Utah will begin accepting applications Monday for a new independent medical cannabis pharmacy in a rural or medically underserved area, according to a news release issued Wednesday by the Utah Department of Agriculture and Food.
The license is the second of two independent pharmacy permits mandated under House Bill 54, a 2025 law that expanded the number of medical cannabis pharmacies allowed in the state and carved out opportunities for operators not owned by large cannabis corporations.
State officials must issue the license no later than Jan. 1.
What is required to get a Utah medical marijuana license?
Eligibility comes with limits:
- Applicants can’t hold a financial interest in an existing medical cannabis pharmacy or be owned by an entity tied to a cannabis production establishment.
- The pharmacy must be in a designated medically underserved county with a population less than 260,000. More than two dozen counties meet the criteria.
Applicants must submit a facility layout, security plan, standard operating procedures for dispensing and inventory and personnel qualifications for pharmacists and technicians.
Utah has 115,472 active medical marijuana patients, according to state data.
The first independent license under HB54 went to Boojum in Moab, which opened this year, according to the Utah News Dispatch. Before Boojum, the closest pharmacy was nearly a two-hour drive away in Price.
Boojum beat out a much larger competitor for the license.
“We were awarded this license over a $2 billion holdings corporation from Chicago,” Boojum Chief Science Officer Olivia Kulunder told Moab Sun News. She did not name the company.
Kulunder said the licensing board cited the company’s local ties as a deciding factor, the Sun News reported.
How does Utah compare to other medical-only states?
Utah’s approach follows a broader trend of states adding cannabis permits tied to specific policy triggers rather than open-ended market expansion.
Florida caps medical marijuana treatment center (MMTC) licenses by law, with the limit tied to the state’s patient registry.
As of June, Florida counted 933,183 active patients, a number that has been steadily rising since the state legalized medical marijuana in 2016 with 24 licenses. The state approved 22 new MMTC licenses in 2024 to keep pace with that growth.
Subscribe to the MJBiz Factbook
Exclusive industry data and analysis to help you make informed business decisions and avoid costly missteps. All the facts, none of the hype.
What you will get:
- Monthly and quarterly updates, with new data & insights
- Financial forecasts + capital investment trends
- State-by-state guide to regulations, taxes & market opportunities
- Annual survey of cannabis businesses
- Consumer insights
- And more!
Georgia structured its medical cannabis market, initially launched in 2023, around a fixed ceiling. Currently, the state limits business licenses to:
- Six cultivation licenses
- 15 retail licenses, six of which are held by Trulieve
- One independent cannabis testing laboratory
However, with every 10,000 new medical marijuana patients entering the program, an additional retail license becomes available.
And since new rules expanding both products and patient eligibility went into effect July 1, the number of patients in the state ballooned from 34,000 to more than 40,000 in just a few weeks.
