Weed wait is over

Customers wait outside shops, on computers for legal pot in Alberta

Albertans lined up outside stores and waited at home in online queues to make their first legal purchases of marijuana. The Alberta Gaming, Liquor and Cannabis commission says more than 11,000 people tried to place orders at its online store in the first hour after it opened just after 12 a.m.

Its first shipments went out to consumers just before noon.

Of the 17 retail shops given interim licences for the first day, six opened their doors in Edmonton.

About 200 people lined up outside Fire & Flower Cannabis in a strip mall in the city’s northeast.

Curtis Hrdlicka of Beaumont, Alta., decided to go into work late so he could be part of the historic day and was the first customer to walk out with a purchase.

“The store’s beautiful. It’s a mix of a pharmacy and a jewelry store,” he said while holding a shop tote bag containing two 3 1/2-gram packs of Glacier Freeze cannabis.

“I looked at the qualities of it. It’s light, citrusy. It was exactly what we wanted to try.”

Another customer, 19-year old Cody Chapman, said it was important for him to buy marijuana on the first day he could do so legally. He’s glad things will be different when he has his own family.

“It’s going to be wild that my kids are going to grow up in a generation where they don’t have to worry about the cops,” he said.

Three stores opened in Medicine Hat, including Green Exchange. Co-owner Jay Hearn said many customers travelled from out of town.

“We’ve had people from Red Deer come, people from Maple Creek, Lethbridge, Brooks, Taber. It’s just been overwhelming.”

Meanwhile in Saskatchewan, people looking to buy cannabis from a retail store in that province on the first day of legalization had very few options.

Only seven of 51 businesses that were granted retail permits from the Saskatchewan government were open on Wednesday.

Cierra Sieben-Chuback, owner of Living Skies Cannabis Ltd. in Saskatoon, said she couldn't open due to a pot shortage.

“The demand is just crazy,” she said. “It makes me really sad that I can't open.”

Gene Makowsky, minister responsible for the Saskatchewan Liquor and Gaming Authority, said Sieben-Chuback isn't the only one in the province with that issue.

Saskatchewan has one wholesale cannabis provider and 17 federally licensed producers selling to retailers.

“I don't think it's a huge surprise that there's some supply issues when a new system is turned on overnight,” Makowsky said.

Two cannabis stores in North

Battleford were open on Wednesday along with stores in Esterhazy, Martensville, Moose Jaw, Edenwold and Yorkton.

Sieben-Chuback predicted her store's opening will be delayed until the end of the month or early November.

Landyn Uhersky, co-owner of Wiid Boutique Inc. in Regina, said he's waiting for a city building permit and hopes to open in the next few weeks.

Consumers in British Columbia wanting to buy recreational marijuana Wednesday were most likely to use the province's online sales system, which Public Safety Minister Mike Farnworth says passed one significant hurdle in the early going.

After it went live at midnight, Farnworth says the system recorded about 1,000 sales in the first hour.