Cannabis sales in New Mexico topped $5 million in the first three days of a legal market for adult recreational use, including over $2.7 million in transactions Friday, when retailers opened their doors to the new industry.
That compares with about $1 million in first-day sales in neighboring Colorado when recreational cannabis became legal there in 2014.
According to data provided by the state Cannabis Control Division, product sales to people 21 and older were just over $5.2 million Friday through Sunday, a number that augurs well for an industry many believe will boost jobs and revenue.
Recreational-use sales, at more than $3.5 million, came in twice as high as medical cannabis sales of about $1.7 million.
Santa Fe sales totaled over $476,000.
Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham, a Democrat who pushed for cannabis legalization in the past few years, said in a statement Monday, “New Mexico’s launch of recreational cannabis has been one of the most successful, if not the most, of any state. Not to mention that we beat Colorado’s numbers for first-day sales.”
The long-term sales trend for recreational cannabis remains unclear.
Duke Rodriguez, president and CEO of New Mexico Top Organics-Ultra Health, the largest cannabis operation in the state, said a deeper analysis of financial data — as soon as the end of this week — is necessary to more accurately predict the industry’s future.
Still, he said, “The three day weekend total was impressive. … The numbers were strong, and the good news is they are in line with where they should be.”
His analysts had predicted sales would be around $5 million for the first weekend, Rodriguez said.
“It would have been worse if we had thrown a party and nobody showed up,” he added.
Cannabis consumers showed up en masse in some places, like the PurLife dispensaries in Albuquerque, where CEO Darren White said “business was crazy … like 4/20 on steroids.”
He was referring to annual marijuana culture celebrations held April 20.
Korynne Lewis, a store manager at CG Corrigan on Early Street in Santa Fe, said she could count on about 60 medical cannabis customers a day before recreational sales became legal. The shop served about 250 people Friday.
There were about 100 customers Saturday and 130 Sunday, she said.
“We had a lot of people,” Lewis said. “I’m happy to say we have not sold out of anything yet.”
Along the southeastern border of New Mexico, much of the money for sales came from Texas, where recreational cannabis remains illegal.
In Hobbs, less than five miles from the Texas border, employees at Bryan’s Green Care watched as a line of people began forming at 7:45 a.m. Friday — more than an hour before the store opened.
The shop, which long has sold CBD-related products, began selling medical cannabis March 1, sales director Jordan McIlroy said.
On its first weekend of combined recreational and medical sales, it saw a 3,000 percent increase in business, with over $64,000 in total sales. “They were coming in so fast it was hard to keep up,” McIlroy said of eager customers, adding wait times were sometimes as long as 90 minutes.
“I would say around 70 percent of our customers over the weekend were Texas residents,” he said.
Rodriguez said his company’s stores along the Texas border also did well.
“The Texans continue to come in,” he said of patrons at shops in Clovis, Hobbs, Las Cruces and elsewhere.
Long a proponent of ending state caps on plant growth, Rodriguez said he believes a cannabis shortage is looming in New Mexico.
State officials said in late March there were more than 1 million mature plants available for production of cannabis products, but Rodriguez and other producers have questioned that number, arguing there is neither the field space nor the number of licensed producers to grow that many plants.
“We do not believe there are 1 million plants in production,” Rodriguez said Monday. “We believe there are about 110,000 to 115,000 mature plants.”
With under 100 licensed growers, each would have to average over 10,000 mature plants to reach the state’s count of 1 million. Ultra Health, the largest cannabis operation in New Mexico, surpasses that, with 26,000 mature plants, but Rodriguez said many producers are microbusinesses that can only grow up to 200 plants.
On Monday, Heather Brewer, spokeswoman for the Cannabis Control Division, said via text the state has no updated plant count numbers yet. She confirmed via text that “heading into sales” last month, the 1 million plant count was where the state was at.
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