u/prillacom

After reviewing the H1 2026 numbers, it seems the gap between brands is a lot wider than expected.

BAT: VELO revenue is up 220%, and volume is up 188% YoY. With VELO Max coming later this year, it's looking good for BAT.

PMI: record quarter on paper, net revenues up 10.4% and past $11B for the first time. ZYN shipments grew by 1.8%, and ZYN Ultra launched this summer and was noted as the first phase of their portfolio expansion - so can we expect more to come?.

Altria: the weak one? Q2 on! shipments down 4.2% YoY, and they missed profit estimates. They're responding with more on! Plus flavors, strengths up to 12mg, and wider distribution. So we will see how that unfolds going into 2027.

Turning Point Brands (ALP, FRE): modern oral revenue up 149%, gross profit up 40.6%, and ALP is launching in the UK and EU. The stock price isn't reflecting the gross revenue though and is still down 20%+.

Read more about it on our blog: https://prilla.com/us/blog/nicotine-pouch-market-report

ZYN growing 1.8% while VELO flies is what stands out to me. Is ZYN hitting saturation, or are people actually preferring VELO Plus? And with VELO Max on the horizon, will this make things worse for ZYN and its new Ultra line? It'll be interesting to see where things end up this time next year!

There are many opinions on which ZYN flavor is the best and that’s without the new Ultra line and the recent additions to the original line. So I thought a poll would be a good way to see if there’s a clear favorite.

There are only six options in the poll, so apologies for not being able to included them all. If your top pick isn’t there or you voted for ZYN Ultra then put the flavor in the comments.

The new ZYN Peach and Ultra Citrus Zest are pretty good but there’s always room for Wintergreen in the rotation in my opinion.

View Poll

Two pouches with the same mg on the can can hit completely differently, and the biggest reason usually isn't moisture or freshness. It's pH.

The basic mechanism

Nicotine is a weak base, and it exists in two forms in any product: a protonated ("bound") form and a free-base form, and it's the free-base form that crosses your gum more efficiently. The pH of the pouch decides the split between the two because the pKa of nicotine is 8.01, so at pH 8.01 it's an even 50/50. Push the pH up and more of it becomes free base. Push it down and more stays bound.

Which is a big part of why higher pH pouches tend to feel stronger.

A randomised trial looked into this

It took 40 moist snuff users and gave them the same product, chemically adjusted to four pH levels: 5.0, 7.7, 8.2 and 8.6. Same nicotine content in every single one.

Going from pH 5.0 to 8.6 produced more than a four-fold increase in both peak plasma nicotine and total exposure over four hours. The mean peak went from about 3.9 to 16.7 ng/mL. That's four times the nicotine actually reaching the bloodstream. (PMID: 34826137)

I know that trial used moist snuff rather than pouches. But the chemistry is the same.

What does that mean for pouches?

There's a study that characterised 37 pouch products and found pH ranging from 6.86 to 10.1, which works out to anywhere from 7.7% to 99.2% of the nicotine being in the free form. The total nicotine ran from 1.29 to 6.11 mg per pouch, but free nicotine ran from 0.166 to 6.07 mg per pouch. (PMID: 34233354)

A spread that wide isn't accidental, so manufacturers are clearly tweaking this on purpose. It's a formulation decision, same as flavor or moisture.

And before anyone asks: no, I don't think drinking something alkaline beforehand is a hack. Saliva is heavily buffered, so I'm not sure it would work very well.

Which leaves the question of whether pH should appear on the can design or at least be listed?

And separately, which pouches feel way above or below their number for you?

Now that ZYN Ultra has been out for a few weeks, I'm curious what everyone actually thinks of it, as I've seen mixed reviews. There was a lot of buzz around the launch, and I'm not sure whether it has delivered.

The obvious question to ask is whether it is better than the original ZYN. Has it replaced it, or is everyone going back to the regular, as I know the flavors have been a sticking point?

And I suppose the other question is whether it genuinely competes with VELO Plus and other moist pouch brands?

Interested to hear from people who've tried both. Which one's staying in your rotation?

So two things degrade in a pouch over time: moisture and nicotine. Cold should slow both down, so in theory, the fridge makes sense.

I also wonder how much of the fridge/freezer habit got passed down from snus users, where it makes a lot more sense, as snus actually contains tobacco. A lot of pouch advice seems to have been inherited straight from snus culture, and I'm not sure it all translates to a tobacco-free product.

I've never properly compared the two, but I keep my mint ones in the fridge because the cold makes them feel noticeably "cooler" when I use them.

I'm interested to hear everyone's thoughts on this and what they do. Fridge or no fridge?