Where'd all the Snus Go?

A few years ago Swedish snus was everywhere. Back in 2010, CSP announced “Swedish Match Launches General Snus Campaign,” saying that a “promotional army” would be spreading snus across the United States. So what happened? I guess nobody here liked it, at least not enough to support broad distribution. The Swedes have had their Waterloo, or in this case, Appomattox as they seem to have left traditional American dippers totally unimpressed.
Rummaging through the trade papers, I see that 2018 sales for smokeless tobacco in the U.S. was $6.8 billion, with snus getting about 5.5% of the loot, call it $374 million. They didn’t differentiate between brands except to say that Camel Snus brought in $229 million of that number, leaving Skoal, General, and the such to divide the leftovers, and I’m guessing that Skoal Snus ran a strong second place. Not great numbers for a line of products launched with such fanfare, almost a decade ago. I imagine that Swedish snus, in America, will turn into one of those niche products like Semois or Oliver Twist, loved by thousands, but not millions.
These days, Swedish Match seems to be placing all its chips on a new product. ZYN is a “nicotine pouch,” consisting of nicotine salts, flavoring, and some filler. No tobacco. Swedish Match is so confident in their product that they built a brand new factory, here in the U.S., to make it in.
Nobody knows if the nicotine pouch business will make it in the long run, but if it does, Swedish Match seems in a much better position to capture the American market than they were with Snus, simply because ZYN seems geared to American tastes. Time will tell, though I don’t expect “Skoal ring” to change to “ZYN ring” anytime soon.