Cannabis sales, as reported by dispensaries in Colorado, for both medical and recreational marijuana is expected to approach $2,000,000,000 in 2020. The previous sales record was in 2019 for both medical and recreational at $1,747,990,628. If you look at the months of March (when Coronavirus cases were confirmed in all fifty states) through July, COVID-19 has had an impact. In 2020 cannabis sales are up over 25% from the same time period the previous year. In the five months prior to March of 2020, medical marijuana averaged $27.2 million in sales per month and recreational sales were a little over $117.2 million per month. Starting in March of 2020 through July, medical marijuana sales averaged close to $39.3 million and recreational $146.1 million per month.
In the first 8 months of 2020 medical and retail marijuana taxes and fees collected for the state has exceeded $244 million. If the marijuana industry in Colorado hits the $2 Billion mark in 2020, the medical and retail taxes and fees collected is expected to reach the $350 million. The cost of the coronavirus pandemic has hit everyone from individuals, families, companies, industries, cities and states and governments very hard. With state and city budgets being cut, the tax revenue from cannabis sales has helped Colorado during this difficult time. In the previous three years the tax revenue from cannabis in Colorado has been $247,368,473 for 2017, $266,529,637 for 2018 and $302,458,426 for 2019. If cannabis sales hit the $2 Billion mark in 2020, that would mean the cannabis industry has provided the state of Colorado with over $1.5 Billion in marijuana taxes and fees since 2014. That’s a big number.