Customers Abandon Smoke-Free Restaurant

The first smoke-free restaurant chain in Beijing is now going out of business.  Apparently customers did not like the ban and have stopped their patronage to the restaurant.

The worlds most “enthusiastic smokers” (Reuters), China has a growing market over 350 million strong.  Numbers like that are big enough to make tobacco companies salivate as well as raise international health concerns.

The restaurant chain, Meizhou Dongpo, reports that business dropped “about 80 percent of that enjoyed by other restaurants across the street” following the smoking ban in October.