Your marijuana is coming: Delivery OK'd from licensed N.Y. businesses

By bike, by vehicle or by scooter, New Yorkers will soon be able to order cannabis products to their doorsteps under a new delivery model just outlined by the Office of Cannabis Management.

The state’s first retail dispensary licensees interested in making sales by delivery can now receive approval from the agency to transport New York cannabis products to customers, according to an announcement Friday.

All license holders will be able to make marijuana deliveries under the model the agency outlines as providing more options to licensees as they build new adult-use cannabis businesses and compete in the new market.

Delivery will be made by vehicles, bicycles, scooters and other similar methods of transportation, and guidance allows for retail licensees to operate out of a warehouse to fulfill delivery orders for up to one year while building permanent dispensary locations. Customers must place orders online or via phone call and are not able to pick up the cannabis products in person or from warehouse locations.

Additionally, cash payments will be prohibited from cannabis consumer to delivery employee. Instead, customers must make online pre-payments.

The temporary delivery authorization requires adherence to all public health and safety regulations, and, as required under state law, there will be a maximum of 25 delivery staff per business to transport products to consumers 21 years and older, with ID verification upon sale and delivery, the agency said.

New York issued its first 36 Cannabis Adult-Use Retail Dispensary licenses in late November after giving first dibs to business owners with documented marijuana offenses. Those licensees will make the first legal adult-use sales with cannabis products grown by family farmers in New York as part of the Seeding Opportunity Initiative.

The delivery announcement, designed to allow businesses to jumpstart sales, comes just weeks after the Office of Cannabis Management asked a federal judge to alter a temporary injunction that has prevented the state from issuing marijuana retail licenses in five of its 14 regions, arguing that it should only apply in the Finger Lakes area. 

Qualifying provisional licensees are still able to submit approval for proposed retail store locations and may qualify for financial support for renovations from the Social Equity Cannabis Investment Fund under the Dormitory Authority of the State of New York. Locations will be matched with licensees as they become available, according to Friday's announcement. 

This story originally reported by Melissa Manno for the Times Union.