Pubdate: Sat, 05 Mar 2016
Source: Winnipeg Free Press (CN MB)
Copyright: 2016 Winnipeg Free Press
Contact: http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/opinion/send_a_letter
Website: http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/502
Author: Gordon Sinclair Jr.
Page: B1

POT AND BOOZE DON'T MIX: CEO

Says marijuana should be sold in stand-alone stores

IT has been a year since CEO John Stinson advised the board of
Manitoba Liquor & Lotteries, which had just hired him, that legalized
pot was coming, and the Crown corporation better be prepared for it.

And now it's been a week since Stinson visited Denver to get the
lowdown on Colorado's legalized marijuana high.

Which is how the CEO of our pot supplier-designate came to offer a
one-on-one briefing about the surprise he got on the trip.

Oh yes, and that pair of special socks he brought back. The ones with
the marijuana plant design that he bought in one of the Mile High
City's private retail pot shops. The same storefront operation where
he got the big surprise. Before he left, his big concern was how pot
would be sold in Manitoba once the federal government delivers on its
promise to legalize recreational use.

To some, Liquor Marts seem like a natural regulated fit. But not to
Stinson. "The quote that got picked up nationally for me was, 'My mum,
my 92-year-old mother doesn't want to buy her Blue Nun next to the guy
buying Jamaican Gold.'"

That, and the booze-buying culture it suggested, is why Stinson
arrived at a decision. "We're not going to put it in our Liquor
Marts." As for a stand-alone operation, Stinson was beyond skeptical.

"I didn't believe there was a walk-in retail model that could work,
that would allow for the social responsibility and control that's
going to be necessary."

Still, Stinson's political bosses wanted to reap a windfall for the
provincial treasury by selling recreational reefers. Initially,
Stinson thought the way to that was through the medical marijuana
model already at work through mail order and the Internet everywhere
in Canada except for British Columbia, where it's the Wild West when
it comes to commercial storefront sales and growing your own.

"So I thought that's probably how we're going to have to do marijuana
- - in a retail setting for medical marijuana."

A Denver pot scene, with a side trip to Vancouver.

"There's no possibility of a storefront kind of retail that's going to
work," Stinson recalled thinking before he flew to Denver. "So I'm
going to Colorado to prove that to myself."

While there, he went to the retail store where he bought those socks
with the buds on them.

"That changed my entire outlook," Stinson recalled. "I went, here's a
model that can work."

It wasn't the socks that did it. It was the setting and the service,
especially the way one sales person steered a middle-aged pot virgin
away from a product that was too powerful for her.

Now, after that experience, Stinson believes the stand-alone model is
the way to go after all, but slowly and carefully. Not for maybe
another four or five years if they do it right, he said. Starting with
two prototype stores, one in Winnipeg and one in rural Manitoba.
There's room for the private sector in producing the product, as it
already does for the medical variety. He even sees an economic
development model for pot production here, not unlike the wine
industry elsewhere.

"I worry," Stinson said, "that the stakeholders, both government and
private sector, go 'Wow,' rubbing their hands in glee around 'We can
make a lot of money with marijuana, and 'We can make tons of money to
help roads and heath care and all kinds of things.'

"But let's do it incredibly slow, because the money's there. Let's not
screw it up. Let's do it right," he said.

A large part of doing it right is the careful part, including how old
someone should be to legally purchase pot. He believes 25 should be
the legal age "because at least the initial medical evidence is,
particularly for young men, there is risk of mental-health triggers
such as schizophrenia."

Stinson's open to discussion on that age - to a point. "I can saw it
off at 21."

He knows younger people will still find ways to buy pot. "But we need,
from a responsibility perspective, to control it in a very rigorous
way."

Stinson sees Manitoba as an ideal place for the future of pot and its
profits.

We're not Vancouver or Toronto, where the storefront private genie is
already out of the bottle. He thinks Canada, and particularly
Manitoba, still has a chance to learn from the U.S. experience and get
it right. Or as right as any jurisdiction can. Don't allow
home-growing of pot, for example. He learned that on the side trip to
Vancouver. And don't sell edible products right away; not before
setting regulations for enticing treats such as THC-laced pop and
gummy bears.

Those were the other takeaways the trip. The ones that may not be as
easy a fit for the future as that pair of pot-leaf adorned socks
Stinson wore to work the other day just for fun. And maybe just to
remind his team where he's been and where they're going.
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