5 signs pot is about to become big business
11 hours ago
h-fwm;slk:follow;elm:icn;itc:0;cpos:1;ct:16;elmth-tu-flw;cpos:1" href="http://www.tumblr.com/follow/amsterdamamerica" target="_blank">Follow on TumblrIn its eighth and final season, Showtime’s “Weeds” depicted the growth of Big Marijuana in America, ending with lead character Nancy Botwin selling her chain of marijuana shops to Starbucks. Now the future “Weeds” predicted in 2012 is almost here.
Here are 5 signs the American pot business is on the verge of a big growth spurt.
1. Marijuana just got its own credit union.
Colorado just approved the creation of the world’s first financial institution for the legal cannabis industry.
The Fourth Corner Credit Union could open as early as next year and would solve marijuana’s cash problem. Marijuana has largely been an all cash business because banking laws limit the legal pot industry’s access to financial institutions.
Colorado’s Fourth Corner Credit Union is still awaiting approval from federal regulators but can open for business while that process is pending.
It already has a transit routing number and will soon have a master account at the Federal Reserve.
2. States aren’t waiting for the federal government.
Across the U.S., states are softening their stances on pot as they watch Washington and Colorado profit from recreational marijuana.
Voters in Oregon and the District of Columbia recently approved legalization measures, and California Attorney General Kamala Harris has said she expects California to eventually legalize marijuana.
Almost half of the U.S. has legalized some form of medical marijuana, and highly lucrative recreational marijuana also is also growing in popularity.
A Georgia senator is pushing his state to follow in Colorado’s footsteps. Massachusetts, Maine, Vermont and Hawaii also are eying legalization measures for recreational marijuana.
3. Commercialization has arrived.
Bob Marley may have been dead for decades, but his family now wants to turn him into the ”Marlboro Man of Marijuana.”
Marley’s estate has teamed up with the private equity group Privateer Holdings to mass-produce “heirloom Jamaican cannabis” for the U.S. market. Marley Natural will be grown in Canada, where Privateer owns the world’s largest marijuana grow farm.
Meanwhile, a staple of American commercialization, Black Friday will soon include doorbuster sales on marijuana.
One Denver dispensary plans to sell ounces of “decent quality pot” for the equivalent of about $1 a joint.
4. The media is embracing legalization.
The New York Times has come out in support of marijuana legalization. The Pulitzer Prize-winning Denver Post has launched the Cannabist, a site geared toward all things marijuana, and mainstream health and fitness magazine Men’s Journal has published a recipe for marijuana-infused energy bars.
Meanwhile, pot business reality shows have begun making their way to television.
Online, “The Marijuana Show” pits marijuana entrepreneursagainst one another Shark Tank-style. CNN is launching “High Profits,” a program that follows a Colorado couple who dream of becoming “moguls of marijuana,” next year. And TruTV is working on a reality series about a Colorado family who runs a legal marijuana production facility.
In the growing pot-umentary arena, MSNBC’s “Pot Barons of Colorado" delves into the lives of three Colorado pot tycoons cashing in on a green rush.
5. Vape is the Oxford Dictionaries 2014 Word of the Year.
A couple of marijuana-related terms made the shortlist for Word of the Year, but vape — the process of inhaling and exhaling vapors produced by e-cigarettes or cannabis oil vape pens —ultimately won.
Here’s what lexicographer Katherine Martin, who was involved in the selection of the Oxford Dictionaries 2014 Word of the Yeartold the New York Times:
“The growing popularity of e-cigarettes, combined with the legal cannabis industry, created a perfect storm. ”
Budtender, think bartender but for legal marijuana, was another Word of the Year contender.