Tekel merchants plan to stop selling cigarettes

The Turkish Tekel Distributors Platform (TTBP) announced that monopolistic distributors throughout Turkey will stop selling cigarettes.

The platform’s statement states that cigarette groups that have not yet passed the price increase after the latest cigarette increases did not supply cigarettes to the monopolies and therefore cigarette sales were restricted.

The statement also claims that as banks’ POS rates rose above 3 percent, profit margins went entirely into the banks’ coffers. The statement, which stated that the profit margin on cigarettes was 4.5, added that monopolies were exposed to unfair competition.

The statement, which claimed that excessive price increases were pushing consumers to smuggle products, both cigarettes and alcohol, stated that “the profit margin on cigarettes is very low and we, as monopolistic traders, are considering taking the decision not to sell any tobacco products with low profit margins throughout Turkey.

CIGARETTES ARE INCREASED BY 5 TL

Following the increase of 5 TL for all cigarette groups at the beginning of September, one cigarette group decided to increase the price again.

All products in the cigarette group, which started selling yesterday with a price increase, have increased by 5 TL.

With the latest price increase, the cheapest cigarette rose to 50 lira.