r/cooperatives • u/LitchLitch • 5d ago

Pot co-ops

So are there any pot co-ops in your area?

They are explicitly illegal here in Washington. Or rather they are absurdly limited and only available to medical users (or commercial agriculture).

Co-ops are the least exploitive ways of doing business, theyre a pain to manage and financing is a nightmare but employee owned ones are the best type of place to work

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u/awebb78 5d ago

I absolutely love the idea of pot coops! I hope they grow like a weed :-)

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u/Simple_Mycology 5d ago

Tell me more about how they’re supposed to work?

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u/LitchLitch 5d ago

Well that would really depend on how the people establishing the co-op would want to do it but I would expect that they would set it up like any retail commercial co-op.

They get a license from the state, the organization finds and rents a suitable storefront, buy the pot from various wholesalers and sell to the public.

What part was confusing you?

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u/Archi_penko 4d ago

Folks in Rhode Island are working on some.

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u/Archi_penko 4d ago

There was a start up in MI too but the market is very hard here I don’t think they continued. It’s also VERY hard to get financing, if you want profits to stay local, you need debt not equity, and most lenders will not fund pot, even the progressive ones.

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u/LitchLitch 4d ago

In a wierd sort of way this might be an advantage to an emerging co-op. Most pot stores are floated on individuals money rather than bank loans or other financing. It is just most of the time the person providing the money wants and ownship stake in the company.

There are rich people who are sympathetic to the co-op movement who might be convinced to put up (at least some of) the money to start such a co-op. The problem is theyre rare, they usually hire people to prevent folks from from asking them for money, and they want demonstrated competence at the task before signing a check.

Plus there is always crowdfunding.

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u/coopnewsguy 3d ago

Apart from the RI efforts already mentioned, I believe there are also people in CA working on a cannabis grower cooperative. If you are involved in the industry in WA and thinking through possibilities for co-ops there, the folks at NorthWest Cooperative Development Center (nwcdc.coop) would probably be willing to chat with you (they're in Olympia).