People line up to buy legal marijuana at the SQDC location in downtown Montreal a day after Canada legalized recreational marijuana on Thursday, October 18, 2018.Dario Ayala/The Globe and Mail
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Long lines and worries about dwindling supplies persisted into the second day of legal sales of recreational cannabis.
In a continuation of a frenzy that began when legalization went into effect at midnight on Wednesday, provinces reported sellouts of many strains and shrinking choice for customers who queued for hours at bricks-and-mortar locations and clicked through websites that warned of high demand and longer-than-expected waits for shipments.
A cold, windy day in Montreal did not stop dozens of people from lining up to get into the Société québécoise du cannabis (SQDC) store on Saint-Catherine Street West, where Mikey Therrien, 29, and Matthew Onesi, 23, waited three hours for their chance to enter the shop past a security guard who let customers in five at a time.
“It’s like a Best Buy, when they have a new product and everyone gets in line,” Mr. Therrien said. “This weed is the new iPhone.”
Mr. Onesi acknowledged they could have skipped the wait and made their purhcases online: “But it takes a couple days. A few hours in line is nothing.”
Similar scenes played out across the country on Thursday, straining retailers' inventories as provinces called on producers to accelerate shipments where possible.
More than 100 people lined up outside each of Calgary’s two retail locations. Manitoba Liquor & Lotteries said product shortages in stores and online could last “up to at least six months.”
Ontario’s online store, which removes items from its site that are sold out, had 75 products for sale by midday on Thursday – dozens fewer than a day earlier.
The SQDC said it expects further shortages – particularly for oil, capsules, atomizers and prerolled joints.
“Given the craze created by the legalization of cannabis and the scarcity of products across Canada, the [corporation] expects significant short-term supply challenges,” it said in a statement.
Alberta and Prince Edward Island also said certain products have sold out online, and Nova Scotia said it ran out of some strains.
Private retailer Thomas Clarke in Newfoundland and Labrador said he is turning away customers at his store in Portugal Cove-St. Philip’s after completely selling out on Wednesday.
Fire and Flower chief executive Trevor Fencott said the retailer’s five stores in Alberta and Saskatchewan are fully stocked, but his company will not launch its online store for Saskatchewan until it receives more supply.
“The first day of recreational sales in Canada appears to have been a success highlighted by the long lines and enthusiasm from shoppers,” GMP Securities analyst Martin Landry said after his research team visited retail stores in four provinces to take the pulse of shoppers.
After surveying 100 customers, Mr. Landry and his team found that customers on average bought between $80 and $90 worth of cannabis, with variations among provinces. Consumers in Eastern Canada had a basket size of $60 to $70, but in Quebec and Alberta it was $90 and $100, respectively, he said in a note to clients.
“Seeing cannabis shoppers wait in lines as opposed to take the traditional easy illegal supply route is refreshing and bodes well for the recreational market in Canada,” he said.
In Montreal, after less than 30 minutes in the store, Mr. Onesi and Mr. Therrien emerged holding brown bags filled with cannabis products.
Mr. Onesi bought some Riff prerolled joints made by Aphria, and some dried cannabis grown by Aurora, Tweed and Hexo, spending $120. He planned to walk around the corner and light up one of his prerolls.
Mr. Therrien, a pastry chef who said he planned to bake cannabis into éclairs, spent about $150.
“I wanted to buy more, but they’re running out of a lot of stuff," he said. “The prerolls are gone. My buddy had the last pack.”
With reports from Justin Giovannetti in Calgary and the Canadian Press.