Tag: Illinois

Employees at two Illinois marijuana retail locations owned by multistate operator Verano Holdings ratified collective bargaining agreements, according to the International Brotherhood of Teamsters. The contract ratifications at Zen Leaf stores in the Pilsen neighborhood of Chicago and the Village of Lombard come after workers at both stores voted last year to join the Teamsters. Workers at the Lombard store voted in favor of unionization in February 2022; employees at the Pilsen location voted to join the union in August 2022. “The workers… Read more.

Teamsters Local 777 has reached tentative agreements for cannabis consultants and agents-in-charge at Chicago’s Zen Leaf dispensaries. Zen Leaf is owned by multi-state cannabis company Verano, and it is the third MSO the union has successfully bargained agreements with after it launched its campaign to organize the cannabis industry less than three years ago.  In a statement, Jim Glimco, president of Local 777, said the “contract includes monumental improvements that the workers on this committee fought incredibly hard to achieve.”   The agreement… Read more.

If past is prologue, then the 55 upcoming Illinois social equity license lottery winners on Thursday are going to have a rough time actually getting their shops open for business. As of January, only three of 192 social equity retailers that received Illinois licenses last year had opened for business, the state Department of Financial and Professional Regulation said in a press release. Only 113 adult-use shops were serving customers. As of Tuesday, the number of operational stores had increased only slightly to… Read more.

The large-scale merger of marijuana multistate operators Cresco Labs and Columbia Care is in question after the companies failed to divest assets necessary for regulatory approvals by the June 30 deadline. It’s not clear if the companies are still working toward completing the transaction or if they will abandon it. “At this stage, Cresco and Columbia Care are working amicably with respect to the next steps in relation to the transaction and will provide further updates in the near future,” the companies… Read more.

Teamsters Local 777 members walked off their jobs at two of Green Thumb Industries’ Rise Cannabis shops in Illinois the day before 4/20. For thirteen days, they picketed the dispensaries, demanding better wages and other concessions. Even when the strike was over, the strife wasn’t. The Teamsters and GTI circulated dueling stories about what a new labor-management agreement said—or whether a new agreement even had been reached. Then the union began charging the company with unfair labor practices that violate… Read more.

A DuPage County hemp farm is among the recipients of $12.6 million in grants to build chargers for electric vehicles. Kerry Farms will receive nearly $480,000 from the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency (IEPA) to build the chargers.   The funds for the program are part of the 2016 Volkswagen settlement, from which Illinois received about $109 million. In all, the grants will fund 348 new Direct Current Fast Charging (DCFC) ports at 87 locations throughout the state.    In a statement, Gov. JB Pritzker… Read more.

Disagreement over how to handle delta-8 THC – and whether to ban the controversial hemp-derived intoxicating cannabinoid, or regulate it like marijuana – have thwarted broader cannabis industry reform efforts in Illinois. According to Capitol News Illinois, a marijuana industry reform bill that failed at a May legislative deadline would have: Increased the canopy space for craft growers. Allowed dispensaries to operate drive-thru windows and offer curbside pickup. Offered social equity retail license holders another year to secure real estate. However, a… Read more.

Thirteen cannabis delivery service providers in central Illinois filed a complaint against state regulators, alleging that they are allowing unlicensed operators to transport product. The lawsuit, filed Tuesday in the Circuit Court of Sangamon County, claims the Illinois Department of Agriculture and its director, Jerry Costello, are not enforcing provisions laid out in the Illinois Cannabis Regulation and Tax Act, or CRTA, which paved the way for the state’s adult-use sales program that launched in January 2020. Among the plaintiffs’ complaints: The agriculture… Read more.

Unionized workers at five Chicago-area PharmaCann adult-use cannabis dispensaries have received a 20% wage hike over three years, the latest pay raise secured by organized labor in the marijuana industry. The increase represents yet another win for organized labor, which continues to pile pressure on major cannabis industry operators across the country. Last week, workers at PharmaCann’s Verilife dispensaries, who are organized by the International Brotherhood of Teamsters Local 777, approved a three-year contract that will see hourly wages increase by… Read more.

Declining prices and out-of-state competition hurt the state's industry. This story was republished with permission by Crain’s Chicago and written by John Pletz.  Illinois marijuana sales growth flattened last month for the first time since the state legalized recreational cannabis in 2020, hurt by declining prices and out-of-state competition. April sales totaled $132 million, compared with $131.8 million in same period a year earlier, according to the Illinois Department of Financial & Professional Regulation. The rate of year-over-year revenue growth in Illinois has… Read more.

With 21 weed shops in the city plus another 53 in the surrounding suburbs (the state has over 100 facilities), there's a lot of bud to sort through in the Land of Lincoln. Naturally, we've put together a handy guide to every recreational dispensary in the city, where you can snag the natural cure to what ails you—from stress mitigation to simple boredom relief. Order ahead or simply walk in to browse the wares: Just make sure to keep an eye on buying limits and… Read more.

The Chicago Cubs are expected to be the first Major League Baseball (MLB) team with a CBD sponsor and sell CBD drinks at its stadium, Front Office Sports reports. The Cubs are working with Chicago, Illinois-based MYND Drinks on the partnership, which received the NSF Certified for Sport designation required to work with MLB teams. MLB, in June 2022, approved plans to allow teams to work with CBD brands. In October, the league named Charlotte’s Web the “Official CBD of… Read more.

A study published last month by researchers at the University of North Texas Health Science Center and College of Applied Health Sciences, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign found one in 10 military veterans reported using cannabis over the past year.   The study was published in the Substance Use & Misuse journal using data from the National Survey on Drug Use and Health (2013-2019) comprised of 16,350 veterans 18-years-or-older. The researchers found that veterans aged 65-and-older were more likely to define their cannabis use as… Read more.