Cannabis has been legalized in Canada for a little over three years now. Since then, cannabis has become an everyday part of Canadian life in multiple aspects. Whether it be through recreational use, medical use, or through a business, it’s become just as prevalent as alcohol and tobacco.

So how exactly has cannabis impacted daily life of Canadians?

Recreational use is one of the most obvious ways cannabis has become part of Canadian society. 23% of Canadians reported having used cannabis in 2020. Most of those were younger adults, with 36% of users being aged 18-24 and 38% of users being 25-34.

Matt Kyle, a 19 year old London resident, has been smoking since high school. Now, we’re not here to discuss the ethics and legality of smoking weed before the age of 19, just know that it is illegal and can cause harm to younger people.

“The first time I did it was just because I wanted to try it with my friends,” Kyle explained about his experiences with cannabis.

“And then, for the past consistent years, I’ve just been smoking just because I enjoy it. I enjoy being high.”

While he does respect people who do use cannabis for pain, anxiety, or any mental health issue, he says he just gets high to relax and enjoy himself after a long day.

Smoking cannabis is not for everyone, but Kyle does think everyone should try it to form an opinion.

“A lot of people listen to other people’s opinions based off of it,” he explained.

“I think everyone should at least try it once and then build off their own opinions from it.”

He recommends to start slow, build your way up to a higher THC count strain, rather than starting high. His other piece of advice was to smoke with someone who already smokes, saying it’s ” nice to have a mentor slash tutor around so that way if you start to feel anxious at all, they could actually help you.”

Another form of use is medical use, be it for physical pain, anxiety, or mental illness.  Becca MacDougall, a PSW and Dietary Aide, uses marijuana for just there.

MacDougall has many different pain disorders and found smoking marijuana ended up being more effective for dealing with chronic pain.

“Instead of taking a really heavy medication that might hurt my stomach, which happens a lot, I can take, you know a little, puff of weed and it normally helps within a few minutes.”

She said normal painkillers take anywhere from 45 minutes to an hour to kick in, while comparing cannabis to “almost a faster form of Advil.”

“A lot of my pain is like muscle, muscle pain and joint pain. I’ll take the weed and it’s almost instantaneous that the pain is gone.”

As with any drug, she says it will differ from person to person, as while it may help some people with their anxiety, it’s not great for hers.

“My advice would just to be if all else has failed and you have never tried to use marijuana for pain or anxiety definitely give it a go. There’s nothing wrong with trying out a medication and if it works for you, that’s great. And if it doesn’t, it doesn’t.”

With so many people using cannabis, someone has to be there to supply it. That’s where cannabis retailers come in.

There has been a recent boom in retail fronts, with London going from four in April 2020, to 40 in April 2021, with that number only increasing since then.

Neat Cannabis, located on Oxford Street near Adelaide, is one of those stores. Having opened March 11 of this year, neat is one of the newer stores in London.

So how has Neat set themselves apart?

“First of all, one thing, one aspect of neat cannabis that we’re very proud of is that we’re 100% locally owned and operated,” Leeanna Newton, the brand director at Neat, explained.

“So our owners live in our area, all our staff have been living in the London and Komoka area.”

Being 100% locally owned is a rare thing in the retail area of cannabis with a lot of people moving to cities like London or Windsor to open shops.

Newton explained that Neat wants customers to take the time in their stores, rather than an in and out situation as it is with a lot of people.

“We want you to linger. We want to ask those questions. And we want you to be open with us to really get to know you on a personal level. Because cannabis is such a personal experience and it varies from person to person greatly.”

One of the very interesting things Neat has done to set themselves apart from the competition was to put a live beehive on the lot of their Komoka store.

“So our bees pollinated 8 billion flowers in the cocoa area, and our supporting crops in the area. And we got about 40 pounds of honey that we’re sharing out of that endeavors”

She says this practice, that According to newton, Neat was the first to start, has reached all the way to Zimbabwe and Britain.

On the provincial scale, it seems to be much the same as London, with a huge boom in cannabis storefronts recently. Ryan Mallough of the Canadian Federation of independent business says the main reason for so many stores popping up in Ontario is a backlog.

“We know prior to the pandemic, that there were roughly between 50 and 100 stores with a plan to get it close to 400 in relatively short order, then, of course, the pandemic hit and well, not a lot of regular government functions could happen.”

With the government able to take the time process these applications during the pandemic, a lot of applications are going through, explaining the big boom in storefronts.

Some argue that the stores are taking up real estate from other locations that could be using it. Mallough says that they’re just like any other business, you just can’t window shop.

“Of course, they are still paying rent, or if they’re purchasing the property, they are still paying property taxes, so long as they’re a viable business,” He explained.

“So we’re not sure yet if cannabis is necessarily crowding out small businesses”

One point he hammered home was that the distribution of these stores was incredibly uneven, which makes it seem that there are “too many” stores popping up in major cities.

“Toronto, I think has hundreds of cannabis stores. Mississauga has none because their municipal council opted out at the store and have not yet voted to opt in. There are still a few communities around Ontario that have that.”

With how the law of supply and demand works, some of these storefronts closing in the coming years is a given.

As for where the industry can go from here, Mallough sees the industry growing with things like a proper online delivery similar to a food delivery service like Uber Eats, and the long debated Cannabis lounge.

“I think there’s still still a lot of evolution to come and a lot of innovation to come in that industry for entrepreneurs looking to get it.”