January 1: A Quick Guide To Buying Legal Weed in California

Christmas is gone, but something exciting is still bound to happen. On January 1, a new year and new laws are coming to California, bringing legal recreational weed to all adults 21 and over.

The first day of legal retail cannabis will bring to life a multi-billion market. On December 31, all medical marijuana businesses shut the door and will open the next day as adult-use dispensaries. However, it will not happen everywhere in the state, and not all at once.

To be one of the first people to buy legal marijuana in California, you need to go to Berkeley, San Diego, San Jose or Santa Cruz. If you happen to live in the Southern California desert or near Mount Shasta, you are lucky, too.

Only cities with locally approved rules can host sales on January 1. Los Angeles and San Francisco are not among them; both cities are expected to allow sales a little bit later.

Where To Buy?

You still can celebrate January 1 with legal weed. Other retail outlets will open their doors on this day to all comers. At the moment, a total of 15 temporary adult-use licenses have been issued to businesses throughout the state. So, where to go?

Santa Cruz

Santa Cruz is a chill beach town about two hours’ drive from San Francisco. It is also a home for the nation’s oldest legal medical marijuana dispensary, the famous Wo/Men’s Alliance for Medical Marijuana.

A Santa Cruz business secured the very first license to sell recreational cannabis in California, so Kind Peoples at 140 Dubois Street is a place to be on January 1. Kind Peoples was able to get a host of licenses from the state Bureau of Cannabis Control in mid-December. If you want to go somewhere else, you may want to visit Del Ray Oaks and Monterey Bay Alternative Medicine, which also has a permit to start sales on January 1.

San Jose

Purists would want to visit the Bay Area on January 1 to purchase from Number One — the license number assigned to Buddy’s. If you do not care about the number on the permit and are concerned with the number of grams in your pockets, other dispensaries begin to work on the same day. Adult-use sales are allowed at Airfield Supply and Purple Lotus Patient Centre.

Berkeley And Oakland

If you happen to be in San Francisco, you may want to drive across the Bay Bridge to the cannabis-friendly East Bay — and you better be there early. Both Oakland and Berkeley have at least one dispensary that will open its doors at 6 a.m. on January 1.

The state’s oldest operating medical marijuana dispensary Berkeley Patients Group will open its door as an adult-use business at 6 a.m. which means that it is your number one spot to get the first legal gram in California. Purple Heart in Oakland will open at the same time, so it is up to you where to go this morning. Plan ahead!

San Diego

San Diego is also a place to be buying marijuana on January 1. The biggest city in the state to allow adult-use, San Diego offers at least five dispensaries open: Mankind Cooperative, THCSD, A Green Alternative, Urbn Leaf, and Torrey Holistics. It is not clear which will be the first to open, but most of them will start their day as usual, at 9 a.m.

The Desert, The Coast Or The Mountains

Cannabis lovers who happen to be near Mount Shasta in far-northern California, the Humboldt County coast or Desert Hot Springs will be able to get legal weed as well. 530 Cannabis in Shasta Lake, Ecological Cannabis Organisation in Eureka, and Green Pearl Organics in Desert Hot Springs will be waiting for you there.

Happy New Year!

This post is based on this material.

(Sweedsy in no way encourages illegal activity and would like to remind its readers that marijuana usage continues to be an offense under Federal Law, regardless of state marijuana laws. To learn more, click here.)