I wanted to be in the legal marijuana industry
I can remember smoking weed in school and convincing myself that I wanted to be in the legal marijuana industry that was mainly sequestered to the western United States at the time. However, the legal cannabis industry has exploded across the United States, and now there are more places where it is legal in some capacity opposed to places where it’s illegal 100%. I’m surprised to see cannabis dispensaries in my own state, but it passed by voter initiative in 2016 and all of us had a burgeoning medical marijuana industry here 12 months later. Lots of people flocked to the industry as patients and employees alike. Most of the employees at my local cannabis dispensary are also patients of the program, but it isn’t a requirement to be an employee by any means. My best friend Larry has been a budtender in our state’s medical marijuana program since early 2018 and he has worked for five strange companies since then. He says that it’s a nightmare working at most cannabis dispensaries because management puts a lot of pressure on employees while the purchasers are often annoyed and ready to take out that anger on the budtender. Despite several people wanting to work in the medical marijuana industry before meeting my friend, usually they have changed their mind once they’ve had an opportunity to speak with my friend about the realities of the work for a few hours. He hates getting berated by cannabis store customers, and it gets worse all of the time. People get seriously entitled when they’re dealing with employees at stores of all kinds these afternoons.