TOB Magazine

After the presidential election last November, a

Time

mag-

azine article said it was “a watershed year for weed.” That’s

because after November, “nearly a quarter of the U.S. popula-

tion lives in places where adult use [of pot] is legal.”

California, Massachusetts, Nevada and Maine approved

recreational marijuana, joining Colorado, Washington, Ore-

gon, Alaska and Washington, D.C. Florida, North Dakota,

Arkansas and Montana passed medical marijuana measures

last November; 28 states now have comprehensive medical

marijuana laws.

But upon checking into the newly passed recreational

marijuana states, only Nevada was actually selling cannabis at

press time.That’s because “testing becomes a serious issue,

and there’s a delay [in] launch in many cases,” says Bethany

Gomez, director of research for Brightfield Group, a cannabis-

focused market research firm. It takes about 18 months, on

average, from the time a state passes legislation legalizing

marijuana to the time of actual retail sales, according to

Gomez. “But not everyone has all their ducks in a row, so

sometimes it takes 12-18 months beyond that to ramp up

and where you see the very fast growth,” she adds. “As new

growth facilities are approved and crops are harvested and

they’re operating at full capacity, this is a very significant

ramp-up time. So, in California, the day after the election, you

saw consumers going to [medical marijuana] dispensaries

trying to buy, and they were not allowed.” Gomez further runs

down her perspective on some states:

California—

“They have had medical marijuana for almost

20 years, but it wasn’t finalized yet, so there are significant

delays as that will be built into the recreational market. It’s a

very complicated process.”

Massachusetts—

“They’re medical side is still ramping up,

so they are in the infancy phase with recreational. They’re

dragging their feet, so in Massachusetts we are not expect-

ing the recreational market [to] turn on as quickly as some of

the others.”

Nevada—

“They are clearly not dragging their feet; they have

been very transparent since they opened medical and now

recreational. They are very business-friendly; they are looking

for the tax dollars, jobs and revenue.”

Michigan—

One state people forget about is Michigan; it has

a very strong medical market. If they do vote for legalization, it

would probably be next year or shortly thereafter. It would be

a good state for tobacco stores to look into because there’s

not much of a distribution network in place.”

Other states with opportunities for tobacco/smoke shops

looking to get into the cannabis industry include the new-

ly legalized states like Massachusetts, she says. The estab-

lished states of Colorado, Washington and Oregon are very

established, and “there’s not much opportunity there.” Alaska

is too small for opportunity, she adds.

As more states legalize, “states around them—especially

now [on] the East Coas,—will see that being highly regulat-

ed is a better option than dealing with the black market,”

according to Bryan Meltzer, partner at New York-based

Feuerstein Kulick LLP, a cannabis-focused law firm. He also

expects that many eyes will be on California, slated to open

for recreational business on Jan. 1, 2018. “It will be the big-

gest market, by far, so that’s an important area to watch.”

[ T O B A C C O B U S I N E S S . C O M ]

TOBACCO BUSINESS

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Grass

States

States with medical marijuana laws

States that have removed jail time for possesing

small amounts of marijuana

States that have both medical marijuana laws and have

removed jail time for possesing small amounts of marijuana

States where marijuana is legal for adults and is taxed and regu-

lated similarly to alcohol; state also has a medical marijuana law