Arkansas reaches $187 million in medical cannabis sales

Arkansas’ slow-starting medical marijuana market is growing, with more than 80% of the state’s dispensaries now open and sales reaching a cumulative total of $187 million since the program launched in May 2019.

That $187 million figure represents more than 28,674 pounds of cannabis sold since the program debuted, according to recent figures from the Arkansas Medical Marijuana Commission.

“We anticipate sales will reach 30,000 pounds by late December,” commission spokesman Scott Hardin wrote in a medical marijuana sales report shared with Marijuana Business Daily.

Arkansas’ yearslong path to a legal medical marijuana market has been fraught with delays.

The state’s top seller of medical marijuana to date, Green Springs Medical in Hot Springs, recently said product shortages are making it hard to meet patient demand and called for increased cultivation capacity.

According to the commission’s recent report, Arkansas currently has 31 operational medical marijuana dispensaries with another six “working toward opening,” including two in Pine Bluff and one each in Little Rock, Fayetteville, Osceola and Hardy.

Average daily medical marijuana sales in Arkansas are roughly $600,000, Hardin told MJBizDaily in September.

Nov. 20, 2020, was the market’s busiest day to date with sales of $850,000, the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette reported.

As of that date, Arkansas’ health department reported 60,013 active medical marijuana ID cards in the state.