History
The NicoBloc story begins during the Vietnam War when American soldiers searched for something to improve the taste of their free issue cigarettes. They would add a drop of glycerine to the filter to take away the bitterness.
This habit was remembered after the war, and the technique was adapted and experimented with as a way of blocking nicotine and tar in cigarette filters. Following field research and laboratory testing, NicoBloc was developed as an aid to stopping smoking.
Two US based scientific studies have indicated the potential of NicoBloc's tar and nicotine reduction capabilities (Stillwell & Gladding 1993 and more recently the Baltimore Addiction Research Centre, 1998 - published in "Pharmacology Biochemistry and Behaviour", 1998).
The Baltimore report demonstrated that smokers do not change their smoking habits when using NicoBloc in order to compensate for the reduced levels of nicotine and a separate report by the University of Pennsylvania (1997) showed that the smokers' enjoyment of their cigarettes was not diminished.
With the assistance of over 130 major employers in Ireland and the UK during the 1990's, NicoBloc was tested on over 2000 smoking employees as part of a corporate stop smoking initiative known as the "Rosen Stop Smoking Programme".
Organisations covering every type of industrial and business sector, with employees ranging from shop floor staff to boardroom executives, took part in the programme. The organisations included many well-known names such as The Royal College of Surgeons, Yorkshire Water, Fortnum & Mason, Dixons, Mothercare, Guinness, Conservative Party Headquarters, Industrial Society, BUPA, Apple Computers, Royal Opera House, to name but a few.
The trial demonstrated that when NicoBloc was used as an aid to stop smoking very significant results were achieved with an average cessation rate of 42%. It was also observed that many of those that didn't stop smoking altogether were able to maintain lower consumption levels.
The programme gained widespread press coverage and was described by Vogue Magazine as "an innovative new programme that takes you there in stages, gradually and painlessly".
The promising results of the trial confirmed that NicoBloc should be made available to a much wider audience and in 2001 a new company was formed to develop NicoBloc into a retail concept. For example where the corporate trials used training videos, the retail pack contains an informative DVD, backed up by a web site that provides interactive cessation assistance, answers to frequently asked questions and an opportunity for consumer feedback.