⏩ Cannabis booming: Business thrives amid pandemic struggles.
Through equity program, at least 10 retail shops opened in 2020
As many San Francisco businesses struggled — or shuttered — under the harsh economic effects of the pandemic, one sector in particular saw its fortunes bloom.
San Francisco’s cannabis industry saw an enormous boom during, and perhaps in part because of, the pandemic.
The city’s Office of Cannabis approved more permits for cannabisrelated businesses in 2020 than in any previous year. And as other businesses were forced to close, at least 10 cannabis retail shops opened in the city last year.
The businesses have opened through the cannabis equity program, which prioritizes permits for people who have been harmed by the war on drugs. In the summer of 2018, the office began accepting applications, and by the end of 2019, it had issued its first two permits. The office expects to issue a handful of additional permits in the coming weeks.
“The pandemic revealed what San Francisco has long known about its cannabis industry,” said Marisa Rodriguez, director of the Office of Cannabis. “The strength of the industry, and the cannabis community more generally, is a story of resiliency and overcoming adversity.”
San Francisco was one of the few cities in the U.S. to designate dispensaries “essential” early on in the pandemic — though cannabisrelated businesses still didn’t receive federal relief or state and local aid. Hurdles aside, the city saw only a handful of cannabis businesses close, bringing the city’s total count to 38 medical cannabis dispensaries and 75 other supplyside and delivery companies.
The city’s cannabis industry also provided a substantial number of job placements through the Office of Economic and Workforce Development — and the pandemic didn’t seem to slow those opportunities down.
According to the OEWD, the city’s First Source Hiring Program connected 82 people with jobs in the city’s cannabis industry since 2019.
The program matches economically disadvantaged San Francisco residents with entrylevel positions across various industries in the city.
The expansion of San Francisco’s cannabis industry last year tracks with national trends. The U.S. saw legal cannabis sales surpass $17.5 billion in 2020, a 46% increase over its 2019 levels, according to BDSA, a research firm focused on the cannabis industry.
California’s market expanded the most, rising by $586 million in 2020. Early in the pandemic, the California delivery retailer Eaze said deliveries to firsttime customers increased by more than 50%, according to the Associated Press.
The pandemic’s tendency to induce anxiety, insomnia, panic and existential distress may have also contributed to the industry’s success last year. During the pandemic, the only San Francisco tax outpacing city projections was the tax on cannabis, The Chronicle reported in November. The local cannabis excise tax generated $4.9 million in 202021, exceeding forecasts by $700,000.
Marijuana businesses can now be found in San Francisco’s Castro, Nob Hill, Bayview, Dogpatch, Hayes Valley, Tenderloin, Pacific Heights and Potrero Hill neighborhoods, among others.
“I think we’re on a pretty good route to become the Napa Valley of cannabis,” said Ali Jamalian, an equity applicant who opened his manufacturing facility, Sunset Connect, in September 2020. “I think people will come here to educate themselves about cannabis — and I think we’re going to be a major tourist destination.”
Jamalian, 42, is the chairman of the city’s Cannabis Oversight Committee — but he’s also, like most of the city’s equity applicants, a person who had been personally impacted by the criminalization of cannabis. In 1999, when he was 20, he was arrested for possession, evicted from his San Francisco home, and nearly got deported back to Germany, he said.
Now, Jamalian’s manufacturing company — which sells to most dispensaries in the city — has grown from four fulltime workers to nine additional employees who work in packaging and processing.
Sunset Connect has also partnered with Cookies and STIIIZY, both major cannabis brands with storefront locations in San Francisco. In October, STIIIZY Union Square, a new location of the dispensary brand, opened at 180 O’Farrell St. through the equity program.
The owner, 39yearold Cindy De La Vega, who grew up in Sunnydale’s public housing projects and has been a longtime activist with United Playaz, a local violence prevention nonprofit, now holds the title of the city’s first Latina dispensary owner.
With reopening and the return of tourism to San Francisco, De La Vega expects even more foot traffic to come STIIIZY’s way, but even in the depths of the pandemic, the store was doing remarkably well.
“San Francisco has a long history of viewing cannabis as a healing substance, ever since the compassionate care movement,” she said. “Cannabis is a medicine, and during the pandemic, folks needed their medicine at a higher demand.”