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Single Cigarette Sales: Hot New Growth Industry?
By
Garth Johnston
Published Apr 5, 2011
Modified Apr 5, 2011
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By
Garth Johnston
Published Apr 5, 2011
Modified Apr 5, 2011
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Cigarettes weren't always sold in packs of twenty. Besides rolling your own, it used to be you could walk into almost any deli across town and buy a single smoke or two ("loosies" if you will). Over the years, thanks in no small part to pressure from cops, the sale of loosies in delis has decreased dramatically. Though we still see them around in certain neighborhoods, they're few and far between. But with packs at $12 or more in New York, is it any surprise that the loosie street trade is booming? To the point that the Times was able to find one loosie vender, Lonnie "Loosie" Warner, who is selling 2,000 smokes a day, mostly two at a time.
Not that there aren't occupational hazards. Apparently the police refer to Lonnie Loosie as "fish," because he is so easy to catch. In four years of selling cigarettes Warner has been arrested nearly 15 times. “When they need a body to arrest, they come pick me up.”
Luckily people seem to like him. "He’s like the goodwill ambassador of Eighth Avenue. And when he comes into court, he says hello to everybody,” one Legal Aide lawyer reported.
Still, to keep those arrests down, Warner (who previously spent 13 years in jail) and his partners have turned their trade into a tobacco version of the classic drug deal, down to having "six eyes on this block.” One upside to their business? No drugs. “We don’t allow people to sell drugs on this block,” he told the paper of record. “We just don’t allow it.”
And who is buying enough smokes at one for $.75 and two for $1 on the street that Warner will soon be able to buy himself health insurance? A little bit of everyone from people looking to save a penny to people who swear they are quitting (we guess they missed their chance at free patches?). As smoking becomes more and more regulated (and more and more expensive), the appeal of loosies only seems to grow.
Maybe street hustlers will start selling organic homegrown tobacco like Audrey Silk smokes. Meanwhile, we just want to point out that in this New York Times story the photograph of Lonnie Warner doing his thing features him in a Daily News sandwichboard.
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