The New Jersey Cannabis Regulatory Commission (CRC) this week released Q2 2023 sales data for the state’s adult use and medical cannabis markets, which is illustrated below.
Total sales showed signs of beginning to inch upward in Q2, but have been quite stable for the last year. As in many young markets, medical sales continued to see attrition as adult use revenues rise.
Sales will surely climb further as more adult use retailers open their doors and are able to stock their shelves with reasonably-priced products. However, the expansion of New Jersey’s market has been slow going since adult use sales commenced in April 2022. About 18 months after sales started, there are only 36 adult use retail stores open, while the market remains supplied by the 14 companies that were licensed initially in the state’s medical cannabis program. We noted previously that Curaleaf, the state’s largest company, recently announced that it is pulling back on production in the state, citing the slow rollout of retailers.
Additional annual adult use licenses were approved at a recent CRC meeting, including 27 retail and nine cultivator licenses. Coverage of the meeting from HeadyNJ quotes the CRC Chair as stating that “nearly 200” annual adult use licenses of all types have been approved to this point, though how many that are actually operational was not specified.