Leaning against a store counter in Missouri, in the American Midwest, two sisters smell and weigh cannabis flowers.
Juree Burgett and Tanya Knight traveled about three hours from neighboring Kansas to buy cannabis, which is prohibited where they live.
“They won’t legalize it in Kansas, even for medical use,” Burgett, 64, says an annoyed.
The business is located in a depressed area of Kansas City, five minutes by highway from the border between Kansas and Missouri, a conservative state that has just legalized recreational cannabis.
The measure, voted by referendum in November, sparked an economic boom fueled by thousands of consumers from neighboring states, in these agricultural plains of the central United States.
Buying marijuana at this licensed store is “easier than getting it on the street” from an illegal vendor, Juree explains. Tanya nods.
Both leave the store with gum that contains THC, the active ingredient in cannabis, a common product in a country where half of the 50 states have decriminalized marijuana in some way.
Tanya was a pastry chef; Juree, dietitian, they’re both retired. Before the reform in Missouri, they used to go to Colorado for two days, a pioneer state in these matters. The one way alone took them eight hours.
The trip “cost us a lot of money, almost as much as marijuana. And now we’re going in three hours,” explains Tanya, a small package in hand and a smile.
For osteoarthritis and depression, “it really does you good. Really.”
– Drop by drop –
Seven of the eight states bordering Missouri ban recreational cannabis, so these out-of-town customers are the cash cow for local businesses. In this one, from the company Proper Cannabis, they make up more than half of the clientele.
“They come directly, from all sides. It’s crazy!” Confirms Chris Brown at the counter, who served the two sisters with multicolored caps and long hair.
Cannabis sales in Missouri reached $103 million in February, the first month since recreational use was approved, up from $37.2 million in January. In Missouri, the use of cannabis for medical purposes has been legal since the end of 2020.
“We were speechless,” says Jack Cardetti, spokesman for the Missouri Cannabis Trade Association (MoCann Trade), according to which the local cannabis market will reach $1.2 billion in one year.
Twenty minutes from the store, between frozen fields and huge logistics platforms, stands a hangar that lacks signs. Behind the cameras and a security post, there are nearly 2,800 square meters of cannabis plants.
Louie Sebald, the young manager of the establishment, says that within three weeks this industrial farm of the firm Illicit Gardens will produce, at full capacity, 680 kg of flowers per month.
The sun and rain do not enter the hangar. The ceiling is full of LED lamps, and there are drippers and sensors everywhere. A green light illuminates the corridors and dryers of this marijuana factory considered a true gold mine.
– Pre-rolled joints –
Sebald gives production costs: $400 per pound (450 grams). And the selling price of the product: $2,300 per pound (0.45 kilograms). “Do the math: it’s almost a $2,000-per-pound margin,” he gleefully.
Next to it, the shoots undergo an accelerated spring-summer-autumn cycle of 77 days. In the hallway, Shastyn Ketterman, an employee, prepares the barcode labels that she will affix to each floor.
Sebald, 35, does not stop doing job interviews. He must increase his staff from 130 to almost 170 employees. In the state, 13,000 people work in the sector, particularly in rural areas where industrial and agricultural jobs are disappearing.
The state does not start from scratch: Missouri has allowed cannabis for medical use for more than two years. The campaign for legalization, in the fall of 2022, built precisely on the success of that program, which created multiple jobs in the area.
In the end, more than 53% of the electorate supported the legalization of marijuana in Missouri, a traditionally right-wing state.
Under the green light of the marijuana factory, an employee shakes the THC-laden flowers to make sure they are not wet. In the opposite room, others are packing. The cannabis buds are processed and packaged directly here. One machine also makes pre-rolled joints, which sell like hot cakes.
“Let’s go buy one and stop somewhere to smoke,” says Tanya. “And then home.” Her sister smiles: “With that we will last the three hours of the trip!”.