Studio Linear is a female-owned creative design firm in Maine that specializes in the cannabis and CBD industries. From marketing, brand strategy and messaging, web design, unique product packaging, photography, and even typography, Studio Linear brings a powerhouse team of creative professionals who work together to bring cannabis brands to life and set them on the path toward a successful future.
Company founder Andrea Beaulieu says she first started Studio Linear as a side hustle, working hard out of her own kitchen in the evenings after the kids had gone to bed. Her continued dedication to the project had built a strong foundation for the company when it officially launched as a full-time agency in 2018. The company started out working for brands across a wide variety of industries—early clients included record labels, musicians, and food and beverage companies—but in 2019, Studio Linear took on its first cannabis client in Garden Remedies, a Massachusetts-based dispensary.
That project won the gold in Integrated Marketing Campaigns at the Broderson Awards (an annual creative design awards show). Following that successful experience working with the cannabis industry, Studio Linear decided to shift gears in 2020 and work exclusively with cannabis and lifestyle brands.
“We found that this was the one industry that allowed us to be as creative as we could possibly imagine and love the process,” said Andrea Beaulieu, Studio Linear’s founder and creative director. “We love package design and dreaming up unique experiences for consumers. That magical unboxing moment is huge and we love dreaming up that experience for our clients.”
When taking on a new project, the team starts their process with a discovery call to chat with and understand their client’s vision. They conduct a brand audit and discuss brand strategy, identity, design goals/possibilities, and more. Ultimately, Studio Linear promises to establish (or reestablish) a full branding package including logos, fonts, custom illustrations, brand guides, and more.
The team also considers the vision and creative input they get from clients and works to ensure they have some personal experience with the brands they represent.
“We love trying the products our clients create, from new CBD oils to tasty THC-infused lemonades,” Beaulieu said. “We truly have the best job in the world!”
While the firm is based in Maine, Studio Linear is digitally mobile and works with cannabis brands from around the country. They guarantee all brand packaging and marketing campaigns are appropriately compliant with each operator’s local market regulations. Studio Linear also collaborates with other top, female-owned photography firms throughout the U.S. and can make professional recommendations for product photography whenever said products are unable to cross state lines.
Arizona’s social equity cannabis rules, according to critics, do not go far enough when it comes to serving those most impacted by the War on Drugs, the Arizona Daily Star reports. The social equity ownership program was part of Arizona’s adult-use cannabis law and sets aside 26 cannabis licenses for those disproportionately affected by the War on Drugs.
“It was also supposed to remove what lots of people viewed to be a perverse situation where a person selling cannabis with a license could become a billionaire and a person selling cannabis without one could go to prison for decades.” — Arizona NORML board member Julie Gunnigle via the Daily Star
Gunnigle says the program does not put any constraints on license transferability and fears licenses may be eventually sold to people the program was not intended to serve. She says a newly issued license could be worth up to $10 to $20 million, setting up an incentive to acquire a social equity license, only to turn around and sell it.
“When you create a program like this, where licenses are freely transferable on Day 1 and are transferable to other people other than social equity applicants and doesn’t have any strings attached … you’ve created a system that’s just right for exploitation,” she said.
An owner of a cannabis lifestyle brand and potential social equity candidate herself, Zsa Zsa Simone Brown wants language added to the law that would only allow social equity licenses to be sold to others who qualify for the program. Similar to Gunnigle, she fears a management company or other well-funded entity could acquire a social equity license and turn around and sell it to wealthy investors.
“If that’s what it says, and we’re going to allow a management services organization or someone who already has a dispensary to buy that, then it’s no longer a social equity license,” Brown said in an interview with the Daily Star
The Arizona Department of Health Services released draft social equity rules in May. In addition to a $5,000 non-refundable application fee and having to live in Arizona for three of the past five years, the applicants must meet four of the following requirements:
Make less than 400 percent ($106,000) of the federal poverty level for three of the past five years,
Be convicted of a cannabis crime, but not have an excluded felony, or been convicted of or asked for the expungement of the possession of fewer than 2.5 ounces of cannabis,
Be a spouse, surviving spouse, parent, child, or guardian of someone convicted of a cannabis crime,
Complete a course on how to run a dispensary,
Live in an area disproportionately impacted by the War on Drugs for three of the past five years
According to the report, the social equity application window will be open this year from December 1 through December 14. Department of Health Communications Director Steve Eliot noted in the report that the licenses will be handed out via a random drawing but says the exact method of selecting winners is not known at this time.
Brown feels the rules may be too broad and as a result not fulfill their intended purpose.
“They have not mentioned that people of color and veterans and Hispanics had been the people who have been disproportionately attacked and have suffered throughout the war on drugs,” she said. “I just feel like this is another opportunity for the state to collect millions of dollars in applications for a handful of licenses. And they’re going to go to the people who already had them.”
New York-based cannabis firm PharmaCann is planning an initial public offering that could value the company at over $1 billion, according to a Reuters report citing sources familiar with the plan.
PharmaCann has not confirmed the IPO but it could take place this fall. The company reportedly submitted the IPO paperwork to U.S. and Canadian regulators within the last 30 to 45 days.
According to the report, Canadian investment bank Canaccord Genuity is expected to be the lead underwriter, with more banks likely to be hired. Canaccord did not comment on the report.
PharmaCann currently operates four medical cannabis dispensaries and one cultivation facility in New York and was one of just 10 companies given an initial license in the state. The company also operated in Illinois, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Maryland.
Over the last few months, the company had received multiple takeover offers, including from blank-check firms, according to sources interviewed by Reuters. PharmaCann could still decide to stay private, decide against launching the IPO or go a different route to go public, the report says.
In June, Cresco Labs took a 10.5% stake in PharmaCann for $110.4 million which valued the company at $1.1 billion.
A botched law enforcement operation in Oklahoma cost a state-licensed cannabis cultivator millions of dollars, KFOR reports. The Special Operations Team of District 23 last week raided Earth Research Labs’ McLoud facility after receiving information from another law enforcement agency.
Earth Labs’ property manager described the officers in SWAT formation, pointing guns, and destroying plants.
Mark Woodward, of the Oklahoma Bureau of Narcotics, told KFOR that the company’s license did not show up on an “initial check” but was found during a subsequent search in their “old system” the day after the raid.
Pottawatomie County District Attorney Alan Grubb said the Special Operations Team believed the information they received from the other, unnamed, law enforcement agency “in good faith to be accurate and correct after several checks.”
Earth Research Labs CEO, Rodney Topkov believes the damages to his business could be as much as $10 million—a figure disputed by Grubb.
Donald Gies, founding and managing attorney at Gies Law Firm, which is representing Topkov and Earth Labs, called the action “a pretty incredible mistake.”
“Whether it’s a computer glitch or a non-communication to the correct agency,” he said in the report. “Either way, we do know that I have a client that is out millions and millions of dollars and we need to know who’s gonna be held accountable.”
The California Supreme Court has ruled incarcerated individuals cannot possess cannabis under the state’s 2016 adult-use initiative, the Associated Press reports. Overturning a lower appellate court’s decision and siding with the state Attorney General, the justices said the 3rd District Court of Appeal’s ruling allowing people behind bars could possess up to an ounce of cannabis went beyond “common sense.”
“It seems implausible that the voters intended to essentially decriminalize marijuana in prisons. We agree with the Attorney General that if the drafters had intended to so dramatically change the laws regarding cannabis in prison, we would expect them to have been more explicit about their goals.”—Associate Justice Joshua Groban in the decision
The case arose when five men were convicted of possessing cannabis in their cells, which was later overturned by the California Appeals Court saying although it was illegal to smoke or eat cannabis in prison, it was not illegal to possess. Other state appellate courts have disagreed with the 3rd District, however. Ultimately, the Supreme Court justices ruled against prisoners possessing cannabis in the 5-2 decision.
The lower court said prison authorities could outlaw cannabis like other substances such as alcohol, but an inmate’s sentence could not be increased for possessing cannabis behind bars. Groban disagreed, writing, “We are sympathetic to the view that (existing law) creates an extreme disparity between how our legal system treats the possession of cannabis generally versus the possession of such a substance inside a correctional facility. That is also true of many other substances, including alcohol.”
In a partial dissent, Associate Justice Leondra Kruger, said she believed prosecutors would have to change the way they filed charges for cannabis possession behind bars, describing the conundrum as a choice between two overlapping felony statutes with different penalties. In the dissent, she wrote that voters may have intended a “limited measure of leniency” for incarcerated persons despite the electorate not explicitly decriminalizing cannabis in prison. Additionally, she wrote that the court should have ignored the legality question based on how the appeal was presented, the AP reports. Only one other judge, Justice Mariano-Florentino Cuéllar, dissented from the majority.
Attempting to explain his decision, Groban said, “Some may well view an eight-year prison sentence for the possession of less than one gram of cannabis (one gram is the approximate weight of a single paper clip or a quarter teaspoon of sugar) as unduly harsh. The wisdom of those policy judgments, however, are not relevant to our interpretation of the statutory language.”
Medical cannabis-derived tax revenues in Oklahoma increased 56% from 2019 to 2020 to more than $66 million, News on 6 reports. Comparatively, in 2020, the state’s tax on cigarettes brought in $71 million.
Oklahoma’s medical cannabis program is considered one of the most liberal in the U.S.
According to Oklahoma Tax Commission data outlined by Marijuana Business Daily, medical cannabis retailers in the state reported more than $831 million in total revenue in 2020. In 2019, medical cannabis revenues in the state topped $345 million.
Currently, there are 129,085 medical cannabis patients in the state along with 818 caregivers, according to Oklahoma Medical Marijuana Authority data. The state has also licensed 3,026 cultivators and 1,479 dispensaries.
Lawmakers are considering a bill that would cap the number of dispensaries for two years and also requiring commercial licenses to be “active,” which is defined in the bill as having at least $5,000 in sales with producers maintaining at least 50 plants monthly. Further restrictions in the bill would lower the number of commercial licenses in the state from 10,000 to 8,000, which would set caps at 5,000 grower licenses, 2,000 dispensary permits, and 1,000 processor licenses.
Last month, Republican Sen. Jim Inhofe requested $4 million in federal funds to combat diversion of cannabis from the state after the Oklahoma Bureau of Narcotics in April seized cannabis grown illegally by one of the companies licensed under the state’s medical cannabis program.
A former Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) special agent was sentenced to 13 years in prison on Thursday for crimes related to official misconduct, including perjury, obstruction of justice, and theft.
Chad Allan Scott, 53, was found guilty of committing perjury—and directing others to commit perjury—to obtain a conviction against an alleged drug dealer. Scott also falsified forms so that he could take possession of a truck bought for him by a drug dealer. When he and two other law enforcement officers began to worry about a potential investigation, they threw evidence of their crimes into the swamps outside of New Orleans, Louisiana. Scott and members of his DEA group also stole money and possessions from defendants they had arrested. The case had been separated into two trials and Scott was found guilty in both of those cases.
Special Agent in Charge Douglas B. Bruce of the Justice Department’s Office of the Inspector General (DOJ-OIG) Denver Field Office said Scott’s crimes were “antithetical to the oath he swore to uphold.”
“While he was a law enforcement agent, Scott compromised cases and conspired to steal from the people he arrested.”—Bruce in a press release
DEA Administrator Anne Milgram said that Scott had taken an “oath to serve his community with integrity, but rather than use his badge to protect his community, he used it to break the law.”
Scott had been found guilty in the cases in August 2019 and June 2021. The case was initially investigated by the Louisiana State Police, and later by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, DEA, Office of Professional Responsibility, and DOJ-OIG.
There is a thriving and illegal U.S.-to-Mexico cannabis market developing, according to a Washington Post report. Relying on legal California dispensaries for their supplies, dealers in Mexico offer menus to clients featuring cannabis products procured north of the border, according to the Post.
It is believed the cannabis is often smuggled via airplane to Mexico from California or it is walked across the border at Tijuana pedestrian crossings. The report notes that 5,600 jars of cannabis gummies were recently seized from a car stopped at the Tijuana border crossing.
The Post quotes a Mexico City street vendor who says the demand for cannabis from the U.S. “has exploded.” He says cannabis produced in the U.S. is “aspirational” for many of his customers who want to “be seen smoking the best stuff, the stuff rappers brag about smoking.” The vendor estimates 60% of the cannabis he sells is from the States, the Post reports.
Josh Bubeck, the owner of Urbn Leaf, a dispensary close to the U.S.-Mexico border, estimates roughly 55% of his customers are Mexican nationals.
“Nobody is going to grow cannabis better than California probably ever. You’re showing ‘This is what I’m about. I’m a bad ass. I got this from America.’”— Bubeck to the Post
Mexico moved one step closer to national legalization when the country’s Supreme Court decriminalized adult-use cannabis by striking down the national cannabis prohibition laws in July. However, there remains no legal way to distribute cannabis products throughout the country.
Mexico’s head of Customs, Horacio Duarte Olivares, said in a statement that cross-border southbound trafficking is increasing but smugglers, “are going to run into a wall, with a firm hand from customs.”
Cannabis use among cancer patients is lower than that of the general public, according to a Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU) Massey Cancer Center study published in the journal Cancer.The study included data from 19,055 participants between 2013 and 2018 and concluded that just 9% of cancer patients used cannabis compared to 14% of people with no cancer history.
Dr. Bernard Fuemmeler, the study’s lead author, associate director for population science, and interim co-leader of the Cancer Prevention and Control research program at VCU Massey Cancer Center said that even when the researchers controlled “for things like age and race, cancer patients are still not increasing their use over time like the general population.”
He added he expected cannabis use rates among cancer patients “to have at least mirrored what was happening in the general population.”
“There is that element of a life-changing moment when you have cancer. You have to be mindful of your health and contemplate whether something like cannabis is helpful or hurtful.”— Fuemmeler in a press release
Study co-author Sunny Jung Kim, Ph.D., Harrison Scholar at VCU Massey Cancer Center and assistant professor of health behavior and policy at the VCU School of Medicine, said the study sheds some light“ on the prevalence of cannabis use among cancer patients and how it has changed over time.”
The analysis also revealed that people who reported higher levels of pain, regardless of cancer history, were more likely to use cannabis, while lower rates of consumption were seen among women, older people, and those with higher incomes, medical insurance, or better mental health.
A federal judge on Wednesday said that Maine cannot prohibit out-of-state companies from operating medical cannabis dispensaries in the state, the Portland Press Herald reports. The ruling by U.S. District Court Judge Nancy Torresen favored the state’s largest cannabis company, Wellness Connection of Maine, and its Delaware-based parent company High Street Capital Partners, who had filed the suit challenging rules that required medical cannabis companies to be owned by Mainers.
Last May, the state reached a legal agreement with Wellness Connection which prevented the Office of Marijuana Policy (OMP) from enforcing the four-year residency requirement for companies to own adult-use cannabusinesses in the state. Taken together with Torresen’s ruling, out-of-state firms can now open either medical or adult-use dispensaries in Maine.
The in-state licensing preference was included in both the state’s medical cannabis and adult-use laws. The company had argued that the rules violated the U.S. Constitution’s Dormant Commerce Clause which prohibits states from passing laws that discriminate against or burdens interstate commerce by favoring its residents over out-of-staters.
Officials had argued that because cannabis is federally illegal, the laws do not “burden interstate commerce more severely than Congress, since Congress has eliminated that market entirely.” Torrensen said that the argument was “not without logic” but since Maine does not bar qualified non-residents from purchasing medical cannabis, or non-residents who purchase cannabis in Maine to take out of state, “the notion that the medical industry in Maine is wholly intrastate does not square with reality.”
Susan Meehan, president of the United Cannabis Coalition which supports the residency clause, said the group is considering appealing the ruling which she told the Press Herald has “a strong likelihood of success.”
The OMP on Thursday announced it was opening applications for new medical cannabis licenses, the first time in 11 years that registration has been publicly available.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has denied two applications from companies seeking to sell CBD hemp extracts as a dietary supplement, Fortune reports. The agency said it rejected the applications because CBD is an approved drug and, therefore, excluded from the definition of a dietary supplement and that both applications failed to show that the extract meets the “reasonably expected to be safe under the conditions of use.”
The applicants were Charlotte’s Web Holdings Inc. and Irwin Naturals.
The Council for Responsible Nutrition (CRN) President and CEO Steve Mister said the organization “is extremely disappointed” by the FDA’s decision.
“FDA has wrongly mischaracterized these products as the same article as a prescription drug and has ignored, dismissed, and downplayed ample evidence that these full-spectrum hemp products can be marketed in a manner that is reasonably expected to be safe. Meanwhile, the agency has done little to protect consumers from the unregulated marketplace it has created from more than two years of inaction.”— Mister in a press release
Mister pointed out that equating the full spectrum extract to the pharmaceutical drug, Epidiolex, was incorrect because the drug “is a highly concentrated CBD isolate that contains 10 times more CBD than either of the full-spectrum hemp ingredients and plainly is not the same article supplement companies are producing.”
In a statement to Forbes, Charlotte’s Web Chief Executive Officer Deanie Elsner, said that while the company disagrees with the agency’s reasoning, the “decision affirms the path to regulatory clarity must come from Congress.”
As many as half of the municipalities in New Jersey are set to opt-out of the state’s new adult-use cannabis market, the Gothamist reports. Jurisdictions have until August 21 to opt out of the system but can re-join the effort at any time. However, if a town does not ban cannabis businesses by the deadline, they cannot opt-out for another five years, the report says.
Areas are dropping out for a variety of reasons, like proximity to residential areas, youth access concerns and as one New Jersey mayor put it New Jersians “didn’t vote for 17-year-olds to become drug users, they didn’t vote for some overtaxed product so some MS-13 gangbanger can come in here and undercut” legal cannabis, according to the report. Others say it is too soon to approve cannabis in their town because the New Jersey Cannabis Regulatory Commission has not yet issued their new rules, which are set to be revealed by August 21, the Gothamist report notes.
Responding to accusations the opt-out is a “delay tactic,” Livingston Mayor Shawn Klein said, that “the people who want marijuana in Livingston are very vocal and really want it.”
“I thought it was important to be very clear about what are the open questions, because they’re worried we’re going to use this as a delay tactic.”— Klein to the Gothamist
Klein added that the town could approve cannabis businesses in the future when the state releases more details like safety protocols and parking requirements.
Despite the opt-outs, New Jersey’s largest cities like Newark, Atlantic City, Hoboken, Trenton, and Jersey City are embracing adult-use cannabis. Many of the towns that are moving forward with the new adult-use cannabis program are writing their own rules. Cities like Newark have passed their own set of rules on security, allowed locations, and odor management. Flemington, banned some of the six license types, while allowing others, according to the Gothamist.
ScottsMiracle-Gro Co. has created a new subsidiary—the Hawthorne Collective—to invest in the legal cannabis industry and announced a $150 million loan to Toronto, Canada-based RIV Capital, a cannabis investment and acquisition firm listed on the Toronto Stock Exchange.
The loan is a six-year convertible note which accrues 2.03% interest annually for the first two years and includes follow-on investment rights. Upon conversion, ScottsMiracle-Gro would own about 42% of the RIV.
Jim Hagedorn, chairman and chief executive officer (CEO) for ScottsMiracle-Gro, said the addition of Hawthorne Collective allows the company “to explore and pursue new opportunities in an industry that is poised for significant growth in the years ahead.”
“By making a minority, non-equity investment in RIV Capital, this initial transaction will have little near-term impact on our financial performance. While this approach means we will employ capital that won’t be available for near-term investments with a more immediate return, we are confident our partners at RIV Capital and our long-term approach ultimately will drive meaningful value for our shareholders.”— Hagedorn in a press release
With the investment, RIV said it now has about $319 million in available capital, at current exchange rates. Narbé Alexandrian, president and CEO for RIV, said the investment “opens opportunities for considerable value creation and growth” for the firm.
“With ScottsMiracle-Gro’s strong track record, reputation, and brand awareness, we can build upon lessons learned in both the Canadian and U.S. cannabis markets, and leverage their insights to optimize our acquisition and investment strategy,” he said in a statement.
The Hawthrone Collective will also have the right to nominate up to three members to RIV’s board of directors, which will be increased to seven. Neither the Hawthorne Collective nor ScottsMiracle-Gro will have an active day-to-day role in RIV nor the companies in which it invests.
The Wyoming secretary of state has certified the sponsor signatures for a medical cannabis initiative, allowing the campaign to begin the process of getting the issue on 2022 ballots, Fox13 reports. Supporters needed just 100 sponsor signatures but provided 250.
The initiative is backed by the state’s Libertarian Party which can now begin the process of gathering signatures from the state’s registered voters. In all, the campaign needs 41,776 signatures to put the issue to voters. The initiative would legalize medical cannabis, and another being circulated by advocates would decriminalize cannabis for personal use in Wyoming.
The medical cannabis initiative also allows for home-growing by patients.
The Libertarian Party is being joined on the campaign by the cannabis legalization advocacy organization Together for Responsible Use and Cannabis Education (TRUCE) whose President and founder Christine Stenquist said is “excited to begin the signature-gathering process to let everyone in Wyoming have a voice.”
“The Wyoming advocates behind this effort have worked very hard to draft initiatives that will work for the people of Wyoming.”— Stenquist, in a statement, via Fox13
The ballot initiative campaign comes as state lawmakers have so far failed to pass a medical cannabis bill. Stenquist said she is “not going to leave it up to legislators” as the group did in her home state of Utah. She added that the fight in Wyoming wouldn’t be the “same fight” as in Utah, noting the staunch opposition to the reforms by the Latter day Saints Church.
A 2016 ballot initiative in Wyoming was opposed by law enforcement groups and the Wyoming Medical Association.
Included in the $1.2 trillion infrastructure bill passed by the Senate on Tuesday are provisions that would allow researchers to study the actual cannabis being purchased at state-approved dispensaries instead of having to use the low-grade cannabis grown at government facilities, Marijuana Moment reports.
The bill included in the spending package also directs the secretary of transportation to work with the attorney general and Department of Health and Human Services to publish a report within two years on how to advance scientific research into cannabis impairment while driving, even if the researchers are in states where cannabis remains prohibited. That report must also advise lawmakers on how to set up “a national clearinghouse to collect and distribute samples and strains of marijuana for scientific research that includes marijuana and products containing marijuana lawfully available to patients or consumers in a state on a retail basis.”
The infrastructure bill still needs to be approved by the House where it could face hurdles in the form of progressive Democrats who have said they wouldn’t support the proposal until the Senate passes a separate $3.5 trillion bill that focuses on poverty, climate change, and health care policy, CNBC reports.
The cannabis language is included in a House-passed infrastructure measure, so it is likely, were the chambers to have to reconcile the two proposals, the cannabis provisions would remain in the final version.
A cannabis legalization bill has been introduced in Wisconsin for the fifth consecutive legislative session despite previous versions of the bill never receiving a hearing by either the House or Senate, the Wisconsin Examiner reports. Democratic state Sen. Melissa Agard announced the bill in front of a dispensary in South Beloit, Illinois, which is right across the Wisconsin border.
“We know that Wisconsin is ready for legalization—past ready for legalization—it is time for Wisconsin to do what we need to do—to realize that prohibition has failed our state and it is past time to get this done for our community. Legalizing and taxing cannabis in Wisconsin, just like we already do with alcohol, ensures the controlled safe market for our community. Legalizing cannabis ensures there are safe products available to our friends, family, and neighbors.”— Agard during a press conference
Democratic Gov. Tony Evers had included the reforms in his 2021 executive budget; however, they were not included in the budget passed by lawmakers as Republican leaders who called legalization part of “a liberal wish list.”
The proposal would allow cannabis sales to adults 21-and-older, allow possession of up to 2 ounces by adults, and legalize the cultivation of up to six plants. Half of the tax revenues derived from the cannabis market would be earmarked for “underserved communities and communities wronged by” prohibition, Agard said during the press conference.
Agard also noted that Wisconsin—which is bordered by Illinois and Michigan’s Upper Peninsula—is “losing out on millions of dollars and family-sustaining jobs to our neighboring states.” Evers last year admitted he was “tired” of Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker (D) thanking him for the Wisconsin residents who cross the border to buy cannabis which leads to additional tax dollars for the state.
“We are losing money that we could be reinvesting to help support our friends and neighbors and make our state a place where people want to live, work, play, raise a family and plant their roots,” Agard said during her remarks.
The Wisconsin Senate’s top Republican, Majority Leader Devin LeMahieu, said in April that he would not support any cannabis reforms in the state without federal action. He added that there is not enough support among the state’s Republican caucus for the legalization of either medical or recreational cannabis.
Cannabis sales in Maine set yet another record last month and more than doubled the growth pace, MaineBiz reports. Adult-use cannabis sales in July reached $9.43 million on 124,000 purchases—a 45% increase from June’s previous $6.47 million record.
The sales equate to $943,480 in taxes for state coffers. So far this year, more than $38.6 million of adult-use cannabis has been sold in the state which has led to $3.8 million in tax revenues.
Maine Office of Marijuana Policy (OMP) Spokesman David Heidrich told Mainebiz that “the Independence Day holiday and summer tourism have all contributed to the robust sales growth witnessed in July.”
“These numbers demonstrate that, as access improves, more consumers are choosing the tested, tracked, and well-regulated market over a longstanding illicit market.” — Heidrich to MaineBiz
This is the first year of adult-use cannabis sales in the state, despite voters approving the reforms in 2016. The launch of the market was delayed first by governor vetoes of the implementation bill and then the coronavirus pandemic.
Maine’s first month of sales in October 2020 was about $1.4 million with only six active licensees, according to OMP data outlined by MaineBiz. June’s record sales of $5.36 million were up about 21% from May, while May sales were up 23% from the previous month, the report says.
Currently, there are 43 licensed facilities actively cultivating cannabis and another 183 facilities in-process. There are 23 active manufacturing licenses, with 76 in-process.
Editor’s note: A previous headline for this article incorrectly stated that Maine cannabis sales had doubled to set the July record but it was cannabis sales growth in the state, not the sales themselves, that doubled.
The Paiute Tribe of Utah is considering a move into the medical cannabis business, Salt Lake City Fox 13 reports. The tribe expressed interest in the venture in a private meeting with Republican Gov. Spencer Cox to discuss how the state and tribes could work together.
In the Fox 13 interview, Tribal Chair Corrina Bow said the effort could help tribal members who need medical cannabis for health issues and act as an economic boost to the largely rural tribe.
“I think it would be good because we also have some of our elders that actually have been having to go out of state to get this. It would be a great opportunity for a lot of them. A lot of them are in rural areas which need it.”— Bow to Fox 13
Tribal Leader Tamra Borchardt-Slayton said the effort may range from “growing, to cultivation sites, to possibly having stores.” She points to the Nevada Las Vegas Paiute Tribe which operates a 16,000 square foot dispensary in southern Nevada, despite cannabis remaining illegal on the federal level.
“That relationship is working,” she said. “Their tribe is flourishing based on the economic revenue that is coming in. Because of that, [the tribe is] able to offer more programs.”
The Governor’s Office did not comment further on the tribe’s interest and Bow told Fox 13 she was “not really sure” how the governor responded.
Cannabis extracts lovers often gear towards solventless extraction methods because these products get straight to the flavor with it. Solventless is the closest extract to the plant — it offers the freshest and purest profile possible.
Let’s talk about solventless extraction and the types of cannabis products that came from it.
What is solventless extraction?
Cannabis concentrates and/or extracts both describe the oil form of the plant — it’s like ‘tomato, tomahto’ but for highly potent cannabis products. To get an extract, you have to go through an extraction process that separates the cannabis crystals from the plant. Those crystals are called trichomes and they house the majority of the cannabinoids, terpenes, flavonoids, and everything else that matters when we experience the effects of cannabis. The anxiety benefits, the insomnia benefits, the anti-inflammatory benefits are primarily housed inside those milky little trichomes.
But many of the extracts on the market use solvents like butane, propane, and carbon dioxide to extract these trichomes from the plant and create the oil that comes from them. These products ultimately have their solvents removed and are safe for consumption but in that extraction, a little bit of taste may be lost/distorted. Also, it’s never a full guarantee that all the solvent has been removed from such a product. But in solventless extraction, manufacturers only use natural substances — i.e air, heat, water, and ice — to separate the trichomes from their plant. They are considered to be superior to solvent-based products by many cannabis consumers, though cannabis is of course all about personal preference.
What do solventless products look like?
The three most common forms of solventless concentrates include cannabis rosin, dry sift (or kief), and ice water hash.
Dry sift/kief
Kief — also called dry sift because it can be sifted from dry herbs — is as pure as cannabis trichomes can come. The dust at the bottom of your grinder is literally just weed dust ready to be sprinkled into a bowl to give your flower some extra umph (or to be pressed up into some rosin). To make a dry sift in an industrial setting, buds are run across a mesh screen or a kief box to separate the trichomes from plant matter. This allows you to rack up kief in a matter of minutes. A quick tip, if you’d like to get more kief fall-off into your grinder’s kief chamber, add a coin inside the flower chamber. After grinding your buds, shake the coin with the flower and the agitation will leave you with bundles of golden weed dust that can increase the potency of any cannabis product.
Ice water hash
Ice water hash is a hash that only uses ice and water to separate trichomes from them. The trichomes are broken away from the buds by shaking them in the ice water then pouring the mixture through microscreens, after which they are separated into hash bags. Ice water hash is also commonly referred to as bubble hash because it tends to bubbles when you put heat to it.
Rosin
Rosin is made through the combined application of heat and pressure. Rosin is a gooey type of wax that can be made by using a specialized rosin press or even a hair straightener. Essentially, it’s a bunch of trichomes exploding at once. You can make rosin from both kief and flower. With a rosin press, the flower goes between parchment paper and the press’s plates heat and squeeze the product until the trichomes explode and oil oozes out. Then, you scrape it all together, and bam — you’ve got some solventless dabs.
Note that while the above solventless options are the most frequently encountered by cannabis consumers, some specialist operators have combined the processes to create a product called live rosin — which is when high-quality cannabis is fresh-frozen, turned into an ice water hash (or dry sift), and then processed through a rosin press. This preserves the most amount of flavor and terpenes which, for many aficionados, make live rosin dabs the absolute pinnacle of cannabis concentrates.
Why are solventless options so popular?
People buy solventless extracts for three main reasons: purity, flavor, and experience.
Purity
Some people are just super big about their weed being as completely untouched by chemicals as possible. They want their weed to be pesticide-free and they want their weed to be solvent-free, too. Even with solvent-based extracts having all of the carbon dioxide or butane removed, the real heads that pursue the most natural experience lean towards solventless extracts. It isn’t without a cost though. Solventless dabs and vape pens are typically the priciest of oils.
Flavor
Cannabis trichomes house nearly all of the terpenes and flavonoids found in cannabis. So if you want the most natural flavor, you’d gear towards the purest, most-untouched trichomes possible. That’s why the flavor chasers in weed run right to solventless extracts. Even the ice water hash just makes the buds so cold that trichomes fall right off like little ice balls of skunky goodness.
Experience
Lastly, the experience is why people love solventless extracts. That purity in cannabinoids and terpenes leads to a highly potent, high-quality experience. Between the safety in consumption, the flavor you get in the oil, and the fact that you know you’re getting a potent high, it’s easy to see why consumers seek out solventless extracts over the alternative.
Cannabis technology company Leafly Holdings Inc. announced on Monday plans to go public via a reverse takeover with Merida Merger Corp. Once finalized Leafly will trade on the NASDAQ under the “LFLY” symbol.
The transaction values the combined company at a fully diluted enterprise value of about $385 million and equity value of approximately $532 million, subject to any redemptions by Merida stockholders, the companies said in a press release.
Leafly CEO Yoko Miyashita said the transaction moves the company into its “next phase … creating more personalized consumer experiences, driving more value to [its] retail partners, amplifying brands on [the] platform, and further scaling [its] presence in local markets as legalization continues.
“For the past decade, we have focused on building a unique, legally compliant marketplace with an equal emphasis on educating consumers and enabling them to reserve cannabis products from legal, reputable providers. … Our consumers recognize Leafly as one of the most trusted brands in cannabis, and we do not take that trust for granted. We are excited to partner with Merida’s deeply experienced team to create even more value for our consumers, partners and shareholders.”— Miyashita in a statement
Leafly said that about 55% of North American retail cannabis licensees are currently subscribed to its marketplace and advertising services and boasts an audience of 10 million monthly unique visitors.
The company says it expects projected revenue of approximately $43 million in 2021E and $65 million in 2022E, representing about 52% annual growth with gross margins of about 88% as it further penetrates current markets and capitalizes on its position in newly legalized states on the East Coast, such as Connecticut and New York.
Adult-use cannabis sales in Illinois set another new monthly record last month, driven, in part, by the Lollapalooza music festival, the Chicago Tribune reports. Sales in July reached $127.8 million—10% higher than the previous record set in May.
It was the first time cannabis was legal during the festival’s 30-year history; although public cannabis consumption is not legal in Illinois.
Sales at retail dispensaries in the River North and West Loop neighborhoods around the festival were up by as much as 50%, shop owners and operators told the Tribune. Jason Erkes, spokesman for Cresco Labs, whose Sunnyside Dispensary in River North was the closest to Lollapalooza, indicated the retailer had its “biggest weekend to date.”
According to state data outlined by the Tribune, sales to out-of-state customers rose 16% from June to $42 million in July; in-state residents spent about $85 million over the course of the month.
“Summer tourism and the Lollapalooza attendees were strong contributors to July’s out-of-state sales.” — Erkes to the Tribune
Jane, the e-commerce cannabis platform also reported a sales increase during Lollapalooza, with sales at 18 Chicago stores up about 6%, compared with the previous four weekends. Despite a ban on smoking at Grant Park, Jane reported a 27.5% increase in pre-rolls sales, the highest increase of any product category.
Todd Maisch, president and CEO of the Illinois Chamber of Commerce, told Marijuana Moment in May that he believed the state would “blow past” a billion dollars in cannabis sales this year—a feat the state accomplished with combined medical and recreational sales last year.
According to an American Marijuana study, 15% of remote employees worked from home under the influence of cannabis and the majority of those employees reported decreased stress (52.9%) and increased creativity (51.1%). Another 42.6% reported increased productivity while working under the influence of cannabis.
The survey included 1,001 full-time remote employees, including some who worked remotely both before and during the coronavirus pandemic.
“Surprisingly, or unsurprisingly, of the 40.6% of respondents who have worked from home while under the influence of marijuana, most did not continue this practice during the pandemic. More than 63% of respondents answered ‘no,’ and 36.8% answered ‘yes’ to the question of whether they got high at work from home during the pandemic.”— American Marijuana, “High at Work from Home”
Gen Z—those aged 20 to 29—were the most likely to use cannabis while working from home, with 41.3% of those respondents saying they consumed it while on the clock. Individuals 30 to 39 and 40-49 used cannabis while working remotely at similar rates, 36.6% and 35.1%, respectively; while 29.8% of those 50-and-older said they used cannabis while working remotely, the study found. Women and men used cannabis while working at similar rates, 37.9% to 36.6%.
White-collar employees used cannabis during remote work at much higher rates than their blue-collar counterparts, 44.9% to 21.6%, American Marijuana found. More employees used cannabis than managers, 37.6% to 34.7%.
The study also found that the majority—53.6%—of remote employees’ companies didn’t drug test at all, while 23% performed drug tests regularly and 23.4% did so occasionally. The vast majority, 72.1%, of respondents indicated they didn’t think any change was required to their employer’s cannabis policy, with 16,8% saying it should be less strict and 11.1% saying it should be stricter.
What many early cannabis dispensaries lacked in presentation, they made up for by normalizing the act of retailing cannabis. But like in any other retail industry, the cannabis shopping experience truly benefits from high-quality interior design and experts like the team behind SevenPoint Interiors are starting to set new expectations for the cannabis space.
We recently interviewed Danielle Marzarella about SevenPoint’s design process for cannabis retail environments and what inspired the firm’s 2017 founding. This interview also covers the unique design and regulatory challenges related to cannabis retail, different requirements for different locations and legal markets throughout North America, the company’s design process and strategies, how they collaborate with clients to create engaging and experiential retail environments, precautions the company has taken in regards to COVID-19 requirements, and more!
Scroll down to read the full interview.
Ganjapreneur: How long have you been in interior design?
Danielle Marzarella: Our founders Robert Turk and John Simmen met back in 1989 and have been in the business ever since. They founded Visual Elements in 2010 which has been recognized as a global leader in retail environments manufacturing since its inception. Recognizing the need for design solutions in the cannabis industry, SevenPoint Interiors was created in 2017, offering full turnkey interior design and build solutions.
What inspired your entry into cannabis retail design?
We purchased an exhibit booth at Retail Trade Show, Global Shop, and created a small cannabis dispensary display pop up. With such a positive response, the team realized the need and demand for elevated cannabis retail design spaces by business owners. With the increasing legalization of cannabis around the globe, SevenPoint seeks to elevate the cannabis experience for the customer through retail and to elevate the process entirely for brands and dispensary owners in creating and executing their company identity/vision and offering turnkey solutions.
What design and/or regulatory challenges has your team faced that are unique to cannabis retail?
Current regulatory challenges in the Toronto market include prohibiting site lines into the dispensary from the street. However, we’ve used these challenges to our creative advantage. For one of our clients, Scarlet Fire, we used this as an opportunity to create a mystique at its storefront by designing a “transportation tunnel”. By strategically placing partition walls with circular cutouts and LED lighting — from the glass line through the back of the store ending at a circular LED screen playing psychedelic video graphics — the end result was a kaleidoscope effect as passersby peek in from the street.
Inside Scarlet Fire Cannabis Co., a Grateful Dead-inspired cannabis dispensary that was designed by SevenPoint Interiors. Photo credit: Erin Leydon
SevenPoint has designed cannabis retail spaces in Toronto and in various states in the US, do the themes and focus differ between the two countries? What about between different states?
Themes tie back to brand and identity and whether it be Toronto, Michigan, or Massachusetts, each of our clients bring a different brand idea to the table. We service each individual client differently to help create and define a vision and theme unique to the brand. Compliance can differ by country and state and sometimes compliance regulations can have an impact on design as reflected in our transportation tunnel for Scarlet Fire. Even though it is a regulation, we used it as an opportunity to create a unique design solution to what might be viewed as a design problem. There has also been a surge in building smaller footprint dispensaries, especially in denser areas such as Toronto. These smaller boutique type dispensaries generally range from 700 sq/ft – 2000 sq/ft.
We’re seeing the growth of educated consumers looking to create a more sustainable lifestyle, which includes cannabis as a natural alternative to traditional medicine. In what ways do you look to incorporate LEED ID+C into your design or are there any other sustainable/green practices considered in your process?
While we will always look for opportunities to lower our carbon footprint, we have specific measures that we’ve implemented in our manufacturing facility and within our design and manufacturing process to capitalize on sustainability. We introduce and specify materials to clients such as our proprietary recycled powder coat finish that offers a unique design aesthetic for fixture and surface finishes.
What is your design process? Does the client set the vision of the space they would enjoy, is it collaborative or do you guide them toward the direction you think they should go? Is this unique to the cannabis industry?
Upon engaging with a client, we will identify their scope of work unique to their needs then provide them with a proposal for the design. We will then go through a series of steps starting with gathering requirements and objectives for their design, providing inspirational sketches and images to identify the look and feel that best represents their brand. Through this well-organized process and with client feedback, we will develop floor plans, elevations, fixture design and 3D images turning it into a final concept design package inclusive of colored renderings, material boards, floor plan, ceiling plan, lighting plan and elevations. We provide our client with a proposal for the fabrication of the fixtures and displays which is a seamless process to immediately move into the engineering and production phase wasting no time. Upon completion, we will ship and provide installation services and visual merchandising support when needed.
Inside Scarlet Fire Cannabis Co., a Grateful Dead-inspired cannabis dispensary that was designed by SevenPoint Interiors. Photo credit: Erin Leydon
Lighting is essential to pick up some of the intricacies of the merchandise. How do you go about creating an optimal lighting plan for a dispensary?
Lighting is one of the most important considerations impacting the overall consumer experience. It sets the tone and mood for the consumer from the moment they step into the dispensary. General and decorative lighting play a part of this process; however, it is all about the product. Product lighting can really enhance the sell through of the product and can be achieved in multiple ways. Whether it be strategically placed overhead lighting to highlight wall displays or tabletops, we can also provide integral lighting options within the wall systems and table tops creating an aura of light for your product and that extra pop you need to elevate the product merchandising.
Where is there space in retail cannabis to innovate the design approach?
COVID fears accelerated cannabis consumption. As we exit the pandemic, there is a return to experiential retail sweeping across the cannabis industry. There is a lot of retail/commercial space open in cities, and owners are looking to capitalize on the opportunity. The customer is ready to get back into stores. They are bored of being trapped at home and want to return to live events and experiences. Creating engaging and experiential shopping experiences with a purpose are still on the rise. We continue our efforts to strive and offer innovation in our design concepts down to the specific product display such as our proprietary Flower Globe and Capsule to help create that memorable experience and drive loyalty.
Is there anything specific about the cannabis industry that drove the demand for the creation of the module system?
When we entered the cannabis space, we recognized very quickly the need for a systematic approach to supporting a category of dispensary owners requiring an easy and cost-effective design and fixture/display solution that worked with their individual budget needs and drove speed to market. The Module Collection is a pre-engineered fixture and display system that we can customize based on individual client needs. The fact that it is pre-engineered using standardized dimensions means we can offer a branded flexible and adaptable solution with a faster turnaround than going the fully custom route that takes more time and money. The collection is available in standard and custom colors, a wide range of finishes, and infinite configurations.
Inside Scarlet Fire Cannabis Co., a Grateful Dead-inspired cannabis dispensary that was designed by SevenPoint Interiors. Photo credit: Erin Leydon
Beautiful accessories can enhance the cannabis experience. Can you speak more about your modular system line, how it developed and where you see it going?
Our Visual Merchandising System works hand in hand with our Module Collection. The components are intended for use with the system or independently. It’s simple, flexible and clean design offers a multitude of display and product storage options for under glass counters, on tabletops and shelving. Opportunities for product information placement as well as custom branding options exist to help educate the consumer during their experience. As with our Module Fixture System, we will continue to develop new elements to complement the existing collection offering fresh new ideas for fixture and visual merchandising displays.
How have COVID-19 safety precautions affected the retail shopping experience from a design perspective?
To follow COVID-19 regulations, we have had to be strategic in space planning to accommodate for social distancing. We also have to be creative when designing the modular fixtures because of this. Partition screens at the POS cash desks have become standard during this time. In the front of the store, we’ve had to integrate dedicated areas for curbside pickup to accommodate for increased online ordering. COVID-19 has taken away the sensory experience of cannabis retail. We aren’t allowed to touch or interact with the flower so that has been an obstacle that we’ve had to work around.
Thanks, Danielle, for sharing your expertise in retail design for the cannabis space! To learn more, visit SevenPointInteriors.com.
Starting September 1, the THC limit in cannabis products in Alaska will be increased to 10 milligrams per serving, doubling the current product limits, the Anchorage Daily News reports. The new rules put the state’s limit in line with that adopted in most other states with adult-use cannabis programs.
The new rules also raise the allowable amount of THC per package to 100 milligrams.
The rules were first approved in June and, at that time, Marijuana Control Board Chair Nicholas Miller said he didn’t consider the change “substantial.”
Tasha Grossl, the owner of cannabis edibles company Lady Gray, told the Daily News in an email that the new limits are “a big win for both the legal industry and the consumers.”
“Depending on the sizes and flavor profiles, some items will be a good fit with minor reformulations while others will take more work to have the desired flavors matching the desired potencies.”— Grossl in an email to the Daily News
Grossl added that the change will reduce the price per THC milligram for edibles in Alaska’s legal marketplace.
Alaska voters approved cannabis legalization in the state in 2014. In fiscal year 2020, cannabis-derived taxes reached $24.2 million in Alaska, representing 2.15% of the state’s tax collections, according to state Department of Revenue data.
