Legal Cannabis Market in California is Booming and Why It Won’t Stop Anytime Soon

• The legal cannabis market reveals the highest sales in any state, according to BDS Analytics.
• BDS Analytics published an infographic to compare California’s market to the markets in Colorado, Oregon, and Arizona.

The legal cannabis market began in 1996 with medical cannabis but expanded to recreational adult use in the last few years. No matter how the regulatory atmosphere is for the rest of the country, it is clear that the market in California will be growing substantially with 4.6 million cannabis consumers in the state alone. BDS Analytics recently released an infographic, explaining exactly how the California market compares with that of Colorado, Oregon, and Arizona.

In the total sales from dispensaries and deliveries alone, California exceeds the highest sales in any of the other three states by over half a billion dollars. While California reflects $1.2 billion, the next highest state is Colorado at $668.5 million.

Regardless of the types of products that are sold California continues to come out on top. In concentrate sales, California almost amounts to the totals of all three states combined at $433.1 million. In flower sales, California beats out the highest sales (Colorado at $259.9 million) by nearly $127 million. For vape sales, California’s total sales of $355.4 million is almost $100 million more than the combined total of Colorado, Arizona, and Oregon. Ingestible sales had similar results, exceeding the combined total of the other three states by about $16 million.

The total units sold in each state is where the data starts to fall out of California’s favor. While California sold 76.7 million units, Colorado beat out their sales at 89.5 million units. Unique retail outlets in California are the second highest of the three states, but Colorado beats them out again at 838 unique outlets, though Oregon follows closely behind at 649 outlets.

The spending per capita is the only occurrence in the whole chart where California is last in line. Colorado boasts the highest spending per capita in 2018 at $260.30. Oregon comes in second ($153.47) and Arizona comes in third ($81.71), which is the only time that Arizona exceeds California’s numbers in any way in this data.