‘No excuse’ for New York State’s strict cannabis marketing regulations (Guest Column)

This post was originally published on this site.

This guest column is from Colin Decker, owner and founder of 7 SEAZ, New York’s first legacy-to-legal adult-use cannabis brand, and owner of Hudson Valley-based Sensei Growth Consulting. The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author, and do not necessarily reflect the views or positions of NY Cannabis Insider.

On my way to an airport in New York, I walked past countless brightly lit liquor stores decorated for the holidays with shelves of heavily marketed and illuminated bottles of booze. Windows clear of any frosted glass and no excessive prevention methods in place to prevent the under-21 crowd from seeing the products that are for sale.

Billboards and digital marketing materials on every corner, front and center in Time Square for all to see – including the youth that will inherit New York.

Many have questioned why the now legal cannabis market is so excessively over regulated from a marketing standpoint and almost demonized in its existence by those who have written the rules. I decided to try and find a more explanatory reason to give my fellow brand owners, store owners and industry operators who are handcuffed from being able to compete against the black and grey market operators that have seized control over New York’s cannabis market due to the lack of enforcement against them by all authorities.

As a former legacy operator, I want to make one thing clear: the vast majority of operators in the illicit market these days are not legacy, but opportunistic individuals and groups who see that the state is doing nothing to curtail the non-licensed operations and taking full advantage of this lack of enforcement.

California is a state that has been through just about every scenario and problem in regards to standing up, redrafting regulations, executing ideas and implementing changes to make a cannabis market functional while competing against one of the biggest illicit markets that existed in the United States, second to New York.

Upon landing in Los Angeles, I thought I would be blasted by countless ads and offers to purchase legal cannabis at insanely cheap prices. This was not the case at all.

The first noticeable difference between our markets is that California stores can offer deals on products, including overall purchase cost discounts to entice first-time shoppers to visit certain dispensaries. This is visible in the above photo where ounces can be seen on sale for $50 as a “doorbuster” special. With green Wednesday right around the corner, I figured sales advertising would have been at its peak, as this is the biggest sales day of the year for licensed retailers.

Once again, not the case.

I only saw one billboard advertisement in Los Angeles that showcased a licensed dispensary and it was by far classier than any liquor ad. This is another stark difference between our New York market and the west – we are not allowed to market via billboards. Other forms of advertising such as magazines, television and radio ads can be done as long as the store can assure that the market audience is expected to be at least 90% 21+ years of age, and how is that supposed to be possible?

It appears that the Office of Cannabis Management is afraid that marketing an already legal product would corrupt the youth, drive the public insane or have people spend more money on cannabis instead of alcohol. If we are legal then why are we still hiding in the shadows and behind frosted glass windows? The state’s lack of enforcement against those breaking the marketing, advertising and packaging regulations, along with out-of-state product being brought in, is already rampant across the New York legal marketplace, so I would not be surprised if some retailers test the waters with upcoming holiday deals and sales to entice their customers to spend more. I can’t blame them either when this market is designed to fail for the small operator to begin with, and store owners have no outlet to fairly compete with illicit stores and operators.

So some may have to do what they need to do in order to keep the Christmas lights on this year.

After I nearly died on a runaway LAX shuttle bus (much like the movie Speed) and saved a stranger’s life from unexpected cardiac arrest (this experience would require another guest column just to explain what I went through), it was definitely time to visit a storefront and see what the future looked like for product offerings, retail storefront design and customer experience.

Having been to nearly every licensed New York retail outlet in existence, I feel confident in being able to craft a comparative opinion on these East/West coast establishments.

Upon entering the California dispensary, I was greeted by security and asked for my personal identification, and could enter the sales floor after being cleared. This runs directly in line with how New York handles customer entry security protocol.

As visible in the above photo, a drastic differentiation between East and West Coast is this humanitarian idea that product can be put out in the open (it is live/real product, not fake empty packaging) and consumers will behave like adults. Why are we hiding what is legal and purchasable by consumers in New York behind glass and locked cages, leading to many unhappy consumers once they walk out the door? I can touch every can of beer in a supermarket and a parent can also walk into a grocery store with their child – and if not paying attention, the child can easily grab a can of beer thinking it is a soda – without a security officer checking ID at the door.

Pricing was certainly a stark difference between recreational in New York and California with full gram concentrate vape cartridges going for $25 compared to $80+ in NY, and solventless hash rosin concentrate going for $45 per gram compared to $110+ by NY operators.

Only two products of outdoor and greenhouse flower were available across all the stores I visited in California. All other product was indoor grown and in a state that can handle year-round production in greenhouses much easier compared to New York. It makes one wonder about the future of NY’s product offerings, and the state’s concerns about energy usage for indoor facilities.

Indoor prices are so low and customers are getting better quality weed than ever before for a fraction of the price. This is the opposite of New York, where quality has tapered and many operators await indoor offerings to be sold before they go all-in on investments, and many out of state brands take the plunge here as well. This is allowing the legal stores to compete against the streets in California where offerings on both sides are not vastly different from one another.

Talking with New York industry operators on the legal side about current challenges and feelings towards the industry here, the common sentiment is that we are allowed to sell weed, but yet we cannot talk and/or advertise to our customers about it – and this is bull. People on the street are not allowed to see into the dispensary for fear of them seeing product on display? Signs outside of stores can only showcase specific elements of the dispensary, once again preventing fully licensed operators from being able to showcase their identity to consumers while the liquor store next door can have 35 neon beer signs, or the well-lit sticker shop can have neon weed leaves under its awning down the block.

Medical operators in New York State can have sales, discounts, deals and loyalty point programs for their customers, and market accordingly, but recreational cannot. In just the last two days I have received at least five email blasts advertising discounts on New York medicinal cannabis from countless retailers regarding Black Friday and Cyber Monday offerings including up to 25% off an entire in-store purchase.

So recreational weed is not allowed to play on the same battlefield as medicinal cannabis, as a drug store selling opioids like hotcakes, or liquor stores slinging tequila and White Lightnin’ by the bottle. We can no longer ignore the truth that this is designed to only HURT retailers and the farmers/brand owners of our state. This does not help anyone.

I witnessed first-hand in just the last week how an entire state was able to survive for the last seven years after legalizing recreational cannabis, and it is clear as day that the marketing and sales strategies allowed by the state did not hurt the general public; the youth were not affected negatively; and the operators had a fair chance at fighting back against the illicit operators using the license that they earned, paid for and continue to pay for alongside generating healthy tax revenues for the state in which they are located.

We cannot sit idly by anymore and watch a program be gutted from the inside out, leaving all of us in the recreational market afloat on a life raft at sea with only one paddle to make it back to shore.

The market in California is barely recognizable to what it once was. It is such a small microcosm of what it once was. We all have heard it before, touted proudly by the OCM, that they “learned” from other states that have done this before. I still do not believe this to be the case.

I suggest all of those who have a hand in writing these laws book a trip out west to any legal state and see for themselves what anyone else will see. That this has all been one big sham and we have been gaslighted into believing that the OCM has utilized any real data from practical and real-life market optics as opposed to listening and utilizing paid consultants to craft their rules and regulations.

I will never believe that a real grower of cannabis at scale, that dispensary operators from other states and those who have successfully navigated these recreational waters were consulted by the New York State government in any way, shape or form. This program has continuously been slapped together since Day One.

The “thank you,” “we know how hard you all have been working,” and the “we applaud the OCM” statements at every CCB meeting make me want to hurl. This plane was never built to begin with, it was only ever a drawing on a chalkboard by an animal in a zoo. These employees of the state are paid handsomely, some in excess of $200,000 per year – salaries with full state benefits – to do one thing: make this program work. They have yet to succeed in the slightest and it’s been over two years going. They sold us all a dream; it is now time we wake up to the truth.

Let those who are licensed and regulation-abiding sell cannabis products the way that all other product retailers are allowed to sell. There is no excuse remaining for why a licensed dispensary cannot advertise that it sells weed. California is still alive, earthquakes and all. New York should be no different. We are the biggest market in the world for a reason.