes of laws are not really there to dictate what we can and can’t do with our lives, but rather how we interact and balance each others rights and responsibilities. I see what you did there trying to reframe the comment to something irrelevant to Mac’s Smoke Shop. Kind of dishonest.
> I fail to see why “the state” (in this case city government) shouldn’t try to discourage teens from becoming addicted to tobacco products.
Again, you shift from threatening the Mac’s Smoke Shop business to something that you admitted yourself is not going to keep people from buying these products. Not good reasoning.
Want to keep teens from buying these products, then disallow teens from buying them. No need to destroy a thriving and long-term business in Palo Alto. It is legislative, political and economic overreach.
> Why should “Mac’s” get special protection?
The question is more why should Macs get special oppression? Can you prove they were breaking the law or selling these products to teens? Want to shut down all liquor stores as well?
> Use of tobacco products significantly, measurably damages people’s health and longevity.
That is trick to prove, and also tricky to put up alongside other threats, such as air-pollution, or junk food, or global warming.
It is also generally accepted but smoking or chewing tobacco is dangerous and we’ve seen most Americans move away from using it on their own. What other measures would you use, how far would you go? Your same arguments would support putting surveillance cameras everywhere with facial recognition to make sure no one ever smoked again.
There has to be some qualification and proportionality in our laws.
Then, you cannot really measure the damage to people. Al kinds of things are damaging but the “measurable” part of that and the evaluation of what you measure is a subjective process.
> So why should we bend over backwards for a tobacco shop?
Mac’s is not just a tobacco shop, it is someone’s business and some jobs.
You have not made any kind of valid or persuasive case to bend over backwards against Macs.
>> Do they think people won’t go elsewhere to buy flavored tobacco?
> Of course they will. So what?
So he commented rationally and logically on it. Apparently you read his comment.
@Gulay Gur, you can get CBD products as pain relievers at most pet stores, health food stores, drug stores and many grocery stores. CBD doesn’t get you high if that’s your concern.
Stop singling out Mac’s.
I think I was misunderstood. I did not single out Mac’s, on the contrary i am objecting, always have, to the city’s arrogance and presumption in trying to control what is right for adults or not. Adults are responsible for their own buying and lifestyle choices, as long as we all respect others and THEIR choices. Mac’s is being oppressed, and pushed out. For shame.
Posted by CrescentParkAnon., a resident of Crescent Park
>> Those tomes of laws are not really there to dictate what we can and can’t do with our lives, but rather how we interact and balance each others rights and responsibilities.
All laws (should) exist to balance our rights with the rights of others. Laws involving flavored tobacco and vapes– same thing. And, …?
>> I see what you did there trying to reframe the comment to something irrelevant to Mac’s Smoke Shop. Kind of dishonest.
Ouch. Unfortunately, you are so caught up with the “myth of the small business” that the impact that a particular type of small business has on the rights of others isn’t visible to you. Not all small businesses are alike. Some harm the public.
>> Again, you shift from threatening the Mac’s Smoke Shop business to something that you admitted yourself is not going to keep people from buying these products. Not good reasoning.
The state may make acquisition and consumption of something more difficult without -banning- it. I have no problem with the state making consumption of tobacco/nicotine products less convenient, without outright banning them. In fact, I think the state should do a lot more of it.
>> Want to keep teens from buying these products, then disallow teens from buying them.
Or, make it less convenient, but, not too inconvenient. We don’t want them to avail themselves of organized crime channels, which also has a huge impact.
>> No need to destroy a thriving and long-term business in Palo Alto. It is legislative, political and economic overreach.
I don’t care if a small business has existed for a year or a century if what it is selling is deleterious to the public. There are small businesses I hope will succeed, and others that I hope will fail. Just because it is a small business doesn’t mean it is sacred.
>> Want to shut down all liquor stores as well?
A throwaway straw man, but, since you brought it up, alcoholic beverages are much trickier than tobacco. A low level of alcohol consumption is a wash, with reduced risk of cardiovascular disease, and increased risk of cancer. “Alcohol Use Disorder”, on the other hand, reduces life expectancy by even more years than smoking, in many ways, not to mention the risk to others (MADD etc.).
In contrast, smoking (and vaping) have -zero- upside (statistically). Not tricky at all.
I feel you have to realize that teens are able to buy these products even though it is illegal. There have been quite a number of instances where teens were able to buy the e-cigarettes. The challenge is, and always seems to be, the adults who buy illegal products for teens and kids. It also is a lack of checking ids from teens when they go to any smoke shop.
This is absurd. The hysteria around legal forms of smoking tasting like something or being delivered electronically is just that, hysteria. As a comparison, do we make the demands of other unhealthy activities involving our bodies?
To a large extent, no.
We allow foods and drinks (including alcohols) to be flavored and sweetened and jam-pack them with unhealthy ingredients, but supermarkets and liquor stores get free rein to sell these items. But specific to vape devices, what is the true danger? Is it addiction, long-term health compromises, second-hand damages? How about the immediate danger: unregulated, black-market vapes that we know do short-term harm to people?
The local government fails here on both sides. Not only do they decrease individual freedoms in terms of the products we can purchase close to our homes, but they increase the risks and danger to our communities, by forcing customers into less-regulated markets with higher amounts of dangerous products.
This is not to say that we should be looking the other way while our kids get Puff Bars from Mac’s, but it is to say that maybe the right step forward is to take responsibility for the actions and choices of our kids on a family and community level, not a governmental one. We need to be comfortable looking our kids in the eyes and teaching them about healthy choices and friend groups, not banning products from our town because we’re scared of what our kids might do.
If Mac’s and Raw Smoke Shop had been more conscientious about refusing to sell vapes and flavored nicotine cartridges to teens with obviously fake IDs, I would agree that the ban was unjustified. However, IMO they prioritized sales over youth health, and that needed to stop.
“Or, make it less convenient, but, not too inconvenient. We don’t want them to avail themselves of organized crime channels, which also has a huge impact.”
Driving to Los Altos or any other nearby town equates to “organized crime channels” ???!!! Really? Alert the media. Call the FBI. Set up roadblocks at the PA borders.
What does any of this nanny-gate hysteria have to do with selling flavored pipe tobacco to grandpa?? Educate YOUR kids.
Paternalism over parenting. Great job guys!
Posted by Online Name, a resident of Embarcadero Oaks/Leland
>> Driving to Los Altos or any other nearby town equates to “organized crime channels” ???!!! Really? Alert the media. Call the FBI. Set up roadblocks at the PA borders.
I have no idea what you are trying to say. What I was trying to say is that -banning- the sale of something, or, making it ridiculously inconvenient (drive to another state, say), drives some people to utilize organized crime channels to acquire something. I’m not in favor of -banning- things for that reason. Organized crime is really, really bad. But, driving to Los Altos, OTOH, is not -that- inconvenient.
>> What does any of this nanny-gate hysteria have to do with selling flavored pipe tobacco to grandpa?? Educate YOUR kids.
Honestly, I really don’t care that much either way. But, I do care that people will rationalize anything on the basis of, “It is a small business!” So what!? It is likely that your grandpa’s tobacco use took a decade off his life. The small business should be selling printer paper and toner cartridges instead. Just because it is a small business doesn’t make the tobacco shop sacred.
@Anon, you said, “Or, make it less convenient, but, not too inconvenient. We don’t want them to avail themselves of organized crime channels, which also has a huge impact.”
By making it less convenient to get something in PA that can be easily obtained in nearby communities, you seem to be jumping the gun to “organized crime channels” so I was just pushing your statement to its logical conclusion.
Apologies if I misinterpreted but in this climate of hysteria over pipe tobacco, one never knows.
I have liver in Palo Alto since 1965. When I was first here Macs was the only place in PA that had the New York Times on Sunday. That is a legacy that should be honored. Selling tobacco products is not necessarily a problem; it is shops that sell to minors. I have not noticed a problem with this at Macs.
Macs is also one of the few places even now where you can find a good selection of magazines. For example, today I was able to buy Scientific American there.
Macs should stay. Young people who want to smoke will find a way whether you close all the good places in PA or not. I fail to see how selling cannacis products is better than selling tobacco. Believe me, young people who want to smoke tobacco will find a way whether or not you close places like Macs. I’ve been there.
Please find a way to keep Macs open. We need independent stores. PA should not be allowed to go the way of only chain stores.
In the middle of a pandemic, City Council puts another long time historically significant store out of business. Seriously? This Nanny Council has nothing better to do?
Don’t get me wrong. I abhor vaping and what it’s doing to our kids. It’s Big Tobacco 2.0 and EVIL. But anyone who lobbied for or voted for this ban that affects Mac’s is either ignorant or lacks intelligence or both. Anyone who knows anything about vaping, and truly knows what teens do (I have teens), knows that teens buy their vaping supplies online! Clearly the City Council does not know anything about teens and vaping. Because this ban will do NOTHING to stop teen vaping. And adults who shop at Mac’s are just that — adults who have a legal right to make their own decisions.
I think we should flip things and survey the personal behaviors of our City Council to see what they are doing that might be deemed unhealthy that needs to be banned (Too many coffees? Carbs? Sugar? High cholesterol diet? Too much red meat? Are they exercising? Low or high carbon footprint? Are they following strict Shelter-in-Place rules? Masks at all times out of their homes? Not seeing anyone outside their households? etc). I would really love to know. I think I’ll pop in Mac’s and start buying something there, even if it’s unhealthy, until the Nanny Council bans whatever that is next.
The store needs to start selling product which doesn’t kill people.
This generation of young people are MUCH smarter for choosing to vape flavored liquids with nicotine in it than any of the previous generations that smoked cigarettes. They are LUCKY that vape juice exists….or else they would be smoking cigarettes just like past generations have.
When I was a teen, over 40 years ago, almost everyone smoked cigarettes. It was cool. Over the past decade, a large number of my friends have died of cancer, heart disease, and other conditions directly related to their smoking.
Today’s young people will NOT die from these ilnesses as a result of vaping because neither nicotine nor vape juice contain any known carcinogens. Per the American Cancer Society, every cigarette contains 40 to 60 known cancer causing ingredients. US manufactured vape juice contains NONE.
So why is the media, politicians, City Council, state and federal legislators, and so many others determined to ban vaping eliquid? It is ALL about MONEY!
Do the research. READ! The true facts are there if you take the time to find the truth.
I think this a good public health policy.
I wonder what my long deceased parents would say about this world of their three teenage age grandsons. My parents’ formative years were the roaring 1920’s with great emphasis on social mores to encourage young women and men to smoke. Advertising was downright deceptive.
Then came WWII, more ads, cool movies and free tobacco for soldiers. As a young adult I remember all the debate to merely put warning labels on tobacco packaging.
We citizens elect leaders to make difficult decisions and this was a good decision in the continuum of good public health.
I’m a native Palo Altan from the olden days and can attest there’s nothing sacred about Mac’s. The fact that their business model involves selling smoking/vaping products shows the problem. Change the business model to something viable and unharmful or move on. I can make a long list of “sentimental/sacred” businesses that are gone. Leave the signage if you want but sell something else. Next!
Agreed no vaping products. What I do not understand is why MACs is not permitted to sell traditional pipe tobacco and cigars to ADULTS. The stats prove that an occasional cigar or pipe does not harm the user and is nonaddicting. Cigarettes are another matter entirely. Yes flavored tobacco products that are geared toward youth should be BANNED. So think of Maigret and Sherlock Holmes and let people buy their traditional pipe tobacco and cigars. The council was correct in banning the fruity-flavored tobacco and vaping products but FLAT WRONG and misguided in voting to prohibit the sale of cigars and traditional pipe tobacco for ADULTS.
First off, I hate cigarette smoke. I probably hate marijuana smoke even more. Secondhand smoke from both trigger headaches for me.
That said: I think that the City is treading on some thin ice with this measure. In fact, they are effectively punishing an existing business based upon their latest legislative whims.
There is a potential legal precedent for Mac’s Smoke Shop to sue in order to stop this ruling. In Church of Lukumi Babalu Aye, Inc. v. City of Hialeah (1992), a “Santeria” church sued to stop the City of Hialeah, Florida from enacting broad ordinances that effectively targeted their church and its practices (such as ritualistic animal sacrifices).
The case eventually made its way to the U.S. Supreme Court. The Court reached a unanimous 9-0 decision against the city of Hialeah. While this case dealt with the First Amendment’s “free exercise” clause, the justices arrived to their decision on the basis that the city had passed a general ordinances that retroactively restricted a religious organization that had already existed in the city.
In other words, the Court ruled that the ordinances were broad yet specifically punished the Church of Lukumi Babalu Aye. This was a big deal when it came to the rules of general applicability. However, the justices recognized that the law was overbroad and specifically targeted a single organization.
https://www.oyez.org/cases/1992/91-948
While I hate cigarettes and secondhand smoke, I think that the City of Palo Alto is exceeding its authority through this. Where would it end? Can the city decide to effectively ban the sale of ice cream because of childhood obesity? Can it ban the sale of automobiles because of climate change? Can it pass an ordinance that retroactively bans food delivery for pizzas that are larger than eight inches in diameter?
At what point do local elected officials turn into our duly elected nannies?
We need to do everything to support business not shut them down at times like this. Shame on city council. They don’t like brown owned business.
Sajid –
Color has nothing to do with it!
pearl
I think if states and the government are going to make these rules they need to not be hypocrites and ban 100% of everything you can inhale. If it’s about health they need to make tobacco illegal and make it as controlled as Cocaine. Same with vaping stuff. I think it’s foolish and there shouldn’t be any bans and it’s government overreach, but to say you can have this and not that defeats their whole argument. Kids are not buying vanilla flavored loose tobacco for pipes. Sorry, but that’s b.s. That’s not happening. I’m 47 and have never seen a kid anywhere smoking a pipe. Ever. The only time they buy cigars is for weed. They usually buy things like White Owls. So if you’re selling higher-end cigars, the kids aren’t buying those, either.
But here’s an idea: maybe this shop can add coffee, and become a coffee shop that sells some tobacco products. I live in CT, but if I lived out there I’d go get my coffee from them every day just to support them.
Hello,
Regus has had tenants using the office space at 228 Hamilton Ave, 3rd Fl, Palo Alto, CA throughout the shelter-in-place, when other businesses can’t open. Why?
Ban all flavored alcohol then too. Oh wait, the council members all use the drug of alcohol so I guess it gets a pass.
Posted by Patrick, a resident of Downtown North
>> Ban all flavored alcohol then too. Oh wait, the council members all use the drug of alcohol so I guess it gets a pass.
A variation of the “Tu Quoque Defence” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tu_quoque
The answer is that this isn’t about alcoholic beverages.
But, I will add that, statistically, light drinking has no significant effect on overall health/longevity. The increase in cancer risk and the decrease in cardiovascular risk cancel out statistically. In contrast, there is zero upside to smoking, and, statistically, it reduces the expected life expectancy of a lifetime smoker by something “on the order of” a decade (!) Depending on the details, you are looking at:
“Life expectancy for smokers is at least 10 years shorter than for nonsmokers.” https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4640109/
It is a large number. Maybe not as large as being a Heroin addict:
“On average, addicts in this cohort lost 18.3 years (SD = 10.7) of potential life before age 65” https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2039886/?tool=pmcentrez but still, a large number.
Looking at population impact, in a 2012 detailed study, tobacco use was the #1 cause of preventable deaths, with overweight+diet+inactivity #2, and alcohol abuse was a distant third. https://www.chcact.org/resource-files/Mokdad_et_al.pdf I am NOT saying that alcohol abuse is not significant, just that tobacco and overweight+diet+inactivity were both far larger.
^ I agree, next new Palo Alto ordinance should target “overweight+diet+inactivity”.
Posted by musical, a resident of Palo Verde
>> I agree, next new Palo Alto ordinance should target “overweight+diet+inactivity”.
Close Mac’s and encourage smokers to walk to Menlo Park.
Isn’t there already an age limit? This is another sad example of the government dictating what adults can and can’t put in their bodies then.
Posted by Bee, a resident of College Terrace
>> Isn’t there already an age limit? This is another sad example of the government dictating what adults can and can’t put in their bodies then.
The government isn’t trying to stop you from eating flavored tobacco if that is what you want to do. Just make you ride your bike a little further to get it.
But, the real point, which I’m sure you know as well as I do, is that not all “small businesses” are alike, and, small businesses that are selling products which do more to damage the health of more people (measured in years of life lost) than any other product, just don’t deserve the same level of support or consideration than the average small business.
I don’t like cigarettes because we injure our lungs. I recently read a review http://cbdcraftmasters.com/ of the use of marijuana oil. This is a new opportunity to save people who suffer from phantom pain. Smoking blends can have similar effects, but I do not support smoking marijuana for pleasure.
Someone please correct me if I am wrong or update me, but I am laboring under the impression that the vaping problem of months back was due to chemicals added to the liquid … and it was in cannabis cartridges … or whatever they are called.
I believe that as scientific research goes, vaping is a less toxic way to smoke.
I used to smoke, not much, and think it was cool in high school. Eventually I realized this is a problem in my life and quit, and I urge others not to smoke or quit if they do now – BUT, have we not decided this is up to the fully autonomous adult citizen to decide for themselves?
I see there are lots of old men who seem to love to smoke a pipe with flavored tobacco, usually cherry. The smell doesn’t bother me if it is 20 feet or so away and very diffused, but it is not something I want, but I don’t see why this store should be targeted for over-regulation.
What are they doing wrong, and as Anon above claimed …
>> Not all small businesses are alike. Some harm the public.
How are they harming the public? Those in the public who want these products are not being dragged in and forced to buy them. It is wrong to say this store is harming the public. If one thinks it is harming the public, how does that harm measure up to all the different stores that sell alcohol?
I am usually on the other side of these regulation issues because I think our capitalist so-called free-market system needs regulation to protect people, but we should be very careful about deciding protect people from themselves. This is a far more complex issue than picking out a store some might have negative feelings about. In a country that is a major contributor to pollution and greenhouse gases when it comes to regulation we should aim at the big problems. Is driving Mac’s out of business something that deserves our local city government’s bandwidth?
At least for this year Covid-19 is a much bigger problem than vaping, and we cannot even regulate the use of face masks and shields. This is government not working.
Why isn’t leaving Mac’s owners or managers to sell their products and decide the future product makeup of their store and whether their customers will support them the best policy here.
>> “Life expectancy for smokers is at least 10 years shorter than for nonsmokers.” Web Link
As far as I know there is no data as to how vaping affects life expectancy. A lot of the comments here just leap from cherry-picked fact to cherry-picked fact without balancing the full context and factors of this issue. That really bugs me when I see it happen – because a town square forum that doesn’t work is a symptom of a democracy that doesn’t work.
We used to have a way and a model of how to debate in this country. Our journalists and media were not so bad at explaining the issues. Today it is more like a smash the other side over the head with the most emotional propaganda you can muster, and find a crowd to come in and make it seem like everyone supports your view, while also trying to make it cool on social media. Yuck – something is really wrong here.
I think Mac’s is an asset to the community and even though the political correctness police are right every once in a while, they are not always right and this is a case where they are wrong. Enforce the laws as they are and then if there is a problem define that problem as clearly and objectively as possible.
Posted by CrescentParkAnon., a resident of Crescent Park
>> >> “Life expectancy for smokers is at least 10 years shorter than for nonsmokers.” Web Link
>> As far as I know there is no data as to how vaping affects life expectancy.
The context got lost. The context was, “Isn’t this a wonderful old institution/small business that sells magazines and pipe tobacco to old men?” My answer was and is, just because it is an institution and/or small business, doesn’t make it “sacred”. Smoking has been the number #1 public health problem for the last 100 years, directly causing more “years of life lost” than anything else.
IOW, it may be a small business, but, is it a *good* or a *bad* small business?
>> A lot of the comments here just leap from cherry-picked fact to cherry-picked fact without balancing the full context and factors of this issue.
I posted a tiny selection of statistics, but, in all honesty, you can *literally* fill a library with all the health impacts of smoking, and the anti-social irresponsible behavior of the tobacco-addiction industry over the last 100 years. The 20th Century was described, in that context, as “The Tobacco Century.” Don’t get me started, please!
>> Yuck – something is really wrong here.
This is just a community-oriented BB. One of many forums. I like to participate, but, I wouldn’t over-exaggerate the impact of one post.
>> I think Mac’s is an asset to the community
I disagree. Not because Mac’s sells flavored pipe tobacco to old men, though. They are, literally, a dying breed. The problem is right there in the comments from the proprietors. That isn’t profitable. The profits come from the new products specifically targeted towards young people. *That* is the problem and that is why Mac’s is NOT an asset to the community. Not all small businesses are *good* small businesses. If they wanted to suggest to me their social consciences, they could start by only selling nicotine-containing products to people over the age of 30– the opposite of the average “vape” shop.
>> >> “Life expectancy for smokers is at least 10 years shorter than for nonsmokers.” Web Link
So you want to talk life expectancy … big issue … lots of contexts … Mac’s Smoke Shop is nanoscopic, and completely not one of them.
In a related topic I’ve always thought that during city Council election campaigns in Palo Alto, of which I have participated three times, in addition to the panel discussions or debates the candidate should get On top of the tables and dance; you can tell a lot about someone by how they move.