Marijuana Business Factbook 2019

Marijuana Business Factbook 2019 Chapter 2 | State-By-State: Legal Overview, Market Data and Outlook 134 © Copyright 2020, Marijuana Business Daily , a division of Anne Holland Ventures Inc. You may NOT copy this Factbook, or make public the data and facts contained herein, in part or in whole. For more copies or editorial permissions, contact CustomerService@MJBizDaily.com or call (720) 213-5992, ext. 1. NEW YORK Medical continued SUMMARY What to watch in 2020 New York’s MMJ program continued to grow in 2019, with patient counts up 31% over 2018. However, MMJ patient roles currently stand at just over 112,000—a lackluster total given the state’s population of nearly 20 million. Significant business challenges for New York’s MMJ program remain, driven by state-controlled pricing mechanisms and prohibition on the sale of flower and edibles products. All the news and developments in New York now are around adult-use legalization. Gov. Andrew Cuomo has revived the prospects of legalizing recreational marijuana sales in 2020 through the state’s Legislature. However, some of the same obstacles during last year’s adult-use legalization efforts remain, namely agreement on where revenues would go and assurances that communities disadvantaged by the war on drugs will benefit from legalized recreational marijuana business opportunities. Marijuana Business Opportunity Rank for 2020 C+ New York’s MMJ program is one of the most restrictive in the country, which has put hurdles in front of entrepreneurs and investors (e.g., extremely high licensing fees, state-determined price caps) and suppressed patient numbers. Even with recent growth, the patient pool remains small relative to population size and major concerns about the regulatory system remain. With the enormous cost to enter the market, challenges with patient retention (only half of patients are repeat customers) and no available licenses, there are few opportunities for new entrepreneurs or existing MMJ businesses in the state. Legalization of recreational marijuana may open the door to additional opportunity but to what degree depends largely on the state’s regulatory framework.