What to expect from the cannabis industry in 2023 as two new stores prepare to open

To hear Chris Stone say it, Springfield's legal marijuana industry has become a more stable place in the three years since the state legalized it back in 2020.

"The revenues have stabilized," Stone said. "You're not seeing the exponential growth like you did in 2020-21."

Stone should know: he is a shareholder and advisor to Ascend Cannabis, with two locations in Springfield, and the landlord of Maribis' two locations on Lindbergh Drive (the old Parkway 8 movie theatre) and Denver Drive (having recently moved from a location on North Grand Avenue). He's also helping to build a brand new dispensary called Share in the old Magnolia Lane store along South 6th Street, scheduled to open this summer.

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Stone's new shop is one of three dispensaries slated to open in Springfield later this year, with work beginning recently on the former Steak n' Shake location in Prairie Crossing for a store run by Bolden Investments III, an LLC based out of Maywood in suburban Chicago and permits being approved for Shangri La, a new dispensary being built out of a vacant lot along Dirksen Parkway.

With those new stores providing more options for weed customers, here's a look at how the business is progressing in Springfield:

How many dispensaries are there in Springfield?

There are four dispensaries currently open in Springfield, with Stone having some involvement in them. Ascend's stores are located along East Adams Street in downtown and on Horizon Boulevard near the Interstate 55-72 junction.

Maribis notably moved into their west side locale in the old movie theatre in 2021, in conjunction with a North Grand location that opened the very day that people could first sell marijuana legally in Illinois. Last month, Maribis shifted its north end operations to a new store on Denver Drive in the North Dirksen Parkway business corridor. Stone said that the facility will be a better place for customers than the North Grand location they had filled for the first three years of legalization.

"It has a lot more (and) better parking," Stone said. "It's located in a heavy retail corridor, so being able to get more people there right off the highway I think lends itself well to that store doing better than it did in Grandview."

Two other stores sell THC-related products: Prairie State Hemp near the Old Capitol Plaza and Simply CBD near the corner of Wabash Avenue and MacArthur Boulevard.

Statewide, how is the weed business going?

In Illinois, marijuana sales have crossed the billion-dollar mark in each of the past two years, with the state setting a new mark in 2022 with over $1.5 billion in sales. That marks an increase of 12% from 2021 and 131% from 2020.

The Illinois Department of Financial and Professional Regulation also keeps tabs on monthly sales, with the agency reporting 3.3 million products sold last month to the tune of $134.8 million in adult use sales, nearly 3% higher than the prior year. However, the increase is the lowest year-over-year since the state started tracking those figures in 2021.

What are the plans for these new stores?

Construction work has yet to begin on Shangri La or the former Steak n' Shake, but the Springfield City Council approved permits for both prior to the April 4 consolidated election.

Stone's new store will cover the southern part of the old Magnolia Lane store, with plans to also use the property for a 5,000-square-foot craft growth facility co-located with the store. The goal is to provide one product that can be sold in the store and in other locations throughout the city.

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"It's right there off of 6th Street, so it's got good traffic," Stone said. "It's in a really well retail populated area and we think it's going to be a good store to be able to not only move the existing products that are out there, but also be able to introduce new products to the market that we hope will become mainstream."

What are some of the challenges facing the marijuana industry?

Stone says that marijuana, despite being legalized in other parts of the country, isn't exactly mainstream in the way that coffee, tobacco or alcohol is. He feels that the natural evolution of the business will come when the general public is convinced that this is a mainstream product worth their time and money.

"Don't get me wrong, we're doing a good job in terms of where the product is going," Stone said. "But less than 10% of the population is a regular user. I think there is a definite ability for this industry to make inroads into a regular use product (that) may be a substitute for alcohol, soft drinks, coffee, whatever you may use that you could potentially use this. I think that education still needs to get out there and I think when we get that to the point where it's truly mainstream, I think that you'll start to see the revenues tick up a little bit."

This article originally appeared on State Journal-Register: Here's a look at the Springfield cannabis industry with two new stores opening