{"id":7395,"date":"2017-05-10T22:07:13","date_gmt":"2017-05-10T22:07:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.denverpost.com?p=2645312&amp;preview_id=2645312"},"modified":"2017-05-10T22:07:13","modified_gmt":"2017-05-10T22:07:13","slug":"colorado-marijuana-sales-top-131m-set-record-in-march-2017","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/colorado-marijuana-sales-top-131m-set-record-in-march-2017\/","title":{"rendered":"Colorado marijuana sales top $131M, set record in March 2017"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"wp_fb_like_button\" style=\"margin:5px 0 5px 5px;float:right;height:100px;\"><script src=\"http:\/\/connect.facebook.net\/en_US\/all.js#xfbml=1\"><\/script><fb:like href=\"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/colorado-marijuana-sales-top-131m-set-record-in-march-2017\/\" send=\"true\" layout=\"standard\" width=\"450\" show_faces=\"false\" font=\"arial\" action=\"like\" colorscheme=\"light\"><\/fb:like><\/div><div class=\"row\">\n<div class=\"large-10 large-centered small-12 columns\">\n<div class=\"entry-meta-date\">Published: May 10, 2017, 3:35 pm \u2022 Updated: May 10, 2017, 4:59 pm<span class=\"single-comments-link\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.thecannabist.co\/2017\/05\/10\/colorado-marijuana-sales-statistics-march-2017\/79215\/#disqus_thread\" class=\"commentsNameLink\" \/><\/span><\/div>\n<p class=\"byline\">By <span class=\"author\"><a class=\"url fn n\" href=\"http:\/\/www.thecannabist.co\/author\/awallace\/\" rel=\"author\">Alicia Wallace<\/a><\/span><em>, The Cannabist Staff<\/em><\/p>\n<p>The Colorado cannabis industry\u2019s unbridled growth hasn\u2019t waned \u2014 in fact, it\u2019s still setting records.<\/p>\n<p>The state\u2019s licensed marijuana shops captured nearly $132 million of recreational and medical cannabis sales in March, according to The Cannabist\u2019s extrapolations of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.colorado.gov\/pacific\/revenue\/colorado-marijuana-tax-data\" target=\"_blank\">state sales tax data<\/a> made public Tuesday.<\/p>\n<p>The monthly sales haul of $131.7 million sets a new record for Colorado\u2019s relatively young legal marijuana industry, besting the previous high of <a href=\"http:\/\/www.thecannabist.co\/2016\/11\/16\/colorado-marijuana-sales-september-2016-revenue-taxes\/67693\/\">$127.8 million set last September<\/a>, The Cannabist\u2019s calculations show. It\u2019s the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.thecannabist.co\/2017\/04\/11\/colorado-marijuana-sales-stats-february-2017\/77088\/\">tenth consecutive month<\/a> that sales have topped $100 million.<\/p>\n<p>Sales tax revenue generated for the state during March was $22.9 million, according to the Colorado Department of Revenue.<\/p>\n<p>March\u2019s sales totals were 48 percent higher than those tallied in March 2016, according to The Cannabist\u2019s calculations. The month closes out a quarter in which sales were up nearly 36 percent from the first three months of last year.<\/p>\n<p>In 2016, the year-over-year quarterly growth rate ranged between 29 percent and 39.6 percent.<\/p>\n<p>The Cannabist also found that March 2017\u2019s year-over-year percentage growth outpaced much of what was seen on a monthly basis last year. Monthly growth rates from calendar year 2015 to 2016 averaged nearly 34 percent.<\/p>\n<p>It was this continued rate of growth that caught the attention of some analysts and economists contacted by The Cannabist.<\/p>\n<p>Andrew Livingston, director of economics and research for cannabis law firm Vicente Sederberg, separately calculated out the year-over-year monthly growth rate for Colorado cannabis sales and saw a trend emerge.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe year-over-year rates of growth have continued at a steady pace, which to me indicates that we have not yet reached the point at which we are starting to cap out the market,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<p>At that point, he added, the growth rates would start to decline.<\/p>\n<p>If the current growth rates keeps up, April 2017 should be another record month, and the summer of 2017 should set new highs, Livingston predicted.<\/p>\n<p>And by the end of the year, that could add up to an industry boasting $1.6 billion in sales, he said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe\u2019re surprised that sales continue to grow so quickly,\u201d said Miles Light, an economist with the Marijuana Policy Group, a Denver-based financial, policy, research and consulting firm focused on the marijuana industry. \u201cWe are not surprised that almost all of the sales growth is in the retail marijuana space.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Adult-use sales, which hit a new monthly high of $93.3 million, accounted for the lion\u2019s share of the March totals. Medical cannabis transactions totaled $38.4 million.<\/p>\n<p>Light and other economists have previously projected that Colorado\u2019s marijuana market would eventually hit a ceiling as the draw from the black market becomes more complete, regular economic cycles take hold and other states implement adult-use sales.<\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s <a href=\"http:\/\/www.thecannabist.co\/2016\/12\/22\/marijuana-sales-pot-taxes-colorado-estimates-projections\/69831\/\">hard to predict when that plateau may occur<\/a>, but the license and application fees in the March 2017 report were telling, Light said.<\/p>\n<p>Ten months into Colorado\u2019s fiscal year (the latest report for March sales show tax revenue remitted in April), the license and application fees for medical marijuana businesses and retail marijuana businesses were down 25.4 percent and 8.5 percent, respectively, according to the Colorado Department of Revenue report.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThis shows that fewer new firms are entering and, I believe, shows that \u2026 sales should be tapering off or declining,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<p>Mark Bolton, marijuana advisor to Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper, said the sales tax revenues tallying $185 million for the fiscal year-to-date are <a href=\"https:\/\/leg.colorado.gov\/publications\/forecast-march-2017\" target=\"_blank\">in line with expectations<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe\u2019re anticipating a significant increase (of marijuana tax revenue) this year,\u201d he said. \u201cI don\u2019t think we\u2019re anticipating any dramatic changes in the market. I guess we could potentially see some changes in the tourism market. We don\u2019t anticipate any dramatic changes in our market with new states online.\u201d<\/p>\n<hr \/>\n<hr \/>\n<div id=\"title\">Sales stats for Colorado weed<\/div>\n<div id=\"subtitle\">A month-by-month look comparing sales of recreational and medical marijuana, as calculated by The Cannabist:<\/div>\n<div id=\"canvas-container\">\n<div id=\"legend-container\">\n<div id=\"recreational\">2017 Recreational total (3 months)<br \/>$257,574,083<\/div>\n<div id=\"medical\">2017 Medical total (3 months)<br \/>$109,154,798<\/div>\n<div id=\"revenue-total\">2017: $366,728,881<\/div>\n<div id=\"recreational\">2016 Recreational total (12 months)<br \/>$875,277,360<\/div>\n<div id=\"medical\">2016 Medical total (12 months)<br \/>$437,879,186<\/div>\n<div id=\"revenue-total\">2016: $1,313,156,545<\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p \/>\n<hr \/>\n<hr \/>\n<div class=\"entry-meta-author\">\n<div class=\"authorimage\"><a class=\"url fn n\" href=\"http:\/\/www.thecannabist.co\/author\/awallace\/\" rel=\"author\"><img src=\"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/05\/colorado-marijuana-sales-top-131m-set-record-in-march-2017.jpg\" class=\"authormug\" \/><\/a><\/div>\n<p class=\"author-desc\">Alicia Wallace joined The Cannabist in July 2016, covering national marijuana policy and business. She contributes to the Denver Post&#8217;s beer industry coverage. In her 14 years as a business news reporter, her coverage has spanned topics such as the&#8230;<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><!-- .row --> <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In March 2017, licensed Colorado marijuana shops hauled in more than $131 million in sales; it&#8217;s the tenth month in a row sales have topped $100 million. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[6811,6813,77,5577,6858,9,5019,1,3,2379,61,1736],"tags":[6816,6818,2655,5580,6860,5022,4974],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7395"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7395"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7395\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7395"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7395"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7395"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}