Three million new consumers could enter the Canadian cannabis market when edibles and other products become available for sale at licensed stores, according to a study by EY and Lift & Co.
Regulations for edibles, extracts and topicals—products that weren’t available for sale when cannabis was legalized last October—come into force on Oct. 17. The products could become available for sale in December, the report said, but those interested in buying them likely won’t see “robust product portfolios” until the spring.
The report found that 12% of all current non-consumers of cannabis may buy new types of products when they become available. Edibles could draw 1.5 million consumers, while topicals such as creams could bring in 2.25 million people and extracts could add 750,000 consumers.
More than half (51%) of respondents who don’t currently use cannabis said they would either be very or somewhat likely to try cannabis-infused beverages. The report noted that beverages will be sold only online and at licensed retail stores, rather than at bars and restaurants, which could limit sales.
Statistics Canada’s National Cannabis Survey for Q2 2019, released on Thursday, found that smoking was by far the most common method of consuming cannabis (for 68% of men and 62% of women).
From mid-May to mid-June this year, about 4.9 million Canadians aged 15 and older (16%) reported using cannabis, StatsCan said, unchanged from the same period last year when cannabis hadn’t yet been legalized.
Read the EY study here and the Statistics Canada report here.