Legal v Illegal

So, I don't live in the USA - I live in a place where cannabis possession is a minor misdemeanor for personal use but is rarely prosecuted. Large scale growing and trafficking is definitely illegal.

I was browsing some weed porn on dispensaries in California and Colorado and see some amazing produce - but the prices are so high! Like, $14 -16 per gram, before tax!!! I pay $5-6 / g for usually good, often great weed, illegally grown by my guy. I don't have the range of choice and sometimes don't even know the name of the strain I'm vaping, and there is a slight undercurrent of risk involved - just like there always has been ... but you guys are paying 3 times as much sometimes. (I know there are special deals/offers/loyalty bonuses, but still...)

So my questions are: Is there a paralell weed network in legal states or has that all gone by the wayside? And do any of you still buy on the black market and is it significantly cheaper?

Also, in recreational states, is a significant proportion of the population rolling around stoned half the time? And how "socially acceptable" has it become? Has it really been "normalized" and what's it like to just pop into a weed store after a visit to the farmers' market on a Sunday morning?

... im in canada and when i look at med prices/quality available today compared to what i can get i cringe.
I know greed gets in the way, but in my opinion legal weed should be priced to eliminate the black market- if they wanna do it legit.

...imo if they cannot compete with and eliminate the black market then it will always be there. idc about selection if it's double the price!
I would rather pay (let's say) half price and NO TAXES than go the legal route- this is what i'm use to so what's the diff


...i am also interested how this has played out in states where canabis is legal...

Commercialising cannabis may have been a bad idea....

All these high prices, tax, and money hungry businesses are gonna spoil the magic of this wonderfull flower....

Cannabis should be high quality, and free to all....

If anything, it should be regulated by the government to avoid the snowballing effect of greed...

I need to come to America to find out if the shop bought product is any better than my lovingly grown, and carefully cured, frosty wardrobe nugs, nurtured in secret as I live in prohibition land.....

I don't think it will be, definitely more choice though....

I wonder If a dispensery opened near me, if I would use it....

I have no experience with Colorado or California, but I have purchased cannabis in many states.

In non-legal states (medical and recreational), the average price for a gram tends to be $20, with discounts for quantity, say 7 grams for $100-120.

In my experience with medical states and dispensaries, the prices are generally $10-$20 a gram, with $15 being the average and $20 for "top shelf". They also sometimes give breaks for quantity, buy 6 grams get one free for instance.

I have noticed in medical states the black market is usually cheaper than dispensaries. I would say $10 a gram is average but $7 is somewhat common for quantity, say 7 grams for $50. This is often the exact same bud that is sold to dispensaries, you're just cutting out the middleman price-wise.

In all fairness dispensaries have rent to pay, taxes, start up costs, utilities, several employees on payroll, and some of them lab test the cannabis for mold, pesticides, THC level, etc.

Yeah, dispensaries are more expensive. But that's what regulation comes with. You get higher prices, but you also get a bunch of lab testing and oversight that hopefully makes the product better, and safer. Going to a good dispensary is a much different experience than going to "your guy" on the street.

That may or may not have value to you, but imo it's a fair reason for the prices being a bit higher.

Some Canadian producers offer $5 gram, and one I'm aware of, AuroraMJ, offers lower compassionate pricing based on some criteria I'm not aware of.
My insurance company pays for my El Pee herb, but much of their herb is lacking in taste and quality. They seem to aim for quantity over quality. I'm sure there are some that are better than others. A buddy just switched to Whistler Organic and loves them, but he's only had one shipment from them...

I live in the UK, if it were to become legal here, I'm sure my government would tax it beyond belief.....

Have you seen how much we pay for petrol????

And tobacco, thank god I fucked combustion....

Cannabis on the UK streets is already 15 GBP per gram....

So that's already more than 20 dollars....

And that's for uncured, untested, untrustworthy cannabis, not top shelf product, guaranteed not to be coated in crushed glass or other contaminants found on street weed....

So could be worse.......

Those states that have medical cannabis and have had it for a while usually have the best choices. Often the black market can be tied to the medical in a lot of areas. You may not always know the name though. It really depends upon where you live in the states.

Some folks might be going back to black market in WA state due to the new medical cannabis rules about dispensaries. Too high of a tax isn't a good thing.

Vapor_Eyes's prices sound right to me. Black market is only cheaper where dispensaries exist, and I doubt it's coincidence. Prices are higher outside the green zone, especially when you get further away from any state with legal dispensaries. There's no way to avoid this happening, anything that's taxed will be cheaper when you buy it illegally without paying taxes. See also east coast cigarette smuggling (buy in VA sell in NYC is popular, some people make a career of it) for another example of how this is inevitable.

I don't think there's much to worry about though. Dispensaries offer selection and some idea of quality control, something you don't generally get from a street dealer, so a lot of folks will come to prefer the safe way.

If we're talking international price comparisons I don't know if we can make a valid comparison. Even within the US, $15/g would make cannabis a pricey habit in much of the deep south but cheaper than tobacco in the northeast.

HighSeasSailor said:

Even within the US, $15/g would make cannabis a pricey habit in much of the deep south

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The deep south is full of cheap Mexican cannabis, generally sold for $5 per gram.

Vapor_Eyes said:

The deep south is full of cheap Mexican cannabis, generally sold for $5 per gram.

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Surely not the quality of medical grow? That same Mexican schwag is available here even cheaper than that, but it's nasty bricked trash. I haven't bought in the deep south in a long time but I imagine someone is hauling the good stuff from the west coast out there too?

Either way, I was mostly comparing the value of money. If you like, a $100,000 dwelling in parts of the country would be quite nice, while in NYC it would be...a box, maybe?

For me, wow, things have really come a long way. When I started out weed was $10 (3 fingers)for a "lid" or a"can". It was usually dirt weed (brown) from Mexico usually "Mihuacan". If you were lucky, you could get some "Acapulco Gold" for a bit more. About 10 years later Thai sticks for $20 each. We were paying $25-$35 1/8 in the 80s-90s for sensimilla or skunk from Humboldt. Early 2000-2003 high grade green was about $40-$50 1/8".

I stopped for over 10 years, until I got my Dr. Rec a few months ago. I live in Cali and prices I see are around $15 average and $18 a gram for some super high grade name brand like Chiquita Banana (31% THC). I usually pay around $35 for really good flowers (1/8), and $45 for great amazing (1/8). Most places I go to have discounts or caps so you get a much better deal for an 1/8. So for me when you take into account the last time I got it from the street, and now from a dispensary 13 years later the price is a bit cheaper in the dispensary and the quality is much more consistent. Not to mention the selection. I would never want to get anything from the street at this point.

Sorry about the long winded diatribe. I just wanted to point out that if someone had told me when I started that I could go into an office building, take my time and pick my choice of cannabis in the future, I would have told him to give me back the joint, you've had way too much!

HighSeasSailor said:

Surely not the quality of medical grow? That same Mexican schwag is available here even cheaper than that, but it's nasty bricked trash. I haven't bought in the deep south in a long time but I imagine someone is hauling the good stuff from the west coast out there too?

Either way, I was mostly comparing the value of money. If you like, a $100,000 dwelling in parts of the country would be quite nice, while in NYC it would be...a box, maybe?

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Definitely not the quality of medical grow, although some of it is better than you would expect. And it can cost less than $3/g for quantity.

There's definitely medical quality around too, including product from medical states out west as well as locally grown. Athens, GA has some killer homegrown that rivals anything I've had from a dispensary.

Deep south prices for med grade are generally the same as non-legal states, $20/g.

I totally get your point about the value of money too. You just reminded me how the deep south had a somewhat unique cannabis market due to the proximity to Mexico, unfriendly laws/law enforcement, and the economic reasons that you mentioned.

ZC said:

Yeah, dispensaries are more expensive. But that's what regulation comes with. You get higher prices, but you also get a bunch of lab testing and oversight that hopefully makes the product better, and safer. Going to a good dispensary is a much different experience than going to "your guy" on the street.

That may or may not have value to you, but imo it's a fair reason for the prices being a bit higher.

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I agree...pay a bit more for what you know is good product that is the strain you want....or buy a bag of crap. Even though the black market weed may be good, even though your trusted dealer says its strain "fill in the blank", its still a bag of crap cause you really don't know what strain it is, you don't know its contents, and you don't know how clean it is.

Just my thoughts from a guy who has bought a lot of "bags of crap" LOL

By the way, I also remember ounces for maybe $15 and pounds for $110, but that was back in prehistoric days LOL

I could care less about full legalization nor medical...

Over 50 yrs on this planet, and have ALWAYS had access/contacts to get what I need/want for the last 40 yrs. Even though I qualify for medical, I have huge issues with being on a 'list' to make it easier for those with access to the list to monitor, infringe on my privacy, or generally harass me (alcohol is a drug... no I.D. required - aside from age), when self supply with today's LED tech micro grows make it as easy-peasy as it can get. I'm also from a generation that indulged in the dirtiest and heaviest drugs out there known to man and survived (albeit I now have physical 'injuries' and mental issues that have not compromised my immune system as others do/have).

When I take care of things myself, it costs me 1.75/g (I don't include my time in that because I enjoy it). When I grab from a network of others who take care for themselves, it's either free (with the same expected in return at some point in time) or max 4.50/g. If I street it, it would cost me 8 to 12/g (which I won't do because it's market rushed and chem/nute residue filled). The first two give me strain options that I enjoy getting and the pleasure of a friendly network, the last is a 'you get what I give you' and is usually pretty crap and/or qty short.

I don't need to 'partake' in the open for all to see, as I've always done... I find an out of eye place and enjoy.... not piece of paper required. Sure, there is always a risk... but life is full of them, and this one I'm willing to take.

This is for myself... and I don't oppose others that find piece in necessity to register for safety, security, whatever their personal reason(s). And, I don't really care (again: personally) if legalization ever comes into effect.

I spent the 60's paying for pot and knowing that Jack Webb (Dragnet) wanted to put me away for life.
I spent 70's waiting for house to be confiscated, children taken away and 20 year prison sentence.
I spent 80's waiting for 10 year federal charge and fine.
I spent 90's waiting for 4 year prison and house confiscation.
I spent Oughts waiting for 2 years and $25000 fine.
I am spending Teens with card, a selection of clone, delivery services, grow stores everywhere (5 in 5 miles),280 dispensaries in 30 mile radius.

Like they tell the kids:"It gets better!"

How much of the price increasing when legal is due to lack of demand because...

A. Street dope is still cheaper
B. You can grow your own

If it was legalised in UK and legal dope was more expensive than black market dope, I'd probably still buy black market (unless the head shop had something nice I would like to try) but most probably I'd just start growing my own.

It was no different than the way tobacco has gone stupid prices in UK, I simply stopped buying tobacco in UK and bought Duty Free / Duty Paid when I traveled. Plus my wife and friends who I travel a lot with don't smoke, so I used their allowance. I hadn't bought tobacco in the UK for years, well till I gave up of course

@1DMF, if it becomes legal in the UK, I'm buying a warehouse, and you will become my chief squisher......

We will be just fine.....

Colorado born and raised. Last time I went to the weed store was back right around 4/20. Was just wanting to sample something besides my own stuff. Got four grams of some of the tastiest cookie-wreck I ever had. I also had a friend who found a bean in one of their cherry diesel nugs, he gave it to me last winter, I flowered it out, and it definitely must have the same father or hermi as the cookie wreck I tried around 4/20. It tastes kind of like a tropical fruit and kind of like a mint cookie. Soooo good. It was $8/gram, with taxes etc.

OF course, there are lots of places that are charging $15+ a gram and I paid it myself when it was just medically legal about six years ago at this point, so it's not like that scene has or will change anytime soon, so it is quite easy to come to Colorado and get the wrong idea about the costs of product.

But I feel like just another part of society now, I don't have to feel like I'm doing anything wrong, I'm not looking over my shoulder before I take a rip etc. You have to experience it to get it. Not just visit, but live it. The plant has become comparable to wine these days, which is great, as it has always been speculated that big tobacco would move in with their budweiser of weed and take over. This hasn't happened yet, and I doubt it will now that terpene and cannabinoid profiles are becoming so important for even casual users. I relish the day I can theoretically be looked at in the same light as perhaps a sommelier of marijuana.

Cheers, and I hope everyone on this planet gets to feel what I do every day. Fingers crossed we never backslide.

kellya86 said:

@1DMF, if it becomes legal in the UK, I'm buying a warehouse, and you will become my chief squisher......

We will be just fine.....

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Yay, roll on legalisation in the UK!

Funny thing is for me, I've never cared what people thought about my dope consumption, however, since quitting smoking and meeting the nice folk on FC, I've cut down on my drinking and feel more ashamed about that than I ever felt about taking drugs even when I did class A.

1DMF said:

Yay, roll on legalisation in the UK!

Funny thing is for me, I've never cared what people thought about my dope consumption, however, since quitting smoking and meeting the nice folk on FC, I've cut down on my drinking and feel more ashamed about that than I ever felt about taking drugs even when I did class A.

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Ah see I'm the opposite sort of, I've always cared what people think, and my family have spent my whole life making me feel ashamed of what I do....

But now the tables have turned, I'm proud of what I do...

I now attack them, and look down on them for drinking alcohol and pumping presciption drugs into their bodies...even their unhealthy lifestyles...

I wouldn't do this normally but I feel i need to prove my point to them, and make them feel ashamed, so they know how they made me feel....

And I do it infront of my children too, so they know that I don't agree with drinking wine everyday starting at lunchtime, and I explain the health risks involved....

This makes my family, sitting there with a dinner swimming in grease and drinking wine, feel bad...and hopefully question the whole idea of right and wrong that they have.....

@1DMF, I'm thinking about planning my weekend near you....possibly in about 6 weeks.... we need to talk....

Anyway goner off topic....

I think I would visit a dispensery as a rare treat if I had the chance, just as a rare treat though.....

Here there is a large diversity of dispensaries and delivery services. Prices anywhere from $5-$10-$15, sometimes $18 a gram. What I noticed is some dispensaries sell really high quality for pretty cheap, and others call everything Private Reserve and jack up the price. Two of my fave places have caps at $35 1/8 with discounts every day. It seems like there's no relationship between quality and price. Every place is different.

In Canada the 'legal' model has people with prescriptions ordering online and the "Licensed Provider' (El Pee, or LP), sending product by mail. For people covered under the medical insurance model (currently only mil and RCMP veterans) you order online from whichever LP you chose, and they mail your order.

So a couple of days ago myself and a buddy are discussing opening an herbal-centric med facility in town - more geared towards cannabis education and information. While chatting we ran into a grower who wants to partner with us. In the last 3 days I've met 3 local growers, quite by accident, and all of them have expressed interest in growing for veterans. These are all people who grow for dispensaries. One of the guys gave us a few pounds of trim, as well as some cured buds and seed pods (Green Crack and Purple Candy) just to show what type of things they do.

Prices in Canada are random. LP can run $15/g, to as low as $2/g (with proof of income).

Anyways, BC is a great place to live if you like meeting growers...

killick said:

Some Canadian producers offer $5 gram, and one I'm aware of, AuroraMJ, offers lower compassionate pricing based on some criteria I'm not aware of.
My insurance company pays for my El Pee herb, but much of their herb is lacking in taste and quality. They seem to aim for quantity over quality. I'm sure there are some that are better than others. A buddy just switched to Whistler Organic and loves them, but he's only had one shipment from them...

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I use a Licensed Distributor in Canada. Mettrum is the name.

They offer stuff from 5.60CAD up to 9.60CAD per gram, which is about 4.20USD$ to 7.20USD

the quality is really good and it's a decent selection too, the only thing they have issue is keeping up their product with demand (;