Vaping, the use of non cigarette nicotine devices, has become a crisis among the youth and a growing challenge for users of all ages. While government efforts have been focused on preventing the sale of these addictive products, a new company is working to help those already hooked quit.
Jones is an anti-vaping network which combines Nicotine replacement therapy, behavioral support, and a judgment-free "quitters" community to help those looking to quit or reduce their vaping. Founded by Santa Monica natives, Hilary Dubin and Caroline Vasquez Huber, this initiative aims to destigmatize quitting, and expand access to the resources available to cease the habit.
Founders and friends, Dubin and Vasquez Huber attribute their close relationship and success to their upbringing in Santa Monica including their first meeting on the Blue Lightning AYSO soccer team.
"Santa Monica High School was really an amazing breeding ground for hustlers. I can say that there was a lot of ingenuity that came out of that place. Going to high school there and really the collaborations that Hillary and I had in school in sports and extracurricular activities more broadly, really did play a role and kind of our lifelong desire at this point to start something we really believe in together," said Huber.
No one understands the addiction of vaping better than Dubin and Huber, who each struggled with the habit until they quit over a year ago.
"For a couple of years … it was every day, a big part of my day. And I decided I wanted to quit maybe like halfway through that and really, really struggled to quit," said Dubin.
While both have different experiences of how they began, they each eventually fell victim to the addictive habit
"Because it was marketed as something that was much safer than smoking it felt like kind of an okay indulgence … I assumed that quitting would be really straightforward, but it wasn’t," said Huber.
Going ‘cold turkey’ became a repetitive cycle of stopping and returning to the vape. Feeling lost, they both thought that resources for quitting vaping were relatively slim, until Huber’s mother, a doctor, recommended nicotine replacement therapy (NRT).
"Taking NRT was the first thing that sort of gave me some freedom to make it through a day without vaping … I personally was very much still quitting when we came up with the idea for Jones," said Dubin.
Typically in the form of lozenges, NRT works by releasing a small amount of nicotine into the body to reduce the withdrawal symptoms of quitting nicotine. It has been studied since the 60s, and while it is currently only FDA approved for cigarette cessation, many doctors now recommend it for vaping as well.
"It sort of gives you the mental space to not focus on your cravings and to feel sort of normal while you’re quitting and while you’re trying to address some of your other habits," said Dubin.
Those "other habits," such as the behavioral and aesthetic aspects of vaping, were something that went completely unaddressed with NRT use alone.
"The purchasing of NRT was really shameful. I think there wasn’t a lot of awareness that NRT, there isn’t to this day, could be helpful for other nicotine withdrawal symptoms, for those who vape … It didn’t at all address the behavioral support side that’s necessary for quitting nicotine, nor did it address any of the aesthetic appeal that both smoking and vaping have," said Huber.
The creation of Jones was born directly out of their shared experience, aiming to put together the missing pieces of the quitting puzzle to ensure maximum efficacy through a comprehensive and user-friendly system. "It was sort of hand in hand with our quitting process. And it was going through that process that really inspired us to seek out something better. And when we realized that that didn’t exist, it inspired us to create it for ourselves," said Dubin.
Aside from the sleek packaged NRT, the duo utilizes behavioral and communal support through an app and text program, where users can connect with others using the Jones method, track their habits, and receive positive reinforcements when cravings get tough.
"The text program is more solo like sort of journaling where it’s like let’s focus on your habits and your triggers and what you can do in your environment and we send you daily encouragement each day, and the community of quitters comes in, in our app," said Dubin
Having the behavioral aspect was particularly important to Dubin, who studied cognitive science.
"Behavioral support actually has been shown to increase quit rates by 40% ... but we haven’t seen anyone really pairing the physical and the psychological elements together," said Dubin.
Regulators have long criticized vaping, especially among youth. In 2020, FDA regulators banned those teen-preferred flavors from reusable e-cigarettes like Juul and Vuse, which are now only sold in menthol and tobacco. But the flavor restriction didn’t apply to disposable products, and companies like Elf Bar and Esco Bar quickly stepped in to fill the gap.
The growing variety in flavors like gummy bear and watermelon has been almost entirely driven by cheap, disposable devices imported from China, which the FDA considers illegal. Those products now account for more than half of US vaping sales, according to government figures.
In the latest survey, about 56% of teens who vape said they used Elf Bar, trailed by Esco Bar and Vuse, which is a reusable e-cigarette made by RJ Reynolds. Juul, the brand widely blamed for sparking the recent spike in teen vaping, was the fourth most popular brand, used by 16% of teens.
The FDA tried to block imports of both Elf Bar and Esco Bar in May, but the products remain widely available. Elf Bar has thwarted customs officials by changing its brand name, among other steps designed to avoid detection
There has been some success in dropping vaping rates. In a survey, 10% of high school students said they had used electronic cigarettes in the previous month, down from 14% last year.
However, those efforts are largely focused on prevention, rather than helping existing addicts quit.
Jones launched on November 9 and can be found at quitwithjones.com. For those under 18, they highly recommend their app and texting program, but would encourage talking to your doctor before taking any NRT.
"I think the number one thing that matters to us is making sure that people understand that it’s really a judgment free journey. Because we’ve experienced this firsthand. We totally understand that quitting is not kind of like this miraculous thing that happens overnight," said Huber.
Antoinette Damico, Daily Press intern
