Oregon Bags $11 Million During First Week of Recreational Weed Sales

Some shops, including Nectar in Portland, report that as many as 500 customers visit their store each day.

Image via Marc St. Gil

At the risk of rendering yourself as immobile as the guy who called 911 while perched atop a pile of Doritos and Chips Ahoy, try to imagine $11 million worth of weed. Glorious, right? That's roughly how much weedOregon sold during its inaugural week of recreational weed sales, according to the latest reports. This $11 million haul places Oregon "far ahead" of money spent on weed compared to both Colorado and Washington's first week of sales, meaning the state's previous estimate of $9 million in net tax revenue for 2017 sales now seems laughably conservative.

The Oregon Retail Cannabis Associationtells KGW that, upon tallying sales and factoring in projections, approximately $3.5 million in weed was sold on the first day (October 1) alone. Jeff Johnson, the owner of Nectar in Portland, says his shop has seen as many as "500 people a day," meaning a lot of weed is making a lot of people quite happy this October. "Obviously we're seeing a young crowd," admits Johnson,  "but we're also seeing people in their 50s and 60s that would never have bought the product if it wasn't legal."

You heard it from Johnson first: Old people in Oregon are finally getting high, which is truly a beautiful thing.

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