By any measure, regular smoking can cost a lot. For example, smoking 20 cigarettes a day over the course of a year would, in 2018, cost a smoker in the UK about £3000, depending on the brand. In practice the amount people we spoke to spent on cigarettes varied – and it was much cheaper if people smoked ‘roll-ups’ or ‘rollies’, loose tobacco rolled in papers. For some money they spent on cigarettes was important in the decision to cut down or stop, while others thought they would always have prioritised spending money on cigarettes.
