June 2025: Global little cigar sales dropped 4% in 2024, outside China
Little cigar sales, outside China, dropped 3.9% to 18.4 billion sticks in 2024. Top-3 markets, USA (5.75 billion), Japan (2.92 billion), and Germany (2.45 billion), accounted for 60.4% of the global sales volume in 2024. Sales revenue for little cigars grew +0.7% in 2024 to $7.22 billion – corresponding to an average retail sales price of $7.85 for a pack of 20 little cigars.
USA remains as the world’s largest little cigar market with $2.7 billion retail turnover in 2024. However, little cigars, a direct competitor to cigarettes, were obliterated by the flavor bans in the U.S. in 2025 and experienced 70.4% sales volume decline in the U.S. multi-outlet and convenience store channel in the 52 weeks ending April 20, 2025 (Circana data). Although untracked channels are presumably holding up better than the tracked channels, U.S. little cigar market is likely to record a significant double-digit decline in 2025.
