Pubdate: Wed, 14 Apr 2010
Source: Creative Loafing Atlanta (GA)
Copyright: 2010, Creative Loafing
Contact:  http://www.atlanta.creativeloafing.com
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1507
Author: Mara Shalhoup

Special Sections: Women And Weed

WORKING GIRLS

The Benefits Of Being A Female Pot Dealer

For Sally Davidson, the decision to sell weed
boiled down to a simple question: How far was she
willing to go to keep her other, legitimate business open?

Davidson had for years poured boundless
creativity and long hours into her small, intown
operation (sorry, we've got to keep it vague,
just as we've changed the names of the subjects
of this story) and out of which she pulled barely
enough money to make the rent. She either would
have to shutter her business or work two gigs.

Had she opted for a more traditional second job,
like waiting tables, she felt she'd have little
energy left to devote to the venture she loved.
And really, what would be the point of running
herself so into the ground that she'd have no
choice but to do a half-ass job at the business
she was trying to save? That was almost as bad as giving up entirely.

Of course, there was another option.

Davidson, whose delicate features and
heart-shaped face suggest a certain sweetness,
happened to be a longtime pot smoker. She also
knew a dealer who, with some prodding, was willing to show her the ropes.

"I figured that this was the one thing I could do
that doesn't take a ton of time and can still
make money," she says. "It's kind of like working
at a strip club, but without the ankle pain."

It turned out that her dealer friend had too many
customers and was already thinking about
downsizing. So he was happy to pass some of his
client base along to her. She found that when it
came to peddling weed, she was a natural =AD and
that there are some things about being a woman
that actually make you a better pot dealer.

"I milk the fact that I look so innocent," she
says. "I'm a young Caucasian woman with a
respectable job. I drive a white-girl car. And I use that to my advantage."

For example, Davidson recalls how she was leaving
the house the other day only to find several
police cars parked outside. "The cops were like,
'Don't worry, everything's OK, ma'am.' If they knew what I had in my house!"

But it's not just about appearances. There are
other perks to being a woman in the pot biz. As
some of Davidson's clients pointed out, her pitch
was notably more polished than her predecessor's.
"I often sell a customer on product that's
locally grown and organic," she says. "Once, when
I did that, the guy looked at me and said, 'God,
it's weird buying pot from a woman.'"

Though she'd been buying weed for personal use
for more than a decade, Davidson had only bought
from men =AD a situation that could be alternately
intimidating and aggravating. As a result,
Davidson started paying attention to the little
niceties that elude some guys, such as returning
phone calls and showing up on time. She says
that, as with any business =AD including the one
she legitimately runs =AD "good customer service and good product are
 crucial."

Although she's now retired from dealing pot, Kate
Simmons agrees that women are often more
detail-oriented than their male counterparts, and
that the many female pot dealers she knew took a
deeper, more philosophical approach to the trade.

"I was very lucky to have elders =AD people who
were [pot] professionals for many years =AD show me
the way when I was young," she says. "That left a
huge impression on me. Most of the women I knew
in the business were in it for the same reason I
was: They saw the common good."

When she was still in her 20s, Simmons progressed
to selling strictly high-grade weed =AD and as much
as several pounds at a time =AD to a small and respectable client base.

Many of her customers were people with ailments
or professional jobs. The former viewed marijuana
as a welcome alternative to side effects that
accompany traditional painkillers, while the
latter considered weed an effective way to deal
with stress. To many white-collar pot smokers, a
few tokes seemed to take a lesser toll =AD and
result in a far more manageable hangover =AD than
knocking back a few scotches on the rocks.

Fortunately for Simmons and Davidson, the
professional crowd is drawn to a woman dealer.
"Doctors, for instance, have to be careful with
who they trust," Simmons says. "They were very comfortable with me."

The trust went both ways. Both Davidson and
Simmons point out how unnerving it is to know
that, should a customer get arrested, he'd be
pressured to give up his dealer. It's therefore
safer to serve customers who are more careful =AD
and have more to lose =AD than the stereotypical pothead.

Simmons says there was another bonus to dealing
with doctors. Sometimes, they'd buy in bulk and
pass the weed along to patients with eating
disorders, cancer or AIDS (marijuana helps with
pain relief and lack of appetite). Those patients
would likely be too skeptical =AD or too sick =AD to
seek out a dealer themselves. "Some of the
doctors would make pot brownies for their
patients," Simmons said. "I showed them the recipe."

Though dealing pot was always more about the
politics for Simmons, she admits the money was
good. In fact, there came a time when she says
she had more cash than she knew what to do with =AD
partly because she lived such a low-key,
flash-free life. She doesn't even drink.

The problem was, Simmons got to the point where
she was afraid to deposit her earnings in the
bank, out of concern that she might come under
investigation for handling suspiciously large
sums of cash. Then she started "hearing my name
around town, associated with dealing." That's
when she started phasing it out of her life.

It wasn't as hard as one might think. Throughout
her pot-dealing career, Simmons worked a regular job. She continues to do
 so.

"I have several friends [who used to deal weed]
who have kids and family [and] are retired as
well," Simmons says. "We're at a different age,
where we have people in our lives who we can't
jeopardize. And it's not worth it here in
Georgia, the way your freedom can be taken away."

Davidson, on the other hand, currently relies on
dealing pot to pay the bills, and she's earning a
more modest haul than Simmons did at her height.
"Business is slow-growing," she says. "For safety
reasons, it's worth taking my time."

But make no mistake; Davidson is intending to
expand. In fact, she says she's more driven than
most to succeed in the pot business.

"That has to do in part with being a woman in
this society," Davidson says. "We make, what, 76
cents to the man's dollar? I'm hungry, and that
influences me to hustle a little harder."

In the meantime, she's cutting expenses and
growing her customer base wherever she can. Just
the other day, she decided to cancel her cable,
because she's not a big TV watcher and could use
the extra cash. When the cable guy came out,
however, he hinted he might be willing to leave
her cable on if she were to offer him a little something in return.

She paused, then whispered: "Do you smoke weed?"
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MAP posted-by: Keith Brilhart