Eight months after adult-use cannabis sales commenced in New Jersey, state regulators determined two companies continued to prioritize adult-use consumers over medical patients, resulting in more infractions.
In Neptune Township, Verano Holdings’ Zen Leaf store was fined $5,000 for running nine point-of-sale (POS) systems for adult-use customers and one POS system for medical patients, resulting in a patient waiting “in excess of 30 minutes” to receive a pick-up order on Dec. 13, 2022, according to the New Jersey Cannabis Regulatory Commission (CRC), which issued a notice of penalty in February.
And in Williamstown, Acreage Holdings’ The Botanist dispensary was fined $5,000 in connection to a 5-to-1 POS ratio for adult-use and medical transactions resulting in a patient waiting roughly 17 minutes to reach a payment system, “while in excess of 15 adult-use consumers were attended to,” on Jan. 7, 2023, according to CRC notice of penalty in March.
These penalties came after the two multistate operators were previously fined for allowing adult-use customers to purchase cannabis products during patient-only hours in the days following New Jersey’s launch of adult-use cannabis sales April 21, 2022. Verano, fined $90,000, and Acreage, fined $60,000, were among five companies that the CRC imposed penalties on that month.
Verano declined to respond to a Cannabis Business Times request for comment at the time, while Acreage Mid-Atlantic General Manager Sharon Ali told CBT The Botanist locations in Williamstown and Egg Harbor had turnouts that were “above and beyond” expectations during the opening week of adult-use sales.
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The most recent penalties for the two companies come at a time when legacy medical cannabis retailers continue to face heavy foot traffic in New Jersey, the most densely populated state in the U.S., as the CRC continues to move along 940 adult-use retail applicants in the licensing process. More than 175 of those applicants had filed their paperwork for annual licensure—the final step of regulatory approval at the state level—Executive Director Jeff Brown said at the CRC’s March 2, 2023, meeting.
But as the process of expanding the state’s retail footprint continues to unfold, patient complaints at Verano’s Zen Leaf and Acreage’s The Botanist led to CRC regulators imposing the $5,000 penalties. Specifically at the Zen Leaf in Neptune, one medical patient complained about being the first in line at a POS system and waiting for 20 minutes before being attended to for a pickup order.
“Six medical patients and I watched five rec customers pick up their orders with this one female budtender while every other budtender continued to be occupied,” the patient stated in the complaint. “I watched one medical customer walk away, and then that budtender disappeared. So, as I walked up expecting to be helped, no one came back at all (for another five minutes), so I went back in line.”
At The Botanist location in Williamsburg, a CRC investigator observed video footage during the time of a patient complaint, according to a CRC field monitor report. The investigator reported that during the time the patient was waiting to be served, three medical cannabis patient sales were completed while 19 adult-use customers were served.
When Acreage submitted its certification to expand to the adult-use market, the company provided a “Certificate of Prioritization of Registered Qualifying Patients,” which stated that its The Botanist dispensaries would “maintain distinct point-of-sales terminals” and additional means necessary to ensure patients are easily able to access its retail locations and obtain products without long wait times, according to the report.
“Review of the internal management system evidenced that [Acreage], during the time in question, maintained only one [of the] point-of-sale terminals that were designated solely for medical patients,” the investigator wrote.
When CRC officials first approved a dozen existing medical cannabis dispensaries to expand to adult-use sales in April 2022, there were 128,500-plus registered patients. As of April 10, 2023, there are 108,524 registered patients, a 15.6% decrease in 12 months.
CBT reached out to Verano and Acreage April 10 for comment on their most recent fines but didn’t immediately receive responses.
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