A month and a half into the legalization of recreational marijuana and the country’s cannabis shortage continues. Nonetheless, it’s been high times for a few more stores in Saskatchewan that opened their doors this week to consumers.
On Thursday, there was still line-ups out the door at The Pot Shack with folks eager to legally light up. The store opened two days prior and Geoff Conn said it had been a steady stream of cannabis customers since.
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“This is awesome! We’re pretty thrilled.”
Approximately 40 people can comfortably fit in the ‘cozy cottage’ themed space at any given time and the store is Saskatoon’s first cannabis retailer to welcome customers.
“Day one was nerve-racking the first half hour I thought the day should have been done but everyone has been really nice,” Conn said.
“But our customers made us feel at ease, we made them feel at ease and it’s been a lot of fun.”
With the help of a budtender, patrons pick from a marijuana menu. A breakdown of each strain, its concentrations of CBD and THC as well as the desired effect among other things.
They fill out their slip, take it to the counter and away they go with their recreational marijuana.
“We have 19 different strains of cannabis in our store, Monday of next week we’ll have 27,” Conn added.
By mid-December, they’ll be sitting at 40 different strains and have had several requests already from patrons.
“Wine stores just don’t have one bottle of wine -they’ve wines that 100 dollars a bottle and 10 dollars a bottle,” Conn explained.
“If we follow that model we’ve got some great premium strains that everyone is loving and value price strains for people that rather have the value.”
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There has been a bit of a hiccup though, The Pot Shack is having to ration its supply to a single purchase per customer.
“The limiting of the products just allows us to manage the products so we don’t close down the road.”
That isn’t the case for 5Buds Cannabis, it was ready to roll on Friday and launching a full-service store in Warman. The location marks the first of three in the province for the blossoming company and has sophisticated decor.
“I truly believe we are offering a very fashionable, stylistic building that my wife would refer to as the ‘Tiffany’s of Cannabis,’” 5Buds Cannabis retail general manager Corey Tyacke said.
The company purposefully pushed back its opening date, after wanting to conduct extensive consultations in the communities it would be operating.
Plus, a perk for clientele – the location has no restrictions on the number of items that can be purchased as long as it falls within the legal limit.
“They could buy up to their 30 gram limit, yes,” Tyacke laughed.
By the end of next week, the shop intends to have 25 strains in stock.
“We will not have any supply issues at all, we are very confident in our supply and we will not be running out or closing our doors during this whole process,” Tyacke explained.
Both stores say their next step is to expand to online sales in the coming days.
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