How California Will Change The Landscape Of The Weed Industry

Although the cannabis industry continues to expand rapidly, marijuana in the United States is still federally illegal, and that creates a number of unique challenges for cannabis business owners. Despite this, now that California has entered the game, cannabis companies have what it takes to revolutionize the industry in the U.S.

California launched its recreational marijuana program on Jan. 1. As the sixth largest economy in the world, people look to California for breakthroughs in virtually every industry. It’s home to Silicon Valley, world-class agriculture and now legal adult use cannabis.

California has Colorado and Washington to thank for paving the way. As the first states to legalize recreational cannabis, they created a roadmap for states like California to follow suit. As new states legalize, they’re leveraging the tried and tested regulations that other states introduced and making elements like 10 mg servings for marijuana products nearly a national standard.

Now that the entire West Coast has legalized marijuana sales, the East Coast could be next. The right-most dominoes are indeed beginning to fall; we saw New Jersey and Vermont adopt new marijuana policies last month, and New York called together a committee to review its own.

It seems that states are beginning to realize what we know to be true, which is that Marijuana legalization is not only widely supported but can help patients deal with chronic pain and disease and boost other state programs through additional tax revenue. With the momentum building, it also makes possible what we see as the future: a nation that embraces cannabis commerce, supported by a backbone of compliant tech.

The media in the U.S. tends to focus more heavily on the cannabis industry’s financial challenges rather than its strengths. But the truth is that cannabis is already breaking e-commerce barriers, testing limits that other more mature multi-billion dollar industries have not.

The reason for this is simple: Cannabis is an industry born in the time of technology. That means it is not subject to the same inefficiencies of other legacy industries. Cannabis will mature and scale using tools unavailable to so many industries that came before it.

Cannabis will set a new standard for how other established industries conduct commerce. Indeed, other industries will likely look to the efficiency, transparency, compliance and business intelligence with which marijuana companies operate and seek to emulate their operations.

Ryan G. Smith is the co-founder and CEO of LeafLink, a B2B e-commerce platform for cannabis.