As cannabis becomes a globally traded medical commodity, cGMP compliance is reshaping how it is grown, handled, and transported. For operators working with imported biomass, controlling contamination and ensuring consistency across supply chains has become a defining challenge. That challenge was a central focus at the International Cannabis Business Conference in Berlin, where a panel on Good Manufacturing Practices (GMP) examined how operators can meet the European Union’s stringent standards for medical cannabis.

Moderated by Constant Ma, CEO & President of Cannactions Consulting Ltd., the session brought together cultivators, scientists, and technology providers to discuss contamination risk from cultivation through post-harvest processing and packaging.

Unlike many agricultural commodities, cannabis presents a distinct compliance challenge. It is a biological product, inherently variable from batch to batch, and highly susceptible to microbial contamination. In medical markets, particularly in Europe, variability must be tightly controlled.

“All of this is super important because with GMP, we have to make sure that our products are consistent at all times,” Ma said. “And we also have to make sure that it’s safe for the patients that are using it.”

Where Contamination Risk Begins

Panelists emphasized that contamination risk does not begin in processing. It starts in cultivation and carries through every stage of production.

Picture the moment a cannabis company’s compliance team gets copied on an email from a banking partner’s risk officer. The subject line says “Questions re: public materials.” Attached is a spreadsheet. On one side, language from the company’s Florida medical dispensary website. On the other, language from the California recreational site, the New Jersey acquisition press release, and a quote from the CEO’s interview in a trade publication eight months ago. The risk officer wants to understand how all of it reflects the same company, because from where she’s sitting, it doesn’t. 

This is not a hypothetical. It is a conversation that is becoming more frequent as financial institutions become more sophisticated in how they evaluate cannabis operators.

Inconsistent messaging across states is not a brand problem. It is an operational risk that has been misclassified, and companies that treat it as a marketing issue tend to find out the hard way that they have compliance exposure.

What Regulators and Banks Are Actually Looking At

A state regulator reviewing a multi-state operator and a financial institution conducting due diligence are doing the same thing, even if they don’t describe it that way. Both are trying to determine whether the organization they’re looking at is actually in control of itself, its operations, its decisions, and its story.

Take a company positioning itself as a premium medical operator in Florida, a value-driven recreational brand in California, and a community dispensary in New Jersey. From the inside, that probably reads as market awareness. From a regulator’s desk or a bank’s credit committee, it reads as an organization that hasn’t decided what it actually is. Localization is a legitimate strategy. Contradiction isn’t.

Cannabis packaging decisions have downstream consequences for compliance, operations, customer perception, and margins. This article offers a practical framework for evaluating packaging suppliers across five dimensions: compliance, product quality, operational fit, customization, and partnership reliability. It closes with a pre-commitment checklist that operators can use before signing any supplier agreement.

Cannabis packaging is no longer a purchasing decision. It’s a strategic one. The wrong supplier can compromise compliance, disrupt operations, damage brand perception, and erode margins in ways that far exceed any line-item savings on the invoice. And once a brand is locked in, switching suppliers mid-stride tends to be both expensive and operationally painful.

The cannabis packaging market is also crowded and uneven. Quality varies widely, regulatory requirements are shifting state by state, and the pace of change has accelerated. The Texas Department of State Health Services (DSHS) rolled out sweeping new packaging rules for consumable hemp products on March 31, 2026, giving businesses roughly 20 days of notice before the requirements took effect. For operators, that kind of timeline is a reminder that supplier selection isn’t just about today’s products. It’s about whether a supplier can keep up with what’s coming.

The framework below covers five evaluation criteria and a pre-commitment checklist. Together, they’re designed to help operators separate suppliers who can sustain a long-term relationship from those who will create friction at every turn.

Start with compliance, not price

Compliance has to be the first filter, not an afterthought. A supplier who can’t speak fluently to state-specific rules or can’t point to how their products meet current requirements is a supplier who will cost more than they save.

Driven by innovation and convenience, pre-roll sales in 2025 not only had the strongest growth of any major category, topping $3.6 billion in sales and moving 383 million units, but supplanted flower as the most units sold for the first time in the industry’s history, according to a new report from Custom Cones USA.

It’s the fifth consecutive year that pre-rolls have outperformed the industry as a whole, growing revenues 9.8% year-over-year, well ahead of the 1.5% growth rate of the entire sector. On top of that, unit sales grew 18.6%, helping lead the category to a 15.9% market share.

In total, pre-rolls have seen by far the largest growth of any category over the past five years, driving growth for the entire industry, despite having the lowest average price point of any major category at just $9.18.

“Pre-rolls are no longer an afterthought,” said Harrison Bard, CEO of Custom Cones USA. “What started as a trim byproduct, pre-rolls have matured into a highly competitive, innovation-driven category where brands are winning through quality, scale, and smart branding.”

Drawing on point-of-sale data from 15 states collected by cannabis analytics firm Headset, as well as a survey of pre-roll manufacturers from around the country, the State of the Pre-Roll Market 2026 report shines a spotlight on this growing and important category, revealing what pre-rolls are selling, how they are being sold, and who is buying them.

As federal policymakers move toward restricting hemp-derived cannabinoid products, a new state-level effort in Colorado is taking the opposite approach by moving to integrate low-dose THC beverages into mainstream hospitality.

A coalition led by Colorado-based attorney Brian Vicente, partner at Vicente LLP, has formed the Colorado THC Beverage Coalition and introduced legislation that would allow hemp-derived THC beverages—up to 10 milligrams per serving—to be sold and consumed in bars, restaurants, and event venues.

If successful, the bill would position Colorado alongside states like Minnesota and Tennessee, which have emerged as early leaders in normalizing hemp-derived THC beverages in social, alcohol-adjacent settings.

A Three-Tier System for THC?

At the core of the Colorado proposal is to treat THC beverages more like alcohol.

As the U.S. hemp industry braces for potential federal disruption later this year, a new bipartisan bill aims to give states a way to maintain control over intoxicating hemp products and potentially keep the category alive.

Sens. Rand Paul (R-KY), Amy Klobuchar (D-MN), and Joni Ernst (R-IA) have introduced the Hemp Safety Enforcement Act, legislation that would allow states and tribal territories to opt out of an anticipated federal ban on intoxicating hemp-derived cannabinoid products. Instead, states could regulate these products under their own frameworks.

The bill arrives at a critical moment for the hemp sector. Federal provisions expected to take effect in November 2026—widely interpreted as banning hemp-derived cannabinoid products exceeding the 0.3% delta-9 THC threshold—have created significant uncertainty across the supply chain. Industry stakeholders warn that, without a legislative fix, the rule could effectively dismantle much of the hemp-derived consumer packaged goods (CPG) market, including fast-growing categories like delta-8 THC beverages, edibles and other ingestibles.

Originally legalized under the Agriculture Improvement Act of 2018, hemp and its derivatives have since evolved into a multi-billion-dollar market. However, the lack of clear federal guardrails has resulted in a fragmented, state-by-state regulatory patchwork. Some states have embraced hemp-derived cannabinoids, while others have moved to restrict or ban them entirely.

Proponents of the Hemp Safety Enforcement Act argue that a state-led approach offers a more practical path forward—preserving existing markets while enabling oversight tailored to local public health and safety priorities. The legislation would also support compliant interstate commerce between states that choose to regulate, rather than prohibit, these products.

For years, the cannabis industry operated in an environment where expansion was the primary signal of success, and investors were excited to get involved. New markets opened, and rapid growth often took priority over efficiency. Companies could move quickly and sort out the details later, trusting that scale would eventually smooth things out.

That environment no longer exists, and in most ways, growth is now more challenging. Margins are tighter, investors are more selective, and competition has intensified. Those changes are forcing a closer look at how businesses actually perform beneath the surface to survive. Growing sales is crucial, but sustaining profitability and managing working capital over the long haul are essential to success. 

This shift tends to start with cost visibility. To survive and thrive, cannabis operators must understand their product unit economics and the variables that influence them. In a compressed market, small inefficiencies have a way of compounding. A slight increase in input costs or a mismatch in pricing strategy can quietly erode performance over the course of a quarter.

None of this is theoretical. It shows up in day-to-day decisions around production, sales, marketing, and where to invest resources.

Growth strategy is evolving alongside that reality. Expansion into new markets still carries long-term value, but it is harder to justify without the infrastructure to support it. Entering a new market introduces layers of operational complexity, and success depends on more than securing shelf space. Distribution, retail relationships, and localized execution all factor into whether a brand actually thrives in a new setting.

In 2024, Colorado state officials announced a recall affecting 172 stores across the state. Batches of flower and pre-rolled joints from one grower exceeded mold and yeast limits. The losses were immense, including for companies that thought the money they were paying each year to insurance companies for premiums would provide, only to discover that coverage wasn’t there when it mattered most.

This is not an isolated story. Cannabis operators across the country pay high premiums for policies riddled with exclusions, resulting in enormous uninsured exposure to areas including product recall, regulatory action, business interruption, cyber liability, and directors and officers coverage. Section 280E makes every uninsured loss even more painful, with effective tax rates that can exceed 60 percent of gross income. The commercial insurance market has failed this industry structurally. Some operators are looking at captive insurance as a structural solution.

What Is a Captive Insurance Company?

A captive is a licensed insurance company that your business owns. Rather than paying premiums to a carrier that keeps the underwriting profit, the promise of a captive is that owners can accumulate reserves, keep the insurance company’s profit, and write policies covering risks that commercial markets refuse to underwrite. As such, it is worth looking at the pros and cons of forming a captive.

The Pros

Coverage for gaps no commercial carrier will fill. Control over your risk program, on your terms, based on your coverage and philosophy. Financial upside: underwriting profit stays in your business, not your carrier’s. Stability against volatile premium markets. Risk management discipline that improves your operations over time. And a powerful signal to investors and acquirers that your business is built with institutional-grade infrastructure, which is a meaningful advantage in capital raises and exit valuations.

A cannabis biopharma company is seeking to join the federal lawsuit challenging the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services’ (CMS) new hemp and CBD pilot program, adding a pharmaceutical voice to a government-sanctioned program allowing untested and unregulated hemp products into the marketplace.

MMJ International Holdings and its subsidiaries, MMJ BioPharma Labs and MMJ BioPharma Cultivation, have moved to join the lawsuit filed by Smart Approaches to Marijuana (SAM) and other plaintiffs against CMS and federal health officials.

The move comes after the court denied the plaintiffs’ emergency request for a temporary restraining order on March 31, allowing the program to launch while the litigation continues. The court is scheduled to hold a preliminary injunction hearing on April 20.

SAM and its co-plaintiffs filed suit on March 30 in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia seeking to block CMS’s new Substance Access Beneficiary Engagement Incentive, or BEI. The optional Innovation Center program allows participating organizations to discuss eligible hemp-derived products with Medicare beneficiaries and, under the model’s rules, furnish them for symptom management.

CMS has argued that the BEI is not a broad Medicare coverage expansion and does not directly reimburse hemp or CBD products in the same way as a traditional Medicare benefit.

All roads in cannabis retail lead back to inventory.

Retail cannabis operators across the country are being squeezed by razor-thin margins, declining cash flow, and a growing inability to pay vendors on time. The culprit is often not weak sales or lack of demand. It is mismanaged inventory.

Inventory is the foundation on which the entire business is built. It is the single biggest driver of cash flow, profitability, and retail performance. Yet many retailers are still carrying too much product, reordering too late or too early, and failing to connect inventory decisions to merchandising, promotions, sell-through, and actual consumer demand. Brands feel the impact too. They cannot accurately forecast production, plan manufacturing schedules, or maintain healthy warehouse levels when retailers are not managing inventory effectively.

Excess inventory locks up cash, slows vendor payments, compresses margins, and creates pressure to discount. Too little inventory creates out-of-stocks, lost sales, frustrated customers, and strained brand relationships. In either scenario, poor inventory management undermines every other part of the business.

Many cannabis retailers are far exceeding the 30-day product turnover goal needed to keep cash flowing and inventory fresh. Some operators are sitting on more than $150,000 in overstock every month, cash that could otherwise be used to pay vendors, invest in marketing, open new locations, or strengthen operations.

From cultivation to retail, businesses are digging deep to tighten operations and increase margins as the only way to endure another grueling year in cannabis without federal support.

A common sales pitch these days centers on cost-saving systems and operational efficiency. The industry has shifted from “how fast can we grow?” to “how do we survive profitably?” There is little tolerance left for inefficiency.

A glance at the agenda for the upcoming MJ Unpacked show in Atlantic City, kicking off May 5, offers insights into the industry’s current challenges as we move through 2026. According to co-founder George Jage, the programming is shaped by input from committees across retail, brands, and cultivation, made up of operators who meet regularly to share pain points and what they are seeing on the ground.

“There’s no higher level of learning than peer-to-peer learning, and understanding the biggest pain points,” says Jage. “We take that information and design panels around the challenges and solutions operators are actually dealing with.”

Here is what I gleaned from this year’s agenda and where the industry is focusing. If the industry is going to stabilize, tight execution at every phase will matter.

For many cannabis founders, the exit problem is not finding the right buyer. It is that there are barely any buyers at all. The field is narrow, capital is tight, and the strategic buyers that do exist are rarely showing up with clean cash offers. More often, founders are being asked to accept low valuations, seller paper, stock in the buyer, or some other compromise that falls short of a real exit.

That leaves owners in a bad spot. They can sell on terms they do not like and watch the company they built get absorbed into a larger platform. Or they can keep running the business and hope the market improves. Neither is a strong answer for a founder who wants liquidity now.

For years, the industry has told itself a familiar story. Survive the chaos, build something real, wait for institutional capital, and eventually a good buyer will show up. It is a nice story. It just has not been true for most operators.

Cannabis does not have a deep buyer universe. 

Most private equity firms have stayed away from plant-touching companies because there is no clear exit path. Most large strategic buyers have their own capital constraints, which means they buy selectively and often on terms that shift risk back to the seller. At the same time, 280E has drained cash from otherwise solid businesses, making it harder for founders to wait around for a market that may or may not improve.

That is why so many owners have been stuck in the same position for years: they have built valuable businesses, but when they want liquidity, the options are limited, and the terms are often weak. “Hold on, and the buyers will come” is not much of a plan.

At the recent Business of Cannabis event in New York, Robert Sciarrone, Chief Revenue Officer at Curaleaf, shared an MSO’s insider view on why he believes New York is poised to become the best cannabis market on the planet.

Sciarrone began by reflecting on his early years as a cannabis-focused venture capitalist. Through his firm, Measure 8 Partners, he has deployed more than $550 million across 20-plus cannabis companies globally, including dispensaries, delivery services, and technology platforms, with investments spanning California, Arizona, Nevada, Canada, and Europe.

After joining Curaleaf two and a half years ago, recruited by Executive Chairman Boris Jordan, Sciarrone transitioned from investor to operator, now overseeing revenue across 18 states in both retail and wholesale. He admitted the operational grind has given him a new respect for the business side of cannabis, but emphasized that passion for the plant and its customers remains the heart of the industry.

Looking back on the “freewheeling” investment era of 2019, when $100 million deals were being done daily, Sciarrone contrasted that speculative period with today’s market. “California’s day is over,” he declared, suggesting that the West Coast market’s oversaturation and regulatory struggles have created space for New York to lead. With its cultural influence, economic strength, and growing consumer sophistication, Sciarrone believes New York can set the standard for how cannabis culture and business shape the global industry.

As a born-and-raised New Yorker, Sciarrone expressed deep pride in being part of that evolution: “It’s my passion to be here and watch this market unfold.”

It starts with a routine test result. A mid-size cannabis brand discovers that a batch of infused edibles has failed a pesticide screening. Within 48 hours, the company issues a voluntary recall, pulls product from dozens of dispensary shelves, and begins fielding calls from anxious retail partners. The financial damage — replacement inventory, logistics, regulatory compliance, and reputational repair — runs well into six figures.

Then comes the second blow: the insurance claim. The carrier cites an exclusion. The payout falls far short of actual losses. Or worse, the policy is non-renewed because the company is now considered “high-risk.”

This scenario plays out more often than anyone in the industry wants to admit. And it exposes a structural problem unique to cannabis: the commercial insurance market is thin, expensive, and full of holes.

Why Commercial Insurance Keeps Failing Cannabis Operators

Because cannabis remains federally illegal, the pool of insurers willing to underwrite cannabis businesses is small. Limited competition drives premiums up and coverage terms down. Many policies carry broad exclusions for the risks most common in cannabis operations — product recalls, crop loss, regulatory actions, and inventory spoilage. Operators routinely overpay for insurance that underperforms, year after year, enriching carriers while getting little in return.

Missouri has quietly built one of the country’s more successful adult-use cannabis markets since launching recreational sales in 2023. Since legalization, the state has quickly grown into one of the largest cannabis markets in the Midwest, generating strong sales and supporting an expanding network of cultivators, processors, and dispensaries.

Unlike many states that see medical patient numbers decline after legalization, Missouri has continued to grow its medical program even as adult-use sales expand.

Curio Wellness, a vertically integrated cannabis company founded by the Bronfein family and headquartered in Baltimore, has been steadily expanding its presence in the state. The company first entered the Missouri market through the acquisition of a cultivation facility and broadened its retail footprint last fall with the purchase of four Greenlight Dispensaries locations.

Wendy Bronfein, Chief Brand Officer and co-founder of Curio Wellness, praised the rollout of the Missouri market, noting that while Missouri operates under a limited-license framework, the market still supports a robust number of operators and retail outlets, creating strong statewide distribution. Bronfein also touted the program’s tax structure, noting that taxes collected from the medical cannabis program are directed to a veterans’ fund that has already received tens of millions of dollars.

She added that Missouri has been notable for both clearly reporting revenues and delivering funds to its intended programs—something that does not always happen in other markets. The program’s success is particularly noteworthy, she said, given that Missouri is a traditionally conservative state, challenging assumptions that well-functioning cannabis markets only emerge in more progressive regions.

While the cannabis industry has made significant strides in incorporating minor cannabinoids into product formulations, a vast number of therapeutic compounds remain largely unexplored. Researchers and cannabis physicians have been experimenting with acidic cannabinoids for several years with promising results, but the broader industry is only now beginning to catch up. As extraction technologies improve and research advances, more acidic cannabinoids are appearing in new product formulations.

“People are more and more focused on acidic cannabinoids now because, before, we did not have the advanced extraction technology to isolate them in a highly purified form, and now we do,” said Hemant Kumar Bid, PhD, program director for the Master of Science in Biotechnology at Morehouse School of Medicine, where he focuses on medical cannabis.

“The plant produces cannabinoids in their acidic form,” Bid explained. “These acids are the precursors to neutral cannabinoids such as CBD and THC.”

Among the acidic compounds, Bid has a particular affinity for cannabigerolic acid (CBGA), often referred to as the “mother of all cannabinoids.”

“In the scientific world, we call it the stem cell,” he said. Stem cells are extremely powerful because they can develop into many different types of cells in the body. CBGA works in a similar way in the plant.

Biotechnology, cannabis medicine, and the rapid advancements in artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) are beginning to converge.

Hemant Kumar Bid, program director for the Master of Science in Biotechnology and the Medical Cannabis concentration at Morehouse School of Medicine, believes this convergence could dramatically accelerate the development of cannabis-based therapies. With AI, cannabis medicine may move beyond today’s trial-and-error approach toward more personalized, precise treatments.

Biotechnology combines biological science with advanced technology to develop medical solutions, including drug discovery, genetic engineering, and diagnostic tools. “Modern biotechnology focuses on molecular biology, genetic engineering, and advanced cell culture techniques. This is where it will advance cannabis medicine,” explains Bid.

The Foundational Elements of AI and Machine Learning

AI and machine learning are closely related but serve distinct roles.

When most people think of luxury goods, they picture high-quality, high-priced products. But what truly sets luxury apart is not just cost. It is craftsmanship, design, heritage, cultural cachet, and mastery of materials and technique. Luxury is a sensory experience rooted in both tradition and innovation.

Cannabis, with its complex chemistry, rich history, and powerful sensory appeal, has all the makings of a luxury product. Yet few brands have moved beyond upscale packaging and clever marketing. The industry is still waiting for its equivalent of Chanel No. 5, Moët & Chandon, or Tiffany.

To understand what it takes to build a bona fide luxury cannabis brand, I spoke with Dr. Avery Gilbert, a sensory scientist and former luxury perfumer who has worked with world-renowned fragrance houses. Today, he brings that expertise to cannabis product development. According to Gilbert, the secret ingredient is blending, an art that defines both luxury perfume and fine wine and may be cannabis’s missing link to true luxury status.

Gilbert outlines how cannabis brands can apply lessons from California’s fine wine cellars and Paris’s perfume ateliers to craft products worthy of legacy status.