After trimming and drying a harvest, the next step for cultivation businesses is to cure, package, and store their product.

Here is a brief overview of each process and some tips for success:

Curing

Curing is a method that helps bring out the unique flavors and aromas of cannabis. It can also positively affect the smokability of the final product. Unlike drying, whose primary objective is the rapid removal of moisture from the plant, curing deals more with the slow transformation of compounds within the flower.

Like cured tobacco or aged wine, cannabis can get better over time—but only under the right conditions.

Curing usually happens in a sealed container that is periodically “burped” by hand or de-gassed with automated equipment. This allows CO2 and moist air to leave the curing container as chlorophyll slowly breaks down within the dry flower. This process should happen in a cool, dark, and relatively dry place, with temperatures in the mid-60 degrees Fahrenheit and humidity levels around 55-65%.

Most growers would agree that the longer the cure, the better. But how long is too long? Like most things cannabis, there are varying and passionate opinions.

Some cannabis connoisseurs believe that nothing less than a six-month cure is ideal. Although that may be true, logistically, it is difficult for commercial operators to accommodate this time frame with every harvest.

Juggling available space and storing several batches of cannabis over six months is difficult.

For one, most operators don’t want to wait 180 days to realize revenue after already spending 120 days to grow the crop. They want their money sooner than later.

Furthermore, a lot can happen in six months. If the person in charge of the process is inexperienced and conditions aren’t properly monitored, the extra time in curing won’t help—and can actually hurt—the final product.

For most commercial growers, a six-month cure simply isn’t an option. Two to four weeks is more realistic. This shorter cure strikes a balance between quality, storage logistics, and revenue.

When it comes to selecting a curing container, keep the following tips in mind:

• Avoid plastic buckets. They’re not as airtight as you might think, and they can negatively affect the aroma of your cannabis.

• Glass jars work well, but usually just on a small scale. Burping hundreds of glass jars can be challenging.

• Use metal containers with lids that seal airtight. They’re easy to use and stack nicely for long-term curing or storage.

Packaging

Nitrogen gas is a common way to package dried cannabis. Nitrogen gas replaces oxygen, thereby helping to delay the degradation process. This is useful for packaging into retail-ready, airtight containers of one eighth or quarter ounces. These are typically white-labeled and then shipped or stored.

Vacuum sealing cannabis is another popular option. Like nitrogen, this process delays degradation by minimizing the amount of oxygen in the bag. The typical bag size holds about 2 pounds, and the goal is to remove enough air without crushing the product.

Bags of vacuum-sealed cannabis are compact, so they can easily be stacked, stored in bins, or filed on shelves like library books. Vacuum sealing allows more product to be transported within a given space while protecting it against crushing damage.

Vacuum sealing is ideal for holding cannabis for relatively short periods, for example, if a grower is awaiting the results of a laboratory test before selling.

Storing dry cannabis flowers

In theory, nitrogen and vacuum sealing can allow cannabis flowers to be stored for a long time. Still, cannabis really shouldn’t be held under any conditions for longer than six months. The longer dry flower sits after harvest, the more could go wrong.

Mold is the number one threat, and it can irreversibly change the smell and taste of your product. With time, the color of dry cannabis flower changes too. Experienced consumers know that cannabis cured for a long time loses most of its green hue, but less knowledgeable consumers may be turned off by brown cannabis.

But some instances may require operators to hold their product for several months. For example, when a grower wants to save their product to sell when there’s more demand. Holding on to the fall harvest until winter, when there is less available supply, may favor the grower.

Conclusion

Regardless of the curing, packaging, or storage method, the fundamentals for success are the same: remove oxygen and store in airtight containers in a dark, cool, and moderately dry space.

But if you’re growing cannabis flower that you can’t sell within a few weeks of it being finished, your focus shouldn’t be on the storage method; it should be on why you aren’t selling what you grow.

Whether it’s due to quality issues, poor genetics, or low demand, you might be better off investigating the root cause of the need to store rather than finding the best way to keep it.

Remember: the best growers with desirable genetics in the hottest market don’t have this problem. Their product is sold out before it’s done drying.

This should be the goal for any cultivation business. If you’re juggling product to make space for the next harvest because the last one is still in your vault, you’ve likely got a problem that goes deeper than long-term storage.
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Strive for Post-Harvest Success: Part 1

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