It’s common for cannabis growers to buy cultivation products at major retailers like Walmart and The Home Depot, but typically these products are general gardening and horticultural supplies, which aren’t marketed or branded specifically towards cannabis cultivation. Potting soils, soil additives, pest control, grow tents, light, and even hydroponic systems are commonly sold by major retailers, and while many of these products are common in cannabis gardens, they are also used in other types of indoor gardening. Though certain products (like 1000 watt double ended grow lights) are probably bought mostly by cannabis growers, when sold by major retailers they aren’t marketed as such. Thus far major retailers have shied away from products branded with obvious indications of use in cannabis cultivation.
So it comes as a significant development in the cannabis industry that Denver-based American Cannabis Company (ACC) has announced a distribution agreement with Walmart, Amazon, and The Home Depot. ACC is primarily a consulting company for the legal cannabis industry, but has recently expanded its offerings to include a number of ancillary products aimed at the cultivation market. Two of these products, SoHum Living Soils and Doctor Marijane Root Probiotic, will be sold by the retail giants. As of now the ACC products are only approved for sale through the retailers’ online stores, not their brick-and-mortar locations.
SoHum Living Soil is ACC’s potting soil designed with cannabis cultivation in mind, and Doctor Marijane Root Probiotic is a soil or hydroponic medium additive manufactured by Earth Alive Clean Technologies. Both products are marketed specifically for cannabis cultivation, and include reference to cannabis in their marketing materials. While none of the retailers currently mention cannabis by name on the product pages on their sites, Walmart’s page for SoHum features the product’s 2017 High Times award for Best Potting Mix, and Home Depot’s page includes a picture that is clearly of a cannabis plant in the vegetative stage. And obviously the name Doctor Marijane is a fairly blunt indication of the product’s intended use.
In a statement release by ACC, CEO Terry Buffalo commented: “ACC is excited to have the opportunity to offer our products online through these major retailers. We are especially excited to be selling our proprietary SoHum Living Soils® potting mix through these online channels, as we have spent years perfecting our blend, and fine tuning the messaging around the brand itself. This fully amended, pH-buffered potting mix will continue to disrupt the agricultural markets as a ‘Just Add Water’ super soil that acts to eliminate the human error element from cannabis and non-cannabis crop cultivation. We are also proud to be offering Dr. Marijane Root Probiotic on these online platforms. This root probiotic is packed with all the beneficial microbes you need to awaken the nutrients in your soil or soil-less (hydroponic) medium. ACC will continue to evaluate other online sales platform opportunities as they present themselves. We are committed to getting our products out in the market and into the hands of the cultivators who can truly benefit from these solutions that we provide.”
It will probably be some time before a cannabis grower can buy everything they need for their garden from Amazon, Walmart, or Home Depot, and dedicated grow stores aren’t likely to lose much business from the retail giants in the near future. But this is still a major development in the entrance of cannabis into mainstream business and culture. Though the federal government has failed to keep up with public opinion regarding cannabis, this move indicates that retail powerhouses like Amazon and Walmart are ready and willing to embrace the ever-expanding legal cannabis industry.
Sources:
https://americancannabisconsulting.com/2018/03/14/acc-inc-secures-new-online-distribution/