Social Media Is the Main Way Pouch Users Discover Brands, UK Retailer Finds

More than two in three nicotine pouch users say they first found out about a pouch brand or product through social media, according to a survey carried out by Haypp, a United Kingdom retailer of the category, and the figure puts social platforms at the center of how new consumers enter the market.

In the study, 66 percent of pouch consumers pointed to social media as the channel where they first came across a pouch product. The next two routes were closer behind, with search engines and recommendation by people the consumer already knew, and the gap between social media and the rest is wide enough to make it the clear first touchpoint.

The timing of the result is notable because it lands against a change in the rules that is coming. The UK's Tobacco and Vapes Act, which will take effect in June 2027, will restrict the advertising of nicotine products, and the survey underlines how much of the current consumer funnel still runs through the social channels that the ban is aimed at. It gives a before-and-after baseline to measure against once the restriction takes hold.

For the trade, the finding reframes where marketing effort is working today. A platform that is doing the discovery for two in three new users is not a peripheral channel, and it is the channel that a June 2027 ban will close or narrow, which is why the number is being cited as one of the reasons the ban is contested.

The result does not measure how many pouch users the social channel has reached overall, and it is a snapshot of one market at one time. It does show, though, that the way new consumers get their first taste of the category is already concentrated in social media, and that concentration is what the coming rules are set to change.