Being the second-smallest Canadian province, one would think that Nova Scotia wouldn’t need very many cannabis retail locations—and they don’t, however, having stores in more convenient locations would be nice.
The province’s approximately 925,000 residents purchase their cannabis products from the Nova Scotia Liquor Corporation (NSLC), which operates a “cannabis corner” set up within the provincially regulated liquor stores. Overall, NSLC sells cannabis out of 24 locations scattered across Nova Scotia’s 55,284 square kilometres, however, until last fall only one retail outlet existed on Cape Breton Island, where 15% of the population lives.
Since then, the NSLC has opened four additional stores on Cape Breton Island in Port Hawkesbury, Baddeck, and Glace Bay, with four more opening soon. According to NSLC spokesperson Beverley Ware, an outlet in Sydney Mines should be open by April 19, with more in Dominion, New Waterford, Sydney, and Inverness that will likely be open later in the year.
“The initial sites were chosen because they were in major hubs and would reach the largest proportion of customers and also because the size of those stores could accommodate us putting cannabis stores in there,” Ware told The Chronicle Herald, a provincial news publication. “But the plan and the intention all along was to build on that and to eventually have cannabis stores across the province to be able to make an impact on the illicit market. We’ve now doubled the number of cannabis stores in the province and we now have 24 and will be able to build on that.”
According to the last financial report from the NSLC, the corporation brought in $22.2 million in cannabis sales in the last three months of 2020, a 27.5% increase over the previous quarter. During that time, it also added six new stores in the province, including the four on Cape Breton Island, and the price per gram went down to $7.58.