BRITAIN’S “vape” market is puffing along nicely these days. In 2012 there were 340 tobacconists—a category that includes vape stores—in England, Scotland and Wales. There are now 1,552. Vapers, who smoke electronic cigarettes that may contain nicotine but never tobacco, can pick up supplies in locations from shabby streetside vendors to slick dispensaries with assistants in lab coats.

Choices too have grown. Vapour flavours range from Baba Napoletano (“Imagine the delicious rum-soaked cakes from the Neapolitan cookbook”) to Alice in Vapeland Crunkberry (“2AM in cereal land: the satisfying hit of a spoon to milk and cereal. Oh, yum!”). But most vapers end up choosing menthol or tobacco flavours, says Andrew Moss of E-Cig Wizard, a firm with 33 branches across the country. “People look for what they’re used to when they’re trying to quit,” he adds.

Euromonitor, a research firm, estimates that Britons spent around £800m ($1.2 billion) on “vaping products” in 2015, up from £50m in 2011. The French, by contrast, spent only £290m and the Germans £230m. Analysts reckon the British love e-cigarettes mainly because they are cheap; heavy taxes make ordinary cigarettes in Britain among the most expensive in the world. Vaping can cost 90% less a month for someone used to smoking 15-20 cigarettes a day, says Shane MacGuill of Euromonitor.

Perhaps for that reason, the increase in vape shops has been concentrated in poorer areas: the north-west has nearly three times the number in the London area, according to the Local Data Company, another research firm. The heavy regulation of tobacco provides vapers with other relative advantages, not least warmth. While smokers huddle outside, forced there by the ban on smoking indoors in public places, some bars and restaurants let vapers inhale behind closed doors.