All language subtitles for American Greed s15e19 Follow the Juul Money

You're watching CNBC On Demand.

In this episode of American Greed, for
years an epidemic of teenage nicotine

addiction sweeps the country.

They think now the it thing for teens.
The FDA today calling it a dangerous

epidemic. Leaving thousands of kids now
fighting to get clean.

I'm 10 hours in.

It's hard.

And the culprit blamed for this ongoing
public health crisis?

An e -cigarette called Juul.

With nearly 75 % market share, e
-cigarette maker Juul has become enemy

one. It's not like millions of kids
using e -cigarettes generally.

Like, they're all using Juul.

Meet the minds behind the life -altering
invention.

James Monsies and Adam Bowen. Two
Silicon Valley entrepreneurs who grow

business faster than Facebook.

Hitting a value of $38 billion in just
four years by selling one of the most

addictive drugs on the legal market.

If you talk to some adults, they'll say,
it was easier for me to get off of

cocaine or heroin than to get off of my
cigarettes.

Bowen and Montes insist they are good
guys working to save the lives of

I think the real opportunity here is to
improve the lives of a billion people

worldwide.

But critics say they target kids and
create a new generation of addicts.

nothing but a marketer of a poison.

And while they are at it, they get
fabulously rich.

And as a result, they've made combined
billions of dollars. And it's just not

right.

It is a drive for profits that earns the
makers of Juul a place on American

greed. As we work to answer the
question, what matters more to Bowen and

Monsies? The mission for the money.

In 2018, a public health crisis is
racing through high schools across the

country.

And in North Carolina, the state's
attorney general, Josh Stein, hears

stories about children in his state who
are vaping.

They got addicted. Their grades
plummeted. They got kicked off sports

They had to switch schools. They had to
seek medical counseling or treatment for

their addiction.

He decides to investigate.

I came back to the office and I said to
my team, what is going on here?

We have to look into what's happening.

And that investigation, he says, leads
to a multi -billion dollar enterprise

that leaves families across the country
in crisis.

In 2005, in Silicon Valley, where dreams
to change the world come true, the

seeds of an ambitious plan to save the
lives of one billion people take hold.

It comes from two students at Stanford
University's product design program,

James Monses and Adam Bowen.

They are smart, creative, and have much
in common.

I ended up with a degree in physics and
a minor in studio art. I double majored

in physics and studio art.

And they also share two more interests
that will chart their futures.

One is a common goal to do good in the
world, and the other, an addiction to

cigarettes.

In a series of interviews with CNBC over
two years, they share their story.

Both of us were conflicted smokers. We
both exercise a lot, eat well, but still

smoking.

Still smoking, even though they know it
is the largest preventable cause of

death in the world.

According to the CDC, more than 400 ,000
people in the United States die from

smoking every year.

They realize that these burning sticks
hanging from their mouth are idiotic.

Lauren Etter is an investigative
journalist who writes a book about

Bowen. They started wondering, why
hasn't anybody innovated the cigarette?

Suddenly, in their deadly habit, Bowen
and Monsi see a phenomenal opportunity

do good, to create a product that
replaces cigarettes.

It's hard to imagine an area that can be
more powerful

to public health in particular than to
eliminate cigarettes from the face of

earth.

Powerful and potentially very lucrative.
And so there are two goals here.

So not only do they have their public
health mission, like this is a product

that can save lives, but wow, there are
one billion smokers in the world.

And if we can grab a tiny piece of that
market, we will be rich.

And in Silicon Valley, getting rich is
the name of the game.

And Bowen and Monsi's head out to search
for investors.

As we're trying to raise more money,
they're really leaning into their

because this is what gives a sheen of
morality to the company, essentially, by

telling investors, no, we're not a
tobacco company. We're taking on big

We're disrupting big tobacco.

The pitch works.

And with a handful of Silicon Valley
investors providing $500 ,000 in seed

money, They get to work on their
invention.

Right from the start, they operate on a
single principle.

It is the burning of the cigarette that
kills, not the nicotine.

If they can eliminate the combustion,
they believe they can eliminate the

danger. We thought, well, you know,
that's easy for us as product designers.

Of course, it turned out to be not so
easy. It took thousands of prototypes.

Finally, in 2010, they have a marketable
product.

A nicotine vaporizer that heats tobacco
rather than burns it. They call it

plume. When you inhale, you get this
vapor. But it's not smoke, it's just

So you get the nicotine, you get the
flavor, but you don't actually burn the

tobacco.

Marketing professional Kurt
Sonderregner, now the owner of his own

business, is hired to sell plume to vape
shops.

But it's a tough sell.

It did have a lot of pain points. To
start it, you had to push this little

button, and if your finger was in the
wrong spot, you could actually get a

little shock.

And there is also an even bigger
problem.

The big thing that it wasn't was
satisfying.

There was no added nicotine.

If you were a smoker, as I was at the
time, you could plume for an hour and

still want to go outside and have a
cigarette.

And so Bowen and Montes search for an
answer, pouring through tobacco industry

records available online, and they
discover a key to their success, a

making nicotine feel less harsh on the
throat.

They found that if you brought the pH
down to more neutral, even a little bit

acidic pH, the smoke went down way
easier.

People could inhale more of it.

More nicotine, that's the answer.

And now they can create their chemical
secret sauce, what will allow them to

deliver roughly three times as much
nicotine as used in e -cigarettes at the

time. It is, they argue, what smokers
need to reject cigarettes.

If an e -cigarette exists and is, in
anyone's eyes, inferior as an

experience to cigarettes, then
cigarettes remain king.

And it is that powerful punch of the
drug that will propel their device into

Silicon Valley's garden.

In Silicon Valley, you often hear about
how can you make a product that's

sticky? How can you make a product that
you can convince users to come back to

over and over again? But Adam and James
had created a product that was

inherently sticky.

Sticky because nicotine is so highly
addictive.

If you talk to some adults, they'll say,
it was easier for me to get off of

cocaine or heroin than to get off of my
cigarettes.

Now, Bowen and Montes face one last
step, designing the device.

We wanted this product to look
distinctly different from a cigarette

it's stigmatized and it's associated
with things that we want to move past as

people.

So they turn to Silicon Valley designers
and ask one question.

What would smoking in the future look
like?

And one of the individuals, he reaches
into his pocket and he happens to have a

flash drive in there, like a little
thumb drive. He pulls it out and says,

should look like this.

And there it is.

Bowen and Monty's revolutionary answer
to cigarettes.

A slim, rechargeable device that
delivers a powerful but smooth dose of

sweetened with tasty flavors.

One reviewer calls it the iPhone of e
-cigarettes.

Bowen and Monsies call it Juul. They are
convinced smokers will love it because

they do.

The moment that we had initial
prototypes, I never touched a cigarette

The more I use Juul, the less desirable
a cigarette really is.

At one point, Bowen and Monsies share
their ideas with the prominent anti

-tobacco activist Stanton Glantz.

He says he gives them a warning.

I said, I think these products are going
to really appeal to kids, and that's

going to be a big problem. And their
reaction to that was, well, we just

that's not our intended audience.

We don't think kids should use these
things. We're all thinking about adult

smokers. And they just discounted the
idea.

Up next, Bowen and Monty's face a
critical fork in the road. Which way

turn?

In June 2015, Adam Bowen and James
Montes are confident that with their

nicotine delivery device, Juul, they are
about to change the world.

I'd say in my wildest dreams, Juul and

products like it will equip cigarette
consumption worldwide within the next 20

years.

And while that success could spell big
bucks for them, Bone and Munsey's insist

they are not in it only for the money.

We see ourselves as a for -profit public
good company, which means that, like

any other business, we care about
dollars, we care about sales, but we

more about the public impact, the social
impact of what we do.

But questions will arise about their
motives, not because of what they say,

but because of what they do.

Right at the start, they face a fork in
the road.

They could take Juul to the FDA and get
it approved as a smoking cessation

device marketed to smokers only, but
they don't choose that path.

Instead, they go to where the big money
is, the open market.

And they leap into the world of a
historically controversial industry.

More doctors smoke camels than any other
cigarette. The cigarette industry, of

course, has this long and very
controversial history.

And they essentially are walking into an
industry that has

incredible baggage from a public health
standpoint, from a legal standpoint.

And there are lessons in that baggage on
where big tobacco went seriously wrong.

They marketed to kids.

Winston tastes good like a cigarette.
The tobacco

companies understood very early on if
they were going to replace the people

were killing, and they spoke about this
in very, you know, blunt terms, they

needed to recruit teenagers.

And they do. By 1997, the number of
young smokers soared to more than 36 %

high school students.

And the tobacco giants are called before
Congress to answer allegations about

marketing to kids.

No, we do not market to children and
will not.

But the congressmen don't buy that. The
American Medical Association found that

91 % of the children, three through six,
could match Joe with a Camel cigarette.

which means, Mr. Johnson, that Joe Camel
was as well -known as Mickey Mouse.

In the end, the tobacco companies
settled hundreds of lawsuits at a cost

billions of dollars.

And they agreed to the rule, no
targeting youth, directly or indirectly.

And so Bowen and Monses, as students of
Big Tobacco, have a powerful precedent

that says one thing.

Do everything possible to keep Juul out
of the hands of kids.

The politically sophisticated person
looking at what happened about the

marketing to kids, they would say, boy,
you know, this is a very politically

dangerous thing to do. This could get us
into a lot of political trouble. It

could get us into legal trouble. But on
the other hand, the companies made a

fortune because they were so successful
in marketing to kids.

And so, as Bowen and Monsies consider
options for Juul, they face another

critical choice.

To be mindful of the kids, or to go for
broke?

At this point, the early investors, who
reportedly have now kicked in millions

of dollars, are getting impatient.

It had been essentially...

Five, six years that the investors had
been patiently waiting for them to

a product that would catch on. And so
Adam and James were under immense

to create a product that was going to
succeed.

And to succeed, as alleged in multiple
lawsuits, they think they need to

establish what they call cool kid equity
by getting Juul into the hands of the

cool kids.

And this is what Juul's launch campaign
looks like.

Chock full of people who look like cool
kids. This is the kind of thing that

advertising professionals know
preferentially recruits adolescents.

Robert Jackler is a Stanford medical
doctor who studies the impact of tobacco

advertising.

This is something that the average 15,
16, 17 -year -old says, I want to be

them, self -confident, attractive, fun
-loving.

young people.

As Jackler sees it, they simply follow
the lead of Big Tobacco.

You know, this is the kind of model that
Juul adopted with the same playbook as

Philip Morris International in
popularizing marble amongst young

The similarities to Big Tobacco ads are
notable.

And while traditional cigarette
companies are banned from creating

Juul goes big in Times Square.

Oh, what's in Times Square? The Disney
store, the M &M store.

So there was major league exposure to
young people.

From the biggest screens, Juul moves to
the smallest screens, getting inside

cell phones via Instagram.

The company pays so -called influencers
with a big following to showcase the

device, and it strategically links its
images with hashtags across the

creating a community of tens of
thousands of followers of hashtag Jewel

Jewel Nation.

And suddenly, Jewel becomes a wild
testament to the power of viral

Viral marketing means that Not only do
you get a lot of people to use it, but

you get those people who are using it to
be evangelists for your product,

actually becoming effectively members of
your marketing team.

But what about the millions of smokers
they want to save?

You know, if they had been marketing
Juul to middle -aged smokers, you would

have seen a totally different
advertising campaign.

They would have been running them, you
know, in the same place that you see the

ads for Pepto -Bismol and erectile
dysfunction drugs and diabetes drugs.

But instead, in the summer of 2015, Juul
hits the road.

Heading to Hotspot, from Manhattan to L
.A., they set up temporary promotional

Juul lounges.

There, they hand out an impressive 41
,000 free starter kits.

of their addictive drug.

The device is untested for health risks
and unregulated.

Everybody in the e -cigarette industry
knew that regulations were coming. But

this golden moment of time, there were
none.

And so they just barreled into the
market.

The company is not even required to put
on a nicotine warning label.

When you look at this, you notice
there's no warning.

It doesn't say anything about nicotine.
This is what you see in the store. So

how do you find out it's nicotine?

You need a really good camera to see
this because it is tiny, fine print, 5 %

nicotine by weight.

At the end of the summer, the success of
the launch is promoted in a video.

At first, they're thrilled with the
momentum that is building on social

media.

But then they look closely.

And they're like, wow, those people look
pretty young.

But should they really be surprised by
the kids?

Anyone who knows anything about
advertising knows that this is how you

to teenagers.

They knew it.

And they did nothing about it.

Up next, how James Muncy spins Jules'
skyrocketing success.

All of a sudden, we couldn't keep up.

Years after it launches, Juul is off to
a phenomenal Silicon Valley start and

moving fast.

They're very swept up by following the
Silicon Valley playbook,

right? By following this kind of path
that set out for them to get the next

round of funding, to get bigger, to be
more successful.

In 2016, they sell just over 2 million
devices, bringing in $60 million in

revenue.

2017, sales explode to $16 million,
bringing in $200 million in revenue.

Bone and Monsi say it just took getting
the product into a few stores.

Those few stores got the product out
into the hands of a good number of

and then they evangelized it.

And then all of a sudden we couldn't
keep up.

But what they don't say is that Juul is
also popular somewhere else, in high

schools across the country.

In Vancouver, Washington, McCall
Mirabella is a freshman in high school.

a straight -A student and a track star.

And that year she is offered a Juul.

The first hit, I got an immediate head
high. But the longer I used it, the less

I experienced it. And then I just became
reliant on nicotine.

And so then it wasn't the head high. It
was like, oh, I really need some

nicotine right now.

And she is far from alone.

Everyone used it. It would be nerds and
band kids and athletes and honor

students. It was everybody.

One attraction for kids is that Jewel is
stealthy.

Easy to hide.

Jewel products are super discreet. You
can put them in your bra, in your shoe,

in your bag, in the waistline of pants.

And on top of that, they don't make you
smell.

And so thousands of kids are slipping
their jewels into schools where they get

their nicotine hits in bathrooms and
even classrooms.

And that is ending up kids in hospitals.

Sharon Levy, director of the Adolescent
Addiction Program at Boston Children's

Hospital, is shocked by who is coming in
for treatment.

Suddenly we were seeing middle
schoolers, and very regularly, kids who

years old, 12 years old, they would say
that they would get headaches, that they

would get nauseated, that they would
vomit when they would use their Juul.

these are all signs that they're getting
a very, very high level of nicotine

into their body.

It feels like taking a huge step back.

For years, organizations have waged a
hard -fought battle to keep nicotine

from kids.

Think smoking makes you look cool?

No way.

With tremendous success.

Since 1997, the number of high school
students smoking has plummeted, down

36 % to under 11 % in 2015.

Because kids have learned cigarettes are
dangerous.

Jayden Alicia Munoz picked up her first
Juul when she is 16.

I don't think I would have smoked
cigarettes. My grandpa always did, and

developed lung cancer from it, and so I
always knew that I would never touch a

cigarette.

But Juuling, as it is called, is not
smoking, and kids believe it is

safe.

Erin Hall is in seventh grade when she
is handed a Juul.

Juul said that it was better than
smoking cigarettes and that it wasn't

like, health -wise, it wasn't as bad as
cigarettes.

So I thought, okay, well, at least I'm
not doing cigarettes.

And for kids, Juul is the device of
choice.

It's not like millions of kids using e
-cigarettes generally.

Like, they're all using Juul. That was
the thing about it. It was like there's

something different about this product.

What's different?

Juul's secret sauce.

Initially, no other e -cigarette had
such a high level of nicotine.

So this is a rule in addiction medicine.

The higher the dose... Of the substance,
and the quicker you can get it to the

brain, the more addictive it will be.

And kids are getting hooked fast on
nicotine they don't even know is in

I didn't know there was nicotine when I
very, very first hit it, but after they

told me, I still didn't know what that
meant.

Like, I didn't know what nicotine was
and what it did to you.

But she later finds out.

And that's when it started.

The addiction got worse and worse.

I would be going through a pack of pods
in four days.

With the nicotine in one Juul pod
equivalent to one pack of cigarettes,

if she has a pack -a -day habit of
Marlboros.

And for a young person, that is
especially dangerous.

Nicotine actually physically changes
your brain. It changes your brain as an

adolescent because your brain is still
developing.

And the hold nicotine can have is
powerful.

I've seen kids drop out of school. I've
seen families sell their house and move

to a different town, hoping there'd be
less vaping in their new town.

By the end of 2017, there are reportedly
plenty of indications at Juul that kids

are big customers.

One is a letter from a Brooklyn store
owner that, according to a federal

lawsuit, is sent to the company in
April.

He writes,

I don't think I can justify carrying
this anymore.

Kids are getting hooked on this thing,
little kids like 14 and 15 -year -olds.

But Bowen and Monsi describe the kids'
usage as merely an unintended

of their heroic mission. And they
repeatedly say one thing.

This is an issue that we don't want. Any
underage consumption of our product is

detrimental to our business.

But their actions say something else.

If you look at Jewel's advertising, it
speaks for itself.

Later, see what happens when McCall
quits Jewel. I'm ten hours in, and it's

hard.

In 2018, after launching Juul, the
company is setting up new offices in an

industrial area on the San Francisco
waterfront. It is expanding at breakneck

speed. In just four years, it reaches a
value of $15 billion.

Amazingly, it is growing faster than
Facebook.

We've scaled tremendously in terms of
sales and personnel and facilities, you

name it.

But what's really exciting is that we're
just getting started.

They're just trying to send this product
into the world. They didn't have the

self -awareness to stop for a minute and
to say, hey, let's pump the brakes,

because that's not what anybody really
inside the company wanted.

From a figure of $200 million in 2017,
Juul's revenue in 2018

skyrockets to $1 billion.

And much of that cash is coming from the
pockets of kids, their allowances, and

babysitting money.

As teenage use of e -cigarettes
explodes.

In September, the National Youth Tobacco
Survey reports that 3 .5 million high

school students are using e -cigarettes.

And so, high school students' tobacco
usage is now heading back toward the

it was in the 1990s.

And the FDA is cracking down.

The disturbing and accelerating
trajectory of use we're seeing in youth

resulting path to addiction must end.

The finger is pointed at Juul, which now
holds 75 % of the e -cigarette market.

With nearly 75 % market share, e
-cigarette maker Juul has become enemy

one. And Juul points the finger right
back at misleading data.

From the data we've seen, The usage of
our product by youth is comparable and

fact less than other adult products such
as cigarettes and alcohol.

That's unfair targeting.

I think we get a lot of the attention
and criticism because we are the biggest

brand, the biggest manufacturer.

And they make it clear they are not
responsible.

Their coast -to -coast launch campaign,
that it seems was just a mistake.

When we launched Juul, We had a campaign
that was arguably too kind of lifestyle

-oriented, too flashy. We received some
criticism when we pulled the campaign.

We think it had no impact on sales.

By 2018, Juul has replaced the cool kids
with older smokers. And what they want

is not criticism, but credit for their
efforts to combat teenage use.

For example, they removed their sweet
-flavored pods from retail shelves.

But they keep selling kids' favorite
flavors like mango and cream brulee

contending that they check a buyer's age
there.

It didn't matter that it was age -gated.
Kids know how to get around that. They

use their parents' accounts. They use
gift cards that don't have IDs with

Later, Juul announces it is eliminating
its presence on social media.

But still, hashtag Jewel posts continue
to pile up, actually tripling in the

next year.

Why? Because they had recruited armies
and armies of teens to carry their water

for them. So all of these teenagers at
that point, the community, if you will,

were members of the Jewel marketing
department.

It is all too little, too late.

But the genie was kind of already out of
the bottle by then. Jewel is already on

its own.

trajectory. There's no taking it back.

As the crisis of teen juuling spirals
out of control, Robert Jackler says he

meets with James Monsies in Juul's
offices.

I said, what are you concerned about?
And rather than say, I'm worried about

these unfortunate kids who are getting
hooked, he said, I'm worried about my

investors.

But so far, investors are all in.

In June 2018, Juul brings in $1 .2
billion in new funding from investors.

And that push to grow, grow, grow says
just one thing to Josh Stein.

They may have told themselves and their
employees that this was some savior

product, but they were very much aware
about the potential impact on young

people and then the real impact.

And they continued to move in the same
direction, which was market share,

share, market share, because they wanted
to cash out. They wanted to sell out.

And in December 2018, many observers say
they do just that.

Altria reportedly closing in on a deal
to buy 35 % of Juul Labs.

It is astounding news.

Juul, the company that set out to
eliminate cigarettes, sells one -third

business for $12 .8 billion to Altria.

Who is Altria? It's these guys.

The company once known as Philip Morris,
makers of Marlboro, the number one teen

starter brand.

Come to where the flavor is.

Come to Marlboro country.

And with that huge lug of money coming
from Big Tobacco, Juul reaches an

astounding value of $38 billion.

Jewel had already been on shaky ground,
and doing the deal with Altria, really,

they lost any shred of moral high ground
that they might have had left.

This was really seen as doing a deal
with the devil.

But Bowen and Monsi stick to their
story.

They are saving smokers, and aligning
with Big Tobacco is the way to do it.

They have a detailed database on roughly
18 million smokers in the U .S.

So these are the very people that we
want to try to reach.

But it is also a huge payday for people
at Juul. The early investors make off

with billions.

And Bowen and Montes reportedly each
personally get around $640 million out

the deal.

And with that money, they achieve the
ultimate Silicon Valley status, making

on the Forbes list of billionaires, the
richest people in the world.

Later, James Monsees buys a $22 million
house on a hill overlooking San

Francisco.

And for some, Bowen and Monsees'
newfound wealth is infuriating.

They presented themselves as these tech
bros. We're not tobacco.

We're not going after young people. But
they were tobacco, and they ended up

going after young people.

And as a result, they made combined
billions of dollars.

And it's just not right.

Up next, the crisis no one sees coming.

Young, healthy adults hospitalized with
severe respiratory illnesses.

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Podcast wherever you get your podcasts.

We'll be right back.

By 2019, just four years after Juul hits
the marketplace, the company is facing

a world of trouble. This morning, Juul
under fire again.

It was almost like deja vu. If you had
been watching the tobacco industry, if

you're inside the tobacco industry, the
same thing was now happening to Juul.

Just like big tobacco, Juul is hit with
hundreds of civil lawsuits across the

country. Many are filled by parents and
school districts.

Josh Stein is the first of 39 states'
attorneys general to sue the company.

They've caused immense harm and damage
to American youth, and they can't just

walk away with their money.

But lawsuits are one thing.

Getting called before Congress is
another.

In June, James Monsi finds himself
exactly where tobacco executives sat

before, in the congressional hearing
room.

And just out of curiosity, Mr. Monsi, do
you happen to know off the top of your

head how old you need to be to create an
Instagram account?

I don't.

13. You have to be 13 years old.

For more than an hour, Monsies is
grilled.

His answers are predictable.

I think the real opportunity here is to
improve the lives of a billion people

worldwide. But congressmen see Juul's
impact differently.

You're nothing but a marketer of a
poison, and your target has been young

people. As Monsies takes the heat, miles
away, a crisis is unfolding that is the

last thing Juul needs.

In Wisconsin, teenagers are rushed to
the hospital.

Their lungs are badly damaged.

Young, healthy adults hospitalized with
severe respiratory illnesses. So sick,

they're being put into medically induced
comas. The cause?

Vaping. In time, the CDC learns that the
primary cause of the mysterious illness

is illegal cannabis vaping products.

But it is a turning point for the future
of legitimate companies like Juul.

I think it was a stark signal to the
public that vaping may not be as safe

as benign as it had been advertised,
right? So that got people's attention.

It certainly gets McCall Mirabella's
attention.

Now, up to two pods a day, she decides
to quit Juul, cold turkey.

It is surprisingly rough.

There were many nights where I would
grab my Juul from my friend and I'd look

it. And I'd be like, oh, I'm going to
hit it. I can't do this.

She records her experience.

I don't know why the fuck I'm crying.

And for months, she captures the story
of her nicotine withdrawal, the

headaches, mood swings, stomach upsets.

When she is four months nicotine sober,
she posts her video on YouTube.

My name is McCall Mirabella, and I am
addicted to nicotine. She gets two

views. Day 90, about five days ago, some
cravings have came back.

Ironically, her motivation is the same
as a smoker trying to quit cigarettes.

The very group Juul is designed to save.

I wanted to live a life where I didn't
need to use a nicotine product every

hour. I wanted to be more in control of
my body.

And that's what powered me through.

Up next, who wins the mission or the
money?

If the rise of Juul is fast, the fall is
even faster.

When the FDA bans sweet flavors in e
-cigarettes like Juul and store owners

crack down on underage sales,

Juul's market share plummets.

Moving in on Juul's territory are
copycats, disposable synthetic nicotine

-cigarettes.

Through a loophole in regulations,

The non -tobacco devices can offer
flavors from blueberry jelly to rainbow

sugar. And these are increasingly
popular with the more than 2 million

who report using e -cigarettes in 2021.

Many blame Juul for this new enormous
market.

Without Juul, I mean, I never would have
started. I don't think anyone would

have really started doing it at my
school because they were really the

point for vaping.

And those who began vaping with Juul
years ago?

Remember that addiction is a chronic
relapsing disease, so many of them will

struggling with addiction for the rest
of their lives.

And studies show that a percentage of
those addicted to Juul will move on to

cigarettes.

And for many, the conclusion seems
obvious.

Juul's battle to eliminate cigarettes
has backfired.

You know, as a public health person, the
way we can reduce smoking in the adult

population is to keep kids from getting
started in the first place.

In 2023, Juul's future is uncertain.

Like hundreds of other e -cigarette
companies, it is awaiting a decision

the FDA about whether it can continue to
sell its product in the United States.

In the meantime, it settles lawsuits
across the country.

Paying hundreds of millions of dollars
to families and school districts who

claim to be its victims.

Forty million dollars goes to North
Carolina.

Juul will be prohibited from influencer
advertising, outdoor advertising near

schools.

With each settlement, the company and
Bowen & Monsi's admit no wrongdoing.

But still, many hold them responsible.

They lit a fire.

And as it started to get bigger and
bigger, they threw gasoline on it, and

stoked it.

And then when the fire company came,
they said, we had nothing to do with

We didn't do anything with that. Oh, my
God, look, there's a fire.

While Adam Bowen is still listed as a
director at Juul, in March of 2020,

Monsey reportedly cuts ties with the
company.

He writes a letter saying he wants to
spend more time with his family.

Bowen and Monsies did not respond to a
request for comment from American Greed.

The irony in the story is that many
smokers do say that devices like Juul

them get off cigarettes.

Kurt Sonderreger is someone who replaces
smoking with vaping.

I haven't smoked since 2012.

I know I probably would like to get off
nicotine at some point, but I feel like

I'm a winner. I got my life back.

I've cycled 20 ,000 miles on my bike
since I stopped smoking, and I feel

completely healthy and alive again.

But many agree that, like all addictive
products, Juul needed to be handled with

more care, and that where Bowen and
Munchies may have gone wrong... is that

lost their dedication to their cause in
the profit -driven mindset of Silicon

Valley.

In Silicon Valley, there's no patience.

So Adam and James were under the gun to
grow their company fast, to grow it

quickly, to make it scale.

And that's not what this particular
product needed. This product didn't need

scale. I mean, in order to become
billionaires, they needed it to scale.

it to be...

a contribution to public health. It
didn't need to scale.

And some say it all goes back to that
fork in the road where they first had to

choose between the mission and the
money. Time and again, faced with

that they could have made between going
for the money or more measured growth

while protecting young people from
becoming nicotine addicted with their

product, they went for the money every
time.