TPD stands for Tobacco Products Directive (Tobacco Products Directive 2014/14/EU (TPD)), an initiative created by the EU to regulate tobacco products, how they’re advertised and how they can be sold to consumers. The principle behind it is to increase the health protection and awareness surrounding tobacco products. TPD covers every aspect of tobacco production and retail from their manufacture, where they can be sold, how they can be displayed, what their packaging looks like and how they’re sold.

It applies to all tobacco products including rolling tobacco, cigarettes, cigars as well as vaping tech and e-liquids. The regulations ensure ingredients are tested before they’re sold to consumers and must be displayed on the packaging. TPD also applies to where people can use tobacco products and regulate how they’re taxed.

Vaping products are still classified as tobacco products, even though they don’t contain tobacco leaf itself. The reason for this is that much of the nicotine that’s used in e-liquid is distilled from the tobacco plant as it contains the highest concentration in any plant. There are now synthetic forms of nicotine as well but any product containing nicotine still falls under TPD regulations.

The TPD was established in May 2014 and became law on the 20th of May 2016. What this meant for vaping retailers was that any remaining non-compliant stock had to be sold before this date. As a result, some brands that were previously available may no longer be on shelves and the way in which e-liquid is sold has changed.

There are a number of regulations, most of which affect the size of e-cigarettes capacity and how e-liquid is sold. By and large, though, much of it from a consumers point of view remains the same. The main change was the way in which e-cigarette products had to be labelled.