E-Cigarette Sting Operation Prompts Warnings to Retailers
- 7-Eleven among 40 recipients of letters on Juul sales to kids
- Gottlieb says the action should serve as notice to others
A JUUL vape at a store in Portland, Maine.
Photographer: Brianna Soukup/Portland Press Herald via Getty Images
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A U.S. government-led sting operation of retailers including 7-Eleven Inc. stores and Royal Dutch Shell Plc gas stations led to 40 warnings for selling Juul e-cigarettes to kids.
The Food and Drug Administration letters are part of an undercover operation the agency has been conducting this month to stop retailers from selling the newest craze in underage tobacco use. Juul e-cigarettes, made by San Francisco-based Juul Labs Inc., resemble a USB thumb drive and have worried regulators and parents because they aren’t easily identified as a tobacco product.