It’s been a year since the law legalizing recreational marijuana was passed in New Jersey in August 2021. The New Jersey Cannabis Regulatory, Enforcement Assistance, and Marketplace Modernization (CREAMM) Act set up the legal framework to permit retail cannabis sale, recreational consumption, and cannabis cultivation among other businesses. Now that many businesses are working their way through the application process, we thought we’d take a look at the different types of permitted businesses and which ones are coming to Hoboken and Jersey City. Read on to learn more about this topic and its impact locally.
Some Background
The CREAMM Act requires all businesses to go through two tiers of approval. There are locality-based approvals such as zoning and planning board approvals in addition to the locality’s cannabis laws. A second set of inspections and approvals at the state level also has to take place. Once a business has both sets of approvals in place, it may open for business.
Because these two systems operate concurrently, the timing of the approvals isn’t perfectly synchronized. Many applicants get a conditional license for their application from the state while the locality-specific applications are in progress. This is a half-step granting permission to move forward while other application processes are in the works.
Read More: Hudson County Businesses Opening in the Second Half of 2022
The state may grant a conditional license to the applicant, which allows the business to “begin building out operations for the cultivation, manufacture, dispensing, wholesale, distribution, or delivery of recreational use cannabis while working towards meeting the requirements for a cannabis cultivator, manufacturer, dispensary, wholesaler, distributor, or delivery license.”
The state law is the basic set of requirements for these businesses. It was up to localities to decide whether to allow cannabis businesses to come to their communities, and if so, to write their own specific set of regulations governing the cannabis industry in that specific town. So while one town may have written its law to include all six types of businesses, a neighboring town may only have one or even none. In Jersey City, all six classes of business are permitted.
“The City of Hoboken hereby permits, by conditional use approval, Class 3 Wholesaler, Class 5 Retailer, Class 6 Delivery license and Medical Cannabis Dispensary permit operations in the designated commercial and industrial zones. Class 1 Cultivator, Class 2 Manufacturer, Class 4 Distributor license operations are not permitted.”
Both Hoboken’s and Jersey City’s regulations acknowledge the possibility of adding on-site consumption when the statewide regulations are finalized. While the CREAMM Act did a lot to clarify certain paths to legal use of cannabis, the state’s regulatory body is still working on finalizing the rules for on-site consumption. Consumption lounges were contemplated in the original laws but the details are still in progress. Several of the businesses listed below anticipate adding on-site consumption lounges once those rules and approval processes are in place.
The Types of Businesses
Class 1 Cannabis Cultivator
Grow recreational use cannabis.
Jersey City – Shayla Cabrera – Tia Planta
Class 2 Cannabis Manufacturer
Produce recreational use cannabis.
Class 3 Cannabis Wholesaler
Store, sell, or otherwise transfer, recreational use cannabis items between cannabis cultivators, wholesalers, or retailers.
Class 4 Cannabis Distributor
Transport cannabis items in bulk between cannabis cultivators, manufacturers, or retailers within the state of New Jersey.
See More: Where to Buy Recreational Marijuana in New Jersey
Class 5 Cannabis Retailer
Purchase recreational use cannabis from licensed cultivators, manufacturers, or wholesalers and sell those items to consumers in a retail store.
Hoboken:
Jersey Joint | 1427 Grand Street
Blue Violets | 628 Washington Street
Story Dispensary | 51 14th Street
Jersey City:
Artistic Dispensary | 365 Central Avenue
Blossom Dispensary | 746-8 Tonnelle Avenue
Butler & Baldwin | 75 Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard
The Cannabis Place | 1542 John F. Kennedy Boulevard
Cream Dispensary | 284 1st Street
Decades Dispensary | 404 Central Avenue
Garden Greenz | 190 Newark Avenue
The Golden Door | 638 Newark Avenue
Idyllx | 171 Newark Avenue – is currently a smoke shop but wants to expand into cannabis
Jersey Leaf | 554 West Side Avenue
Kushmart Jersey | 1521 John F. Kennedy Boulevard
Local Modiv | 155 Newark Avenue
The Leaf Joint | 391 Central Avenue – is currently a smoke shop but wants to expand into cannabis
Medicine Woman | 660 Tonnelle Avenue
Medusa NJ | 759 Bergen Avenue
MMD NJ | 665 Newark Avenue
Oceanfront Holdings | 141 Newark Avenue
The Other Side | 38 Congress Street
Strictly CBD | 394 Communipaw Avenue – operates as a CBD store but wants to expand into cannabis
Uforia | 138 Griffith Street
WR Wellness | 150 Bay Street
Class 6 Cannabis Delivery
Transport a consumer’s purchases of recreational use cannabis and related supplies from the retailer to that consumer.
