The email went out to legal cannabis growers around Washington state, alerting them that another of their colleagues had gone under.
“Liquidation sale,” it said. Attached was a spreadsheet of items up for grabs: LED grow lights for $500 apiece. Rotary evaporators for hash oil, $10,000.
Across the Columbia River in Oregon, where the state’s top marijuana regulator recently warned of an “existential crisis” in the industry, it’s an open secret some licensed growers have funneled product to the out-of-state black market just to stay afloat.
California’s “Apple store of weed,” MedMen, is teetering with millions in unpaid bills, while the Canadian cannabis company Curaleaf has shuttered most of its cultivation operations in California, Oregon and Colorado.
Along the West Coast, which dominated U.S. marijuana production long before states began to legalize it, producers face what many call the failed economics of legal pot.
There is vast supply, thanks to great growing conditions and a wealth of expertise, but any surplus remains officially trapped within each state’s borders due to the federal ban on marijuana. Prices have plunged and producers have struggled.
“I’m at rock bottom,” said Jeremy Moberg, who owns CannaSol Farms in north-central Washington and, like many licensed growers, complains that the state’s 37% cannabis tax leaves virtually no profit margin for producers. “I’m tired of running a failing business.”
[Read more at AP]
Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *
Name *
Email *
Website
Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment.
Comment *
Notify me of follow-up comments by email.
Notify me of new posts by email.
Δ
The legal cannabis industry is thriving in the U.S., reaching its highest-ever number of jobs and sales, a new report shows. Vangst, a cannabis industry job platform, found that at…
Maine is the newest frontier for the illicit marijuana trade, with potentially hundreds of suspected unlicensed grow houses operating in the state, a CBS News investigation has found. It’s part…
Ten years ago this month, Iowa policymakers made it legal to use cannabis for certain medical treatment, marking the start of what would eventually become Iowa’s existing medical cannabidiol program.…
By Tom Hymes Remediation in the cannabis industry has become an increasingly hot topic as the practice has expanded in legal markets throughout the country, and for good reason. Remediation…