Ohio medical marijuana dispensaries get green light for recreational sales on Tuesday

Ohio medical marijuana dispensaries get green light for recreational sales on Tuesday

By: Sarah Donaldson | Statehouse News Bureau

Published in:
Saturday, August 3, 2024

< < Back to

COLUMBUS, Ohio (Capitol News Bureau) — After months of preparations and paperwork, some of Ohio’s medical marijuana dispensaries were given the green light to begin the state’s first non-medical sales on Tuesday.

More than one retail chain said they began receiving emails Friday notifying them that they had obtained dual-use operating certificates, the final piece of the puzzle for the start of recreational sales. Before Friday, only growers, processors and labs had the operating certificates, according to data from the Cannabis Enforcement Division.

Now, dispensaries in Ohio’s largest cities and smallest towns and villages have received the green light they’ve been waiting for. These include local chains like Ohio Cannabis Company and Terrasana and national ones like Trulieve and Cannabist Company.

“I’m so excited to be a part of this historic day,” Ohio Cannabis Company owner Brian Wingfield said in a statement. “If you had asked me nine years ago, I would have guessed we’d be lucky to have any medical cannabis, let alone recreational.”

Wingfield and other retailers have said long lines are almost guaranteed at first for elderly customers who do not need medical care.

“We will try to act as quickly as possible, but we will also make sure that we don’t make any dispensing mistakes or anything that could cause us to lose our license or anything like that. We hope that a lot of people come, but we also hope that a lot of people will be patient with us,” said Terrasana spokeswoman Nikki Stanley in an interview.

Stanley said the gap between when applications went out in June and when Terrasana actually obtained its operating certificate for its four branches allowed them to add additional staff and design marketing materials.

“Everything you can imagine has already been done because we were hoping it would be a little bit earlier, so we feel very prepared,” he said.

Rep. Jamie Callender (R-Concord), who has been heavily involved in cannabis policy at the state level, said sales could begin as early as June, but no later than September. Licensing ultimately took longer.

A spokesman for the Cannabis Control Division offered few details in a statement Friday afternoon, writing that the Division would make “a formal announcement on Monday.”

According to previous statistics from the Division, nearly 200 medical marijuana dispensaries had submitted applications for dual-use licenses. The spokesperson did not share how many would receive their operating certificates by Tuesday.