Cigarette bandits steal $11,000 worth of stock from IGA

It was a calculated raid that was all over in a matter of minutes and left the Beeliar IGA thousands of dollars out of pocket.

Three masked men broke into the West Australian store by dismantling the entrance and were there to steal one thing - cigarettes.

"They knew exactly what they were after, exactly where to look for them, they were not here to steal cornflakes that's for sure," store-owner Terry Cain said.

The thieves left with $11,000 worth of cigarettes and destroyed the store roller-doors last Thursday night.

"You have to try and make it a fortress and every time you get done over by the crims, you try and improve your security even more," Mr Cain said.

Directly across the IGA, the Tobacco Station was broken into on Monday but the robbers were unable to break through the cabinets and safe.

Fremantle Police are investigating both incidents but do not believe they are linked.

While Police say they're not seeing a current trend in systemic, organised theft of cigarettes, the appeal to illegally obtain tobacco could be due to the rise in prices.

According to Cancer Council Victoria the average price of a cigarette has raised from about 20 cents in the 1980s to more than a dollar now.

Border force figures show a huge increase in Australia's tobacco black market.

In the past three years the number of times illegal tobacco has been discovered has skyrocketed from 61,000 to 286,000.

That includes a huge increase in illegal cigarettes from 233 million to 426 million.

"There's a very high strike rate that the Australian Border Force has been able to achieve in that," WA Police Commissioner Chris Dawson said.

"They're basically not paying excise if they're illegally bringing it in and avoiding tax," he said.