Category: Industry News

A non-profit group of over 150 current and former athletes is calling for marijuana to be removed form the World Anti-Doping Agency's prohibited substances list. Medical marijuana legalization is spreading across the US, but most pro-athletes are still prevented from accessing it. That's because most major sports leagues follow drug guidelines set by the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA), which bans athletes from using cannabis even outside of competition. Players can receive suspensions if caught using…

LOS ANGELES — Potheads have for decades celebrated their love of marijuana on April 20, but the once counter-culture celebration that was all about getting stoned now is so mainstream Corporate America is starting to embrace it.
No, Hallmark doesn’t yet have a card to mark “420.” But many other businesses inside and outside the multibillion-dollar cannabis industry are using April 20, or 4/20, to roll out marketing and social media messaging aimed at connecting with consumers driving the booming market.
Today, Lyft is offering a $4.20 credit on a single ride in Colorado and in select cities in the U.S. and Canada. Carl’s Jr. is using a Denver restaurant to market a hamburger infused with CBD, a nonintoxicating molecule found in cannabis that many believe is beneficial to their health.
On 420 last year, Totino’s, a maker of frozen pizza snacks, tweeted an image of a microwave and an oven with the message: “To be blunt, pizza rolls are better when baked.”
“I think brands that associa..

It’s probably not a good idea — and it can’t be great for productivity — but that’s not stopping a lot of Washingtonians from doing it.
I’m talking about getting high at work.
One in four marijuana users who are employed admit to doing this within the past year, according to a new survey of cannabis consumers in Washington, Oregon and Colorado, three states where recreational weed is legal.
One in four also said they’ve gotten high before work.
The marketing communications firm Quinn Thomas, which has offices in Seattle and Portland, funded the survey, which was conducted by polling-and-opinion outfit DHM Research. A representative sample of 900 cannabis consumers were interviewed — 300 in each of the three states — from Jan. 8 to 14. The survey has a margin of error of plus or minus 3.3 percent.
“There is a lot of information out there about the cannabis industry and its regulatory structure, but not much is known about consumers,” said Zach Knowling, vice president at Quinn Thom..

The joint you smoked last night won’t give you schizophrenia. It also won’t make you assault your neighbor.
You might not know that after reading a recent New Yorker article that draws connection between marijuana use, schizophrenia and violent crimes in Washington.
In the article — “Is Marijuana as Safe as We Think?” — writer Malcolm Gladwell focused on a 2017 report by the National Academy of Medicine that examined the scientific evidence of the health effects and therapeutic purposes of cannabis and cannabinoids. Gladwell’s article also draws on a new book by former New York Times reporter Alex Berenson called “Tell Your Children: The Truth about Marijuana, Mental Health and Violence.”
Gladwell’s article and a subsequent New York Times op-ed by Berenson, was quickly rebuked by marijuana researchers and legalization advocates, who took issue with Gladwell’s selective use of data and Berenson’s linking marijuana use to schizophrenia.
Beatriz Carlini, a senior research scientist at..

TALKEETNA, Alaska — The presence of a marijuana retail store has caused a deep divide in this quirky tourist town, where hundreds of visitors roam the streets daily browsing in art galleries and souvenir shops housed in historic cabins.
Most of Talkeetna’s stores line the two long blocks that make up its Main Street, where tourists — many who arrive in Alaska on cruise ships and are bused about two hours north from Anchorage — wander into storefronts like Nagley’s General Store for ice cream or slip through its back door for a cold one at the West Rib Bar and Grill.
At Main Street’s opposite end, near a river park where visitors snap photos of the continent’s tallest mountain, is Talkeetna’s newest venture into the tourism trade. The High Expedition Co. is a nod to the rich mountain climbing history of the eclectic community purported to be the inspiration for the 1990s television series “Northern Exposure.”
Talkeetna’s first marijuana retail store is causing a rift not seen in othe..

JUNEAU, Alaska — Governors in at least two states that have legalized recreational marijuana are pushing back against the Trump administration and defending their efforts to regulate the industry.
Alaska Gov. Bill Walker, a one-time Republican no longer affiliated with a party, sent a letter to U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions this week asking the Department of Justice to maintain the Obama administration’s more hands-off enforcement approach to states that have legalized the drug still banned at the federal level.
It comes after Sessions sent responses recently to the governors of Alaska, Colorado, Oregon and Washington, who asked him to allow the pot experiments to continue in the first four states to legalize recreational marijuana. Sessions detailed concerns he had with how effective state regulatory efforts have been or will be.
Washington state also responded to Sessions this week. Gov. Jay Inslee said the attorney general made claims about the situation in Washington that ..

NEWPORT, Ore. — Eddie Biggar sports a black-and-green suit dotted with tiny green leaves as he dances jovially on a corner of the Pacific Coast Highway.
Some two-and-a-half hours southwest of Portland, he owns the sidewalk. Just like a sign-waiver might promote the local pizzeria, The Weedman boasts $5 grams, urging customers down the street to CannaMedicine.
The state has licensed pot dealers in every Oregon county bordering the Pacific Ocean, with the highest number near the beach here in Lincoln County, state data show. But there’s little so far to suggest marijuana is changing the coastal economy, which is already largely fueled by tourism.
Still, there’s no question many out-of-towners are heading into coastal pot shops. Retailers say they’ve seen people from China, Mexico, the Dominican Republic and South Korea.
“I’ve never seen so many different IDs in my life,” Shane Ramos-Harrington said in Touch of Aloha, his Hawaii-themed marijuana outpost in the area of Depoe Bay, a com..

WASHINGTON — Attorney General Jeff Sessions has warned of a crackdown on marijuana. But documents obtained by The Associated Press show he’s getting no fresh avenues from a special task force formed to find the best strategy.
Instead, the Trump administration task force is offering familiar suggestions to Sessions. Those include continuing to review whether to change or rescind the more hands-off policies of the Obama era, which allowed the nation’s legal pot industry to flourish.
Advocates and some members of Congress had long feared the recommendations would give Sessions a green light to try to take down the multimillion-dollar industry.
Sessions has compared marijuana to heroin and blamed its legalization for violence.
He is not bound by the task force recommendations, but any federal crackdown would be difficult politically and practically.

LOS ANGELES — Billions of dollars are expected to flow through California’s legitimate marijuana industry next year when recreational pot becomes legal, but most of those businesses won’t be able to use banks.
The reason: Many banks don’t want anything to do with pot money for fear it could expose them to legal trouble from the federal government, which still lists marijuana as illegal — and regulates the banking industry. There is uncertainty over how the Trump administration will react.
Because of those fears, pot dispensary operators in the 29 states where the drug is legal, either for medical or recreational purposes, often find themselves nervously handling obscene amounts of cash.
During the Obama administration, the Justice Department issued guidelines to help banks avoid federal prosecution when dealing with pot businesses in states where the drug is legal.
But most banks don’t see those rules as a shield against charges that could include aiding drug trafficking. And they ..

SEATTLE — Washington Attorney General Bob Ferguson says he’s disappointed with a letter from U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions about the state’s efforts to regulate marijuana.
In a letter dated July 24 , Sessions pointed out to Ferguson and Gov. Jay Inslee that a 2013 Justice Department memo which was interpreted as clearing the way for states to regulate marijuana did not preclude federal prosecution. Sessions also highlighted a 2016 report from a federally funded drug enforcement organization that raised questions about how effectively the state is controlling the industry.
Sessions asked Ferguson and Inslee to provide information about how they’re addressing the issues raised in the report.
In a written statement Friday, Ferguson said the U.S. attorney general’s letter relies on “incomplete, inaccurate and out-of-date information” about Washington’s marijuana regulations. He added that “any action from the Department of Justice short of allowing our well-regulated, voter-approv..

The most rigorous study yet of the effects of marijuana legalization has identified a disturbing result: College students with access to recreational cannabis on average earn worse grades and fail classes at a higher rate.
Economists Olivier Marie and Ulf Zolitz took advantage of a decision by Maastricht, a city in the Netherlands, to change the rules for “cannabis cafes,” which legally sell recreational marijuana. Because Maastricht is very close to the border of multiple European countries, drug tourism was posing difficulties for the city. To address this, the city barred noncitizens of the Netherlands from buying from the cafes.
This policy change created an intriguing natural experiment at Maastricht University, because students there from neighboring countries suddenly were unable to access legal pot, while students from the Netherlands continued.
The research on more than 4,000 students, published in the Review of Economic Studies, found that those who lost access to legal ma..

One year into the merged medical and recreational marijuana market, the reviews are mixed.
State officials say the new medical system has been a positive step. Store owners say the new setup hasn’t been effective.
But everyone agrees on one thing: Far more people are using marijuana medicinally than the 24,000 people statewide who have registered under the new law.
“The patients that are using it for medical reasons aren’t seeing a savings enough to substantiate doing what the state wants them to do,” said Loren Carlson, owner of Cannabis Country Store in Battle Ground. “The state’s not giving the medical patients enough of a break.”
The goal of the Cannabis Patient Protection Act (Senate Bill 5052) was to bring medical and recreational marijuana producers, processors and retail stores together under the regulation of the Washington State Liquor and Cannabis Board.
The new law, which went into effect July 1, 2016, aligned the largely unregulated medical market with the recreationa..