Why Shop the Legal Market?
We understand that not everybody is happy to pay tax on a product they’ve never had to before, and it’s easy to save some money by buying from illegal sources. The levels of care, regulation, and transparency the legal weed industry has compared to the illicit market are astounding and more than rectify the added HST and higher price tag.
With legally sourced cannabis you can trust that the information that you’re being given is accurate, as there are strict rules in place that must be adhered to for cannabis to reach consumers. If you have questions or concerns about any of the given information many of the growing companies will do their best to give answers.
We’ve compiled a list of reasons to (hopefully) convince you to buy from the legal market and how to tell if the product you’re buying is legal.
You know that the product has been tested for quality.
All legally approved producers are required to have their products tested for cannabinoid ranges, unapproved pesticides, heavy metals (i.e., Mercury, lead), foreign matter (i.e., Pests), and microbiology (i.e., E. Coli, Salmonella).
These products are then sent by the OCS to a third-party testing center to ensure that the information given to them is accurate. If anything is incorrect, the product will not be sent out to consumers. If a discrepancy comes up through later testing the affected product will be recalled and all information will be sent to retailers and consumers.
Legal products are marked with an excise stamp – yellow in Ontario – These stamps are to be placed on the package so that you cannot open it without disturbing the stamp. With the excise stamp intact at the point of purchase, you can be reasonably assured that the product has not been disturbed since being shipped from the packaging facility.
You know that the package was designed with safety in mind.
Regardless of product type, each container is designed with child-safety mechanisms to prevent children from accessing the cannabis product. Standard child-resistant packages create a lock that requires a combination of adult strength, hand size, and dexterity. Each package is also under strict rules concerning the colour and size of brand elements to reduce underage interest in the unopened product.
In addition to being child-resistant, all forms of packaging in the legal market must prevent the contamination of the product, be opaque or translucent to prevent underage persons from seeing the contents and must have a security feature. Packages will block most if not all the product’s aroma when closed and will be airtight.
You know what the product is & how it was grown – it’s traceable.
Purchasing from a legal storefront or a regulated online retailer gives you access to more information than just a name or THC percentage. Often, the consumer will be able to find information about the growing conditions and methods, the location of their growing facility, product lineage, other names the strain may be known as, percentages for many cannabinoids other than THC present in the plant, as well as a (basic to complex depending on the company) terpene analysis.
Products produced are given a Batch/Lot number to tie them to a specific growing period or other conditions based on the individual company’s terms. Each product requires the packaging date marked on the bag or container, which can indicate the moisture level. Many companies on the legal market currently include moisture packs with dried flower to keep the product in optimal condition.
When re-purchasing a product, you can feel confident that what you buy will be similar in aroma, flavour, and visual appearance. The minimal discrepancies found within a Lot of a product come from cannabis being a naturally occurring plant. This means that the terpene and cannabinoid levels will be different based on where on the plant they’ve grown and how much light they received during the growth period.
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