(The Center Square) – With an array of products, legal cannabis dispensaries are getting Illinois marijuana consumers to dump their illegal dealers and buy retail.
About 113 dispensaries now operate across the state, leading to booming adult use cannabis sales in Illinois. In 2022, legal cannabis sales totaled $1.5 billion, the Illinois Department of Financial and Professional Regulation saidd.
“Consistently, month after month, we have seen an increase in sales,” said Jason Erkes of Sunnyside Dispensaries in Chicago. He told The Center Square that buyers like the quality, the safety and the selection they find in the legal cannabis dispensaries.
“More people are switching from the illicit drug market to the regulated market because there is a wider variety of products to buy and people like the safety,” Erkes said.
Most customers go to Sunnyside to get products for a recreational buzz, Erkes said. That is the most traditional way to consume cannabis. But not everybody is interested in getting high.
As Erkes tells it, Sunnyside is selling “wellness” and likens the Sunnyside dispensaries to Whole Foods and GNC stores rather than liquor stores.
People want cannabis products to manage pain and anxiety, and to help them get a good night’s sleep, he said.
“We are trying to normalize the cannabis buying experience so that people have the same experience walking into a cannabis store as they do at any other wellness retailer,” Erkes said.
The diversity of people who come through the doors of cannabis dispensaries surprises some people, he said.
“We have grandmothers and college students. We have construction workers and professionals,” Erkes said.
The key to having a positive experience with cannabis is education, he said. At Sunnyside, trained staff members are there to guide people to a positive experience.
“A lot of consumers who are looking for a wellness benefit don’t want to smoke and don’t want to inhale something,” he said. “We see a lot of people buying edibles and micro dosing edibles. That way, they get a very low-dose edible that they can take consistently without getting that euphoric high.”
Cannabis can make people uncomfortable if they do not get the right dose, Erkes warned.
“We get people to start low and start slow,” he said. “Nobody wants to consume too much. You can’t take it away once you have consumed it.”
Because of the opioid crisis, the medical profession has gotten increasingly restrictive about prescribing pain medication. More chronic pain patients are turning to cannabis, Erkes said.
“We see so many people that are looking for a more natural way to deal with their pain,” Erkes said. “It’s less addictive. They don’t want harmful side effects.”
Cannabis can be helpful to chemotherapy patients who experience nausea, he said.
This year looks to be another banner year for Illinois cannabis sales. There are 189 conditional licensees who are in the process of receiving their full dispensary licenses from IDFPR.
A recent study from Temple University announced in November by the group Smart Approaches to Marijuana showed that youth marijuana use increases after recreational legalization. The study will be published in the Addictive Behaviors journal in March 2023, the group said.
“Perhaps the most alarming finding in this study is the increase in [cannabis use prevalence] and decrease in CUD treatment utilization,” said Dr. Kevin Sabet, President and CEO of Smart Approaches to Marijuana. “There is no question that CUD is stigmatized and proponents of legalization have told us that legalizing marijuana will lead to more and better treatment options for those struggling with a substance abuse disorder. This study shows that in reality, legalization normalizes use and creates heavy users who are less likely to seek help.”
