Retail

Data from the cannabis tech company Weedmaps found that retail cannabis sales on the day before Thanksgiving — dubbed “Green Wednesday” by the industry — surpassed average cannabis sales on Black Friday.

Budtenders at the Strawberry Fields dispensary in Columbus, Ohio voted to join Teamsters Local 413, becoming the first dispensary workers in the state to join the union.

Missouri cannabis retailers sold $113.1 million worth of adult-use products in October, according to data from the state Department of Health and Senior Services.

The medical cannabis market in Ohio is expected to hit $520 million this year, according to cannabis industry intelligence firm BDSA, which also predicts the state’s combined cannabis markets will total $820 million in 2025.

The number of registered medical cannabis patients in New Mexico has dropped significantly from the May 2022 peak of more than 135,000 to about 85,000.

Starting next month, Connecticut will raise the purchase limit for adult-use cannabis products from seven grams to 14 grams per transaction.

Workers at the Home State Dispensary in Kansas City, Missouri voted this week to join the Teamsters Local 955, making them the first cannabis workers in the city to unionize.

The first legal — albeit experimental — cannabis dispensary in Europe received final approval last week from Swiss regulators; the dispensary was approved as part of a study on the retail of adult-use cannabis.

New York’s Office of Cannabis Management has stopped the administrative trial process for businesses accused of retailing cannabis without a license.

Denver, Colorado has collected more than a half-billion dollars in cannabis tax revenue and industry fees since the city’s first dispensaries opened, topping $501.5 million for the city in August.

Adult-use cannabis dispensaries in Rhode Island set a new monthly sales record of $7.11 million in September, putting sales on track to meet the state’s annual cannabis revenue projections of $76 million for fiscal year 2023.

Connecticut’s combined medical and adult-use cannabis sales surpassed $25 million in September, setting a new monthly sales record for the state.

Officials in Cook County, Minnesota are considering opening a municipally owned cannabis dispensary that would “create a new revenue stream for county government.” The county already operates a municipal liquor store and the dispensary arrangement would be similar.

A recent study found that about 19% of online cannabis retailers do not require age verification when purchasing cannabis products. However, it is unclear if the study differentiated between regulated cannabis and hemp-derived cannabinoids.

Nearly 70 New York state lawmakers sent a letter to Gov. Kathy Hochul urging her to sign the Cannabis Crop Rescue Act, which lawmakers approved in June to allow licensed cannabis farmers to sell their products to dispensaries located on Tribal lands.

The Pennsylvania Senate last week passed a proposal that would allow more licensed medical cannabis companies to operate as dispensaries — currently, just five of the state’s 25 cannabis companies are allowed to retail medical cannabis products.

Square announced this week it was entering the Canadian cannabis space through a partnership with cannabis e-commerce company Jane Technologies.

Workers at a Phoenix, Arizona dispensary went on strike last week after the company, Curaleaf Midtown, failed to negotiate a contract despite workers having voted to join the UFCW Local 99 union last summer.

Combined medical and adult-use cannabis sales in Connecticut set a new monthly record at $25 million in August after adult-use sales totaled $14 million and medical cannabis sales reached $11 million.

California lawmakers have passed a bill to allow cannabis cafes in the state, sending the proposal to Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) for final approval.

Adult-use cannabis dispensaries in Massachusetts have sold more than $5 billion worth of product since the market launched in 2018.

High Times, the famed counterculture publication-turned-cannabis retailer, last week entered an intellectual property partnership with Lucy Scientific, a Canada-based company with holdings and operations in a variety of psychotropic businesses.

Missouri’s combined medical and adult-use cannabis sales totals last week topped the $1 billion mark, according to state data.