"I come from one of the largest Black families here in Hudson and Columbia County, and those tentacles go wide," Hughes said. "I know when I open my doors, they're coming to my shop, and they're not going to go anywhere else. Their friends are coming to my shop, and they're not going anywhere else. I know that. I can say that very confidently."
Meanwhile, at the Common Council Finance Committee meeting last night, the disappointing revenues from the cannabis tax were a topic of discussion. In 2024 and 2025, high on the promise of new revenue for the city from the 4 percent cannabis tax, the Board of Estimate and Apportionment anticipated revenue considerably greater than what was realized. In 2025, projected revenue from the cannabis tax was $235,000. The actual revenue from the cannabis tax in 2025 was less than half that amount. Last night, City Treasurer Heather Campbell reported that $40,000 had been projected in cannabis tax revenue in the most recent quarter of 2026, but only $18,000 had been received.
Commenting on the situation, Councilmember Mohammed Rony (Second Ward) observed, "The informal economy still exists. The legal side does not eliminate the illegal side." Recalling how the lines went around the block in Great Barrington when the first cannabis dispensaries opened in Massachusetts, Councilmember Rich Volo (Fourth Ward) suggested, "It's just a trend that's kind of over." Noting that there was now a dispensary in Greenport and soon to be one in Claverack, Campbell suggested the problem was market saturation.
In the Register-Star article, Hughes, whose dispensary will be the third in Hudson and the fifth in the area that shares the 12534 zip code, responded to the notion that the market for cannabis was oversaturated:
"I always laugh at that," Hughes said. "Do we have a saturation of bars and breweries? Is there a saturation of hotels? Do we have a saturation of coffee shops? It's laughable. Customers are going to choose the business that they want to patronize."
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Update: A reader informs that a second dispensary is soon to open in Greenport, on Route 66 across from The Falls.
I go to all the dispensaries around here and they are never full except on rare occasions when an entire wedding party comes in at once. This is true in MA, too. At first, buying legal weed is a lark, then it's just another trip to the corner store. Then you realize you can buy legal weed illegally so . . ..
ReplyDeleteAll business is difficult. If making money was easy, everyone would be rich. I wish Bill luck. I hope he hires a seasoned marketing team.
That last quote is disappointing and makes it seem as if Bill doesn’t understand the business. The hotel comparison makes no sense at all, and the bar/brewery/coffee shop comparison seriously misunderstands the way those businesses work compared to dispensaries.
ReplyDeleteBars, breweries and coffee shops are social third places. Many locals use one or more of them as remote work spaces. Customers often spend hours in the same seat. Dispensaries are basically drive-thrus. It’s very rare to still be in a dispensary more than 5 minutes after you’ve made your purchase. These aren’t the same things.
Regarding Volo’s observation that legal cannabis consumption is a “trend that’s kind of over”: this is the opposite of what is actually happening. Cannabis use is at an all-time high.
And even if the analogy to bars, breweries, hotels and coffee shops was a valid one, I say we DO have saturation there. I think his better argument is that he can succeed by taking customers away from the other two shops. That's assuming, and I really don't know one way or the other, that the customers are Hudson residents and not tourists
DeleteHudson doesn’t have nearly enough hotel rooms for the events it already puts on. And it has 0 hotel rooms that someone making close to an average salary can afford. Bars, breweries, coffee shops..if we hit saturation, the businesses that aren’t someone’s trust fund fueled flight of fancy will close.
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