SnusCentral's Larry Waters Reports!

V2 Tobacco publicly announced they are launching their highest nicotine snus series to date; Thunder RAW Ultra Strong Snus, during Week 44. The first flavor to be released as a RAW Ultra Strong portion will be the popular Thunder Frosted recipe.

The Thunder Raw series of snus will contain 21mg/gr nicotine. While V2 Tobacco is not the first or the only snus manufacturer to meet or exceed the 20mg /gr nicotine level, they are the first to classify a snus of this strength Ultra Strong. GN Tobacco's EXTREME snus series and Swedish Match's Lab Series 06 are marketed as Extra Strong although both are 20mg/gr+ snuses. A little snus history demonstrates why this is significant.

Modern Extra Strong snuses appeared in 2008. Nicotine strengths at the time were broken down into two categories: Original and Strong/Stark/Sterk. The new Extra Strong snuses were categorized under the Strong category at first by manufacturers and Swedish snus eStores. This worked for a while until the number of Extra Strong snuses and their widely varying nicotine strengths led to consumer confusion, especially among those new to Real snus.

No common standard was ever established by the snus industry and still has not been. The gold standard of strong snuses; Swedish Match's General Onyx, was rated at 11mg/gr of nicotine. Swedish Match never advertised Onyx as a Strong snus, though. SnusCentral.com forced the issue after my August 2008 article discussing Onyx as the first snus shop to categorize General Onyx not only as a Strong Snus, but as a White Portion/Black portion snus.

Read more: Beyond Extra Strong: Thunder RAW Frosted Ultra Strong Snus