By Dave Gordon
Traditionally, a second anniversary gift is cotton – but three guesses how cannabis connoisseurs celebrated the second anniversary of legalization in Canada?
If you guessed by sparking a joint, you’d be wrong! Heavy cannabis users are passing on dried flower (as it’s called in the industry) and reaching for something that, until now, was only available in the black market: Extracts.
Extracts offer unique attributes that dried flower does not. In addition to a high that’s well-beyond (extracts are very high potency), they offer easy, precise dosing and clean, refined flavours. In fact, extracts preserve the compounds in cannabis that matter most to the cannabis connoisseur.
And nobody knows this better than Talal Rshaidat, a 29-year old extraction protege who’s blending his biochemistry expertise with a keen business sense to seize an emerging market opportunity. As Chief Science Officer at FUME labs, Rshaidat explains how the future of cannabis is changing from dry flower to concentrates, oils and rosin because they provide the purest flavour and offer a unique experience that’s preferred by discerning cannabis users. The illicit market (aka black market) still maintains 48% of the market share according to Statistics Canada, but with the legalization of extracts and concentrates, Rshaidat expects that number will drop – especially spearheaded by a new line from Fume Labs aimed squarely at the niche cannabis user: TR Signature.
According to Statistics Canada, Canadians spent $803M on legal weed during the second quarter of 2020 – compared to the $785M million earned in the illicit market, showing that Canadians are finally spending more on legal cannabis than illegal products. According to Rshaidat, the concentrates and extracts market is poised for rapid growth in Canada for several reasons. Savvy users are looking beyond the psychoactive effects, for an enhanced experience in terms of flavour, smell, and smoothness.
And with the Canadian extracts category positioned for rapid growth with the introduction of “Cannabis 2.0,” products, such as vape pens, oils, and concentrates, more premium and artisanal products derived from cannabis extracts will account for a growing share of industry sales.
