I've been in the Cannabis Industry for a few years now and one of the perks is being able to travel to legal rec states to get the pulse of what is going on as well as purchasing my favorite strains!
Recently someone asked me which city I thought consumed the most marijuana. My answer - L.A. is probably first just because of the size, population and recent rec legalization not to mention the entertainment industry and the fact that I’ve never met a person from CA that didn’t consume! Next, I chose Las Vegas. I was thinking about a recent visit to about a dozen dispensaries in Vegas (for research of course) where every dispensary, no matter what time of day, was busy! Since Vegas has millions of tourists a year I thought for sure they would be second over Denver just because of sheer tourist volume. And finally Denver, because it’s where adult use legalization began and well, it's Colorado.
It seems I was wrong - according to a recent article in the Cannabist, the number one city is New York! Frankly I was shocked. It’s a non legal state for adult usage and has pretty strict medical use regulations. In New York you cannot medically buy weed to smoke. Yet this recent Cannabist article states that New Yorkers consume 77.44 metric tons annually, more than twice the amount consumed in L.A. I found this staggering. Chicago came up third and Nevada didn’t even make the top ten list.
If this is true, it's an eye opener for me as I always believed, (as most people do) that in rec legal states, where marijuana is more easily available, that's where the most consumption occurred.
What does this all mean. Well I’m not really sure. I guess it depends on where you are in this industry. But what I do know is that you can use it as an opportunity to figure out what these stats will mean to your life, neighborhood and business or simply add it to your arsenal of education about how and where people consume.
This further proves to me there there are still so many misconceptions about this industry and we are finding out and learning more everyday. Although I trust the Cannabist sources, I think I'm going to look into this a little more.
My advice, keep reading and sorting through all of the data and don’t take anything for granted. If you want to read more here is the link: https://www.thecannabist.co/
Stay informed and as always happy consuming!
Thank you to Abdiel Ibarra for our blog cover pict
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