High demand for cannabis, postal strike causing delays
Ontario Cannabis Store asking first-day clients to chill over deliveries
The Ontario Cannabis Store says first-day customers could see further delays as a result of ongoing Canada Post strikes and high demand.
The OCS said “unbelievably high demand” for cannabis products and “complicated” rotating strikes at Canada Post operations are causing ongoing shipment delays, according to a Tuesday news release.
“While a majority of first-day orders will be fulfilled within days, many first-day customers will still see delivery times that are longer,” the statement read.
“We ask for and appreciate the public’s patience as OCS continues to process orders as quickly as possible as this new business takes hold,” OCS President Patrick Ford said in the release. Strikes at Canada Post’s Toronto-area sorting plants continued Wednesday after workers walked off the job just after midnight on Tuesday.
Operations at a Mississauga facility, which processes about two-thirds of all parcels in the country, and an East York facility were virtually shut down when workers walked off the job. The union has said the walkouts will continue until Canada Post sweetens its contract proposals for rural and urban carriers.
The union and postal service have been unable to reach new collective agreements for the two bargaining units in 10 months of negotiations.
Should the strikes continue and orders can’t be shipped, the OCS said they have a contingency plan but will only reveal details if the plan must be executed.
In the first 24 hours of legalization on Oct. 17, the OCS received about 100,000 orders for legal weed, with 12 per cent of orders being placed in the first hour.