CBD stores proliferate in Valley
Is it a fad, or does it deliver on relief from variety of ailments?
Jason Harmony and his 8year-old son walked into a storefront on the Emmaus Triangle on Thursday and headed straight for the back, where the peach ring gummies are kept.
After Harmony’s son confirmed his interest in the gummies, his father bought them.
The duo weren’t in a candy store, but in a store selling products containing CBD, or cannabidiol. Anecdotal accounts say the compound, which is found in marijuana and hemp, helps people and their pets with myriad issues, including pain, anxiety and depression.
And stores hawking CBD products are proliferating in the Lehigh Valley. The owners of the Emmaus Your CBD Store, which opened in April, are opening another storefront, at 2705 MacArthur Road in Whitehall Township, on Monday. They said that from April to May, their store had the 16th highest sales in the country among the chain, which has more than 300 stores.
Another Your CBD Store opened June 8 in Easton, and Smooth Roots, a CBD store that opened in Palmer Park Mall about a year ago, will soon open storefronts at 911 Hamilton St. in Allentown and in New Hope. Those retailers are in addition to the countless health food, grocery and other stores that have also started selling CBD-infused oils, lotions, tinctures and snacks.
CBD grabbed attention in a 2013 CNN documentary “Weed” that featured a 12-year
old girl whose near-constant epileptic seizures were reduced after she tried a CBD-rich cannabis strain. The compound has risen in popularity since then and is found everywhere from CVS to Kim Kardashian’s baby shower.
Harmony, who has attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, is bipolar and has other mental health issues, says the compound has helped him cut down on the number of medications he takes. He used to take so many that he carried them around in a gallon sized ziplock bag, but now he just has five or six and the CBD. His blood pressure is down.
“Everything has changed,” he said.
The CBD-infused gummies also help his son, who has attention deficit disorder and autism, he said. Since he started taking them, his teachers noticed a change at school and he sleeps better, Harmony said.
The pair were among a steady stream of clients who visited Your CBD Store during lunch hour Thursday. Some were older clients seeking help for pain or Tourette syndrome. A younger couple hoped to find something for anxiety.
They’re contributing to a market for CBD that’s estimated to grow to $16 billion by 2025, according to some analysts, Forbes reported.
“It’s definitely part fad, but there’s also some substance to this that shouldn’t be ignored,” said Martin Lee, the director of educational nonprofit Project CBD and author of “Smoke Signals: A Social History of Marijuana — Medical, Recreational, and Scientific.”
Lee said CBD products are so popular in part because they tap into a general dissatisfaction with health care and pharmaceuticals and have the general allure of being associated with cannabis, but without the high.
There’s also some scientific validation for its use to treat anxiety, pain, depression and metabolic issues, he said.
In the U.S., clinical trials have supported the use of CBD to treat specific seizures in children. In other countries, a drug containing CBD and THC is approved for neuropathic pain, spasticity, overactive bladder and symptoms of multiple sclerosis.
The Lehigh Valley Your CBD Stores’ owners said their sales are taking off as people become increasingly aware of CBD and its properties.
At the Emmaus store, brothers Jeffrey and Jonathan Valera greet each customer by asking what brings them into the store. They’ll give customers a rundown of the products, and direct them to whatever is most likely to help their ailment.
People hoping to treat a flareup symptom might try a water soluble pill or droplets that work quickly. Those hoping to treat a chronic issue might prefer an oil, which has a longer-term effect.
Sometimes people are drawn into the store by the “free samples” sign posted outside. Sometimes they’re back within two hours to buy whatever they’d tried, the Valeras said.
They’re careful not to make unfounded scientific claims to customers, but they share anecdotes of what they’ve heard from others.
There was a woman who came in almost limping, and 15 minutes after she tried a sample, she was able to wiggle her leg.
“I’ve had people cry because they’re not hurting anymore,” Jeffrey Valera said.
Some of their customers come in after hearing about CBD from a friend or family member with similar problems. Bill Hartenstein, 71, of Schnecksville stopped by the store to see if CBD could help with his Tourette syndrome.
He said his wife is always encouraging him to try different things to manage his symptoms. So when he heard about CBD at a graduation party over the weekend, he thought he might as well check it out.
“I thought, make her happy, give this a try,” he said.
The blue-painted space feels part like a salon, part a pharmacy and part a store. The Valeras and their employees talk through customers’ symptoms and the proper dosage they should be using.
Smooth Roots, another CBD store, set up shop in Palmer Park Mall about a year ago, after the owners of Lehigh Valley Mall decided to ban CBD, owner Kyle Katynski said.
He said customers increasingly are already familiar with CBD when they walk toward his kiosk.
“When we first opened, we were pretty much educating people on what CBD was,” he said. “Now, a lot of people at least know what it is, if they haven’t already tried it.”
A legal turning point came when the federal Farm Bill went into effect this year and declassified hemp as a Schedule I drug (marijuana remains on the schedule).
Experts warn that there’s still little federal oversight of CBD, so it can be hard for consumers to verify if a product contains the claimed amount of CBD and isn’t contaminated with anything else.
A study published in November 2017 said many CBD products had labels promising an incorrect amount of CBD. About 43% of products were under labeled and 26% were over labeled, according to the study.
Some products claiming to have only CBD also contained THC, Marcel Bonn-Miller, a researcher at Thomas Jefferson University who worked on the study, told The Morning Call earlier this year.
He recommended people call CBD companies and ask for their testing reports.