Clark County cannabis sales dip slightly in 2022
VANCOUVER, Wash. — Since legal marijuana first arrived on the scene in Clark County in 2014, sales have steadily risen, making it a prominent local industry. But not all news is great news for those in working in it.
There are 17 licensed retailers operating in the county, according to the Washington State Liquor and Cannabis Board. That’s a far cry from the one store the county had when Main Street Marijuana, which opened in downtown Vancouver in July 2014.
Not only have the number of retailers increased, so have sales, according to sales data from the cannabis board.
In 2015, Clark County retailers sold $27 million in product. That increased to $52.5 million in 2016, $71.1 million in 2017, $64.1 million in 2018, $62.6 million in 2019, and $74.3 million in 2020. The pandemic saw a large jump in sales — up to $93.3 million in 2021 — and have since fallen to $83.9 million in 2022.
It is worth noting that the county’s population has grown in that time. In 2015, Clark County was home to an estimated 459,495 people, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. In 2022 meanwhile, that number was an estimated 511,404.
Statewide, the picture is similar. Retailers sold $259.5 million in 2015, $786.4 million in 2016, $1.4 billion in 2017, $972.5 million in 2018, $1 billion in 2019, $1.3 billion in 2020, $1.5 billion in 2021 and $1.4 billion in 2022.
“Just based on the statistics alone that we have on our computer, it shows that we’ve grown quite a bit since even just last year,” said Drew Tippets, manager at Orchards Cannabis Market. The shop has been around for almost three years.
Still, there are challenges. The cost for marijuana has sunk. An eighth of an ounce of marijuana used to cost around $40 in 2016 and 2017, Tippets said. Now, the average cost is $20 to $25.
One of the reasons the price has dropped so low is the significant oversupply of raw cannabis flowers, said Aaron Pickus, spokesperson for the Washington CannaBusiness Association. That makes things difficult.
“It’s a robust marketplace,” Pickus said. But the increased sales from the pandemic have largely subsided, he added.
Those in the industry face many difficulties, from increased security costs to very high startup costs, not to mention the extremely high taxes, Pickus said.
Washington legalized recreational marijuana in 2012 along with Colorado, which became the first states to do so.
However, Washington has a 37% tax on the product — the highest excise tax in the country — with some local governments having additional taxes on it.
“Even though we’re a much, much, much smaller economy than in California, we have the second most tax revenues from cannabis in a legal state just because of how high the tax rate is,” he said.
“For a wide spectrum of reasons, what we’re hearing from our members — retailers, producers and processors — are that economic times are pretty tough,” Pickus said.
(TNS)
