July was an especially productive and profitable month for the marijuana industry, with retailers making record-breaking sales in at least four states.<\/p>\n
This is continuing a trend that\u2019s been observed in numerous states as cannabis markets have come online and matured. And it\u2019s all the more impressive considering how the industry has thrived even amid the coronavirus pandemic.<\/p>\n
In Illinois, Maine and Michigan, sales on adult-use marijuana products reached new highs in July. The same goes for Missouri\u2019s medical cannabis market.<\/p>\n
Here\u2019s a breakdown of the record month of marijuana sales in July:\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n The Prairie State saw nearly $128 million in recreational cannabis purchases<\/a> last month\u2014more than double the total monthly sales from a year ago.<\/p>\n People bought\u00a02,802,124 individual cannabis products in July, which represents another monthly record.<\/p>\n The Illinois Department of Financial and Professional Regulation reported that in-state residents bought $85 million in marijuana, or 69 percent, while out-of-state visitors accounted for $42 million in sales.<\/p>\n July marks the fifth consecutive month that sales in Illinois\u2019s adult-use market have topped $100 million. If the trend continues, the state is on track to see\u00a0more than $1 billion in adult-use marijuana sales<\/a>\u00a0in 2021.<\/p>\n That would mean a significant increase revenue for the state. Illinois sold about $670 million in cannabis last year and\u00a0took in $205.4 million in tax revenue<\/a>.<\/p>\n Illinois took in\u00a0more tax dollars from marijuana than alcohol<\/a> for the first time last quarter, officials reported in May. From January to March, Illinois generated about $86,537,000 in adult-use marijuana tax revenue, compared to $72,281,000 from liquor sales.<\/p>\n Adult-use marijuana sales reached $9.4 million in July\u2014a 45 percent increase from the prior month\u2019s record.<\/p>\n Cannabis business owners on the ground credit the Fourth of July holiday and tourism for the spike, The Portland Press Herald reported<\/a>.<\/p>\n The retail market for recreational cannabis launched in October<\/a> of last year, and it\u2019s steadily grown in popularity. July marks the first time that adult-use sales rivaled those of the state\u2019s older medical marijuana market.<\/p>\n And of course, these rising sales are contributing to tax revenue for the state. The Maine Office of Marijuana Policy reported $943,500 in cannabis sales tax revenue for July.<\/p>\n Michigan marijuana sales broke another record last month<\/a> with more than $171 million in cannabis transactions, according to data from a state regulatory body that was released last week.<\/p>\n There were $128 million in adult-use sales and $43 million in medical cannabis purchases in July.<\/p>\n The prior month saw $107 million recreation marijuana sales and $42 million for medical cannabis.<\/p>\n For July, the total sales translates into $23 million in tax revenue, some of which will go to infrastructure projects, public education and individual jurisdictions.<\/p>\n Last week, state officials also awarded $20 million in marijuana tax revenue to fund a pair of research projects<\/a>\u00a0meant to investigate the therapeutic potential of cannabis for military veterans with post-traumatic stress disorder.<\/p>\n Most of last month\u2019s recreational\u00a0sales\u00a0went to flower cannabis products ($63.5 million), followed by vape cartridges ($26.3 million) and edibles ($18.5 million).<\/p>\n For the first time, Missouri medical cannabis sales exceeded $20 million in July.<\/p>\n Analysts say<\/a> the record-breaking figures is largely attributable to a combination of new dispensaries opening and growing patient enrollment in the state\u2019s medical marijuana program.<\/p>\n With July\u2019s $21 million in cannabis sales, that raises the total medical marijuana purchases in the state to about $91 million for 2021.<\/p>\n Meanwhile, a\u00a0group of Missouri marijuana activists recently filed four separate initiatives to put marijuana reform on the state\u2019s 2022 ballot<\/a>, a move that comes as other advocacy groups are preparing separate efforts to collect signatures for cannabis ballot petitions of their own.<\/p>\n Still other activists are focusing on getting the legislature to pass a resolution to place the question of legalization before voters next year.<\/p>\n A recent scientific analysis of sales data in Alaska, Colorado, Oregon and Washington State found that marijuana purchases \u201chave increased more during the COVID-19 pandemic<\/a>\u00a0than in the previous two years.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cFindings show a general increase in cannabis sales following stay-at-home orders issued in AK, CO, OR, and WA in late March 2020,\u201d the report, published earlier this month in the International Journal of Drug Policy, says. \u201cIn all four states, those increases were greater than the percent increases observed in the preceding two years.\u201d<\/p>\n Throughout the pandemic, many states allowed cannabis retailers to remain open\u2014with governors and regulators in several markets\u00a0declaring marijuana businesses to be essential services<\/a>\u2014and some jurisdictions issued emergency rules allowing curbside pickup, delivery services or other more relaxed policies in order to facilitate social distancing.<\/p>\n An exception to the booming sales trend is Colorado, however, where purchases fell<\/a> again in June, the most recent month for which data is available.<\/p>\n Ohio Activists Submit Revised Marijuana Legalization Petition For 2022 Ballot After State Rejected Earlier Version<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n The post Four States Report Record-Breaking Marijuana Sales In July<\/a> appeared first on Marijuana Moment<\/a>.<\/p>\n
July was an especially productive and profitable month for the marijuana industry, with retailers making record-breaking sales in at least four states. This is continuing a trend that\u2019s been observed in numerous states as cannabis markets have come online and matured. And it\u2019s all the more impressive considering how theContinue Reading<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":458,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"false","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1335,18],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49451"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/458"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=49451"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49451\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":49452,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49451\/revisions\/49452"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=49451"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=49451"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=49451"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Illinois<\/h2>\n
Maine<\/h2>\n
Michigan<\/h2>\n
Missouri<\/h2>\n
These record-breaking sales reports have become a common theme across legal states amid the coronavirus pandemic.<\/h3>\n
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\nRead More: Four States Report Record-Breaking Marijuana Sales In July<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"