Cannacurio: COVID-19 Doesn't Slow Licensing - From Maine to Oklahoma to Florida

Business, schools and some government offices have closed down or reduced resources but we’ve still seen a few bright and interesting spots of license issuance. In the last week Maine issued their first conditional licenses while Oklahoma has continued to generate licenses across the value chain and we dig into alligators in the Florida CBD Processor Market.

Maine

Maine issued 31 conditional licenses last week covering cultivation, manufacturing and retail. Some industry watchers have pointed out that this state has taken the longest to implement as Maine voters approved the adult use, retail sale and taxation of marijuana way back in November 2016.

Maine’s program has been unique in many ways. Their medical program issued 8 dispensary licenses and currently has 2,634 caregivers. In researching the companies with conditional licenses, many of them are already in business with established websites, Facebook accounts and customers. They’ve been operating as caregivers and are already a part of the cannabis infrastructure.

Why Is This Important?

It makes Maine a little bit like California. California had collectives that operated as local dispensaries throughout the state. When legalization came these organizations and the professionals that worked their transitioned into a regulated, mainstream business (successfully or not is a fair question). Compare this to other states that implement limited license medical programs with high fees and hurdles where it takes close to a year to get cannabis on shelves. I think Maine will be more like California than Maryland.

One other observation from looking at the list of conditional licenses and applicants – we have not spotted any MSO’s in the mix. They might be lurking in an LLC somewhere but few may want to complete in such an established and sparsely populated state.

Oklahoma

Although we have seen a slowing down of license issuance in OK, there are still people willing to part with $2,500 for their shot at the green rush. $912,500 in licensing fees purchased this collection of 365 licenses:

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The Sooner State is now home to 2,362 dispensaries which is one for every 1,669 residents. In New York it is one dispensary for every 500,000.

Florida

Last week I wrote about Florida licensing retail food establishments that were permitted to sell CBD. Since then we’ve added 322 licenses of companies who can process CBD into food. Florida has 28 different categories of Food Establishments that includes Wholesale Bakeries, Cold Storage and Honey Processor – but the most notable would be Alligator Processor – and there is only one in the whole state:

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Why Does This Matter?

It doesn’t. They’ve answered the question that no one asked – but will it still taste like chicken?Cannabiz Media customers can stay up-to-date on these and other new licenses through our newsletters, alerts, and reports modules. Subscribe to our newsletter to receive these weekly reports delivered to your inbox. Or you can schedule a demo for more information on how to access the Cannabiz Media License Database yourself to dive further into this data.Cannacurio is a weekly column from Cannabiz Media featuring insights from the most comprehensive license data platform.