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Jonesing to fill up that little glass Mason jar tucked in the back of your closet before April 20?
Don’t bother leaving Massachusetts.
As of this year’s national unofficial marijuana holiday — 4/20 — Massachusetts boasts the least-expensive adult-use cannabis prices in the state since legalization, not to mention what appears to be the cheapest weed in all of New England.
The average price for an eighth of flower is about $19, according to data over the last month from the Massachusetts Cannabis Control Commission, which shows prices are down from about $50, where they were three years ago.
Bay State business is also booming beyond bud in sales for vape products, the state’s second favorite way to consume cannabis, according to CCC data. Edibles are neck-and-neck with raw, pre-rolled bud in third and fourth sale places.
And just those four products, in last week alone, brought in well over $5 million in sales, the commission reported.
It’s a different story over the borders in Connecticut, Vermont or Rhode Island.
Consumers are paying nearly or upwards of $40 for the same amount of bud — and dispensary sales have yet to match up to Massachusetts’, although the Bay State has been selling for 2-5 years longer.
On average, an eighth of flower is $44 in Connecticut, the state government’s page on last month’s cannabis statistics showed.
Nutmeg State dispensaries opened January 2023 after recreational legalization in 2021, and adult-use sales for all products totaled just over $16 million for the entire month of March 2024, according to the state. It equates to about $4 million in average sales per week across all cannabis products.
Consumers, regular or not, clearly notice the difference, said Tim Rooke, who works for Springfield dispensary ZaZa Green as its community ambassador volunteer.
Since opening last July, he said the number of Connecticut customers crossing over to buy increases almost daily.
“In Connecticut, their menu is limited, and their pricing is much higher,” Rooke said. In addition, its location just over the border, expansive parking lot and 11 p.m. closing time all make up for the drive from Connecticut, Rooke said.
In Vermont, the average price is $42, and Rhode Island price points average $38, according to a site called PriceOfWeed.com. Maine cannabis users pay on the slightly lower end around $25 per eighth of bud, the state’s Office of Cannabis Policy data showed.
Though an obvious consumer benefit, Massachusetts’ continually dropping pot prices have been a learning curve for business owners amidst changing regulations and heavy in-state competition. More than 300 dispensaries operate across the state. With volumes of product hitting the market and more places to buy it, the price of cannabis keeps dropping.
“It’s about being adaptable,” Hailey Delima, the general manager at Cannabist Boston, told MassLive Friday. “It’s definitely been a shift in the last three years … the reality of the price point of our product, it’s going to continue to drop or change.”
To survive, Delima said the Boston dispensary has been doing a “pretty good job” focused at the “operational level” on keeping “the other parts of our business ironed out and well-managed.”
Rooke said his Springfield dispensary’s strategy of “blue-collar pricing,” to which he explained means, “We’d like your money and we’d like your business. We just don’t want it all tonight,” is their way to keep up in the high-stakes market.
In Worcester, Mission Cannabis Dispensary’s general manager, Tyler Hayden, called the state’s price compressions “beneficial” to recreational users, medical card holders and to his own business.
“I don’t think [the prices are] affecting too much, as far as business goes. If anything, it’s helping,” he said on Friday, adding his customers were already “busting down the door” to get in for the dispensary’s early April 20 deals.
Rooke said there’s room for the price point to be “corrected.” The dramatic drop in cannabis flower prices is indicative of the market’s ongoing correction, with New England echoing trends in other states that have more mature legal cannabis markets that also saw rapid declines in cannabis prices, though in varied rates.
But they’ve been “happy” in Springfield with cannabis prices, Rooke said — and he’s got sensibly-high hopes come April 20, even for in-state competition.
“4/20 is typically the busiest day in in cannabis sales, usually 30% more than what you typically do. But because it’s on a Saturday, we expect it to even be a little bit higher,” said Rooke.
“So each of the dispensaries should do very well, and that’s what we hope. We hope that everybody does their fair share of business,” he said.
