What standardised packaging means
Standardised packaging is also called plain packaging. It is a set of legal rules that limits how tobacco products and their packs may look, so that features used for promotion are removed. In Great Britain the rules are set out in the Standardised Packaging of Tobacco Products Regulations 2015, which official guidance abbreviates as SPOT.
The UK regulations were made on 19 March 2015 and came into force on 20 May 2016. They sit alongside other labelling rules, such as the minimum sized health warnings, that apply to tobacco packs.
Why the rules exist
UK government guidance says packaging rules are meant to reduce the appeal of tobacco products, particularly to children and young people. They also aim to stop misleading statements about the benefits of tobacco products and to make required health warnings more noticeable.
Other countries have their own laws. Australia's Tobacco Plain Packaging Act lists its objects as improving public health, including by discouraging people from taking up smoking or using tobacco products. It also states that the Act gives effect to certain obligations under the Convention on Tobacco Control.
Shape, colour and text on a cigarette pack
The UK regulations say a unit pack of cigarettes must be cuboid in shape. A unit pack is the smallest individual packaging in which a product is, or is intended to be, presented for retail sale. A transparent wrapper does not count as a unit pack.
The regulations also control the cigarettes themselves. The only colour or shade permitted on the paper, casing, filter or other material forming part of a cigarette, apart from the tobacco, is plain white with a matt finish. That rule is subject to other provisions in the regulations.
Text is allowed only within set conditions. The regulations allow the external packaging of a cigarette pack to carry the brand name and variant name, but only if each listed condition is met. A pack may also state the number of cigarettes, optionally followed by the word Cigarettes, again subject to conditions.
Health warnings
Standardised packs still carry health information. Under separate UK regulations, a unit pack and any container pack of a tobacco product for smoking must carry a combined health warning. For a unit pack of cigarettes, the warning must be at least 44mm high and 52mm wide.
Producers must also rotate the photographs used. Each of the 14 photographs in a specified set must appear on between 1/24 and 1/12 of the total packs under each brand name produced in a production year. Guidance adds a rule for larger surfaces, where the warning must cover a minimum area of that surface.
Noise, smell and changing packs
The regulations restrict sensory and interactive features. No person may produce or supply cigarettes or hand rolling tobacco if the retail packaging makes a noise, or contains or produces a smell not normally associated with such packaging. A smell resulting from a manufacturing process designed to give a flavour that is not prohibited is excepted.
Packaging also may not include features designed to change it after retail sale. Together with the rules on shape, colour, text and warnings, this is what standardised packaging requires of a cigarette pack. This article is AI-assisted and summarises only the sources listed; the full legislation and current guidance should be consulted for exact requirements.
Sources
- legislation.gov.uk (legislation.gov.uk)
- legislation.gov.uk (legislation.gov.uk)
- Tobacco packaging guidance: Great Britain (April 2021) (GOV.UK)
- Tobacco Plain Packaging Act 2011 (legislation.gov.au)