Canadian cannabis sales have grown 157% from May 2020 to May 2023, according to a report from cannabis intelligence firm Headset. While sales have increased year-over-year, sales growth from 2022 and 2023 was 11.8%, compared to 88.3% from 2020 to 2021, the report says.
Over the last year, cannabis flower sales in Canada decreased 15.8% while pre-roll sales have grown by 23.5%, bringing the category nearly even with flower, according to Headset. Vape pens saw a 7.1% sales increase, beverages a 5.2% increase, and concentrates a 1.6% increase. Sales of capsules fell 7.8%, topicals 19.6%, and oil 23%. The sales of tinctures and sublingual products fell from 0.1% to 0.0%.
The report also found a 369% increase in the number of brands in the Canadian cannabis market from 2020 to 2023, but the market is becoming more concentrated. In 2021, the top 21% percent of brands captured 80% of total sales – that figure was 12% so far this year.
“But with all of these new players entering the game, is there enough sales growth to support them or is tightening competition stymieing their success? Store count growth has added more available real estate for these brands, however, it doesn’t seem to be enough to spread the wealth across all new entrants. Between 2020 and 2023, the median total sales per brand dropped by 70%. Additionally, the total sales in the market have become significantly more concentrated by a subset of top brands.” — Canadian cannabis overview: a look at the last 5 years of recreational sales, Headset, June 27, 2023
Flower prices have also flattened since the start of 2022 following several years of price compression, according to the report, while the prices of edibles with higher THC levels saw a 25.3% price reduction as their popularity rose.
Customers are also spending less per trip, as the average basket size has decreased 15.6% over the last two years and the number of products per basket dropped by 5.1%, the report says.
Data for the report came from real-time sales reporting by participating cannabis retailers via their point-of-sale systems, which are linked with Headset’s business intelligence software.
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