The companies say they are ready and have been pressuring the fledgling New Jersey Cannabis Regulatory Commission through the media since late October to let them get started. They say they’ve boosted inventories and added hundreds of staff in anticipation of recreational sales starting by the law’s one-year anniversary on Tuesday.
The commission started accepting recreational applications for cannabis cultivators, manufacturers, and testing labs in December and has received more than 300, mostly for cultivation. Curaleaf Holdings Inc., which has three medical cannabis stores near Philadelphia, expected sales to start as early as last November. New York-based Columbia Care Inc., which has stores in Deptford and Vineland, predicted in November that recreational sales would start no sooner than April. Another firm said maybe this summer.
Bellmawr on Jan. 27 gave its blessing for Curaleaf to start selling recreational cannabis there when it gets regulatory approval. Winslow Township on Feb. 8 passed a resolution that would allow cannabis grown there to be sold for recreational consumers.