Harvest Of AZ Marijuana Dispensaries
Harvest of Tucson Logo
Harvest of Arizona is a budding medical marijuana dispensary in Tucson, Arizona. Founded in 2013, three years after medical-use cannabis became legal throughout the state of Arizona, Harvest Cannabis Dispensaries has since opened up multiple locations throughout the Grand Canyon State.
The humble beginnings of Harvest Cannabis Dispensaries
2010’s Proposition 203 allowed citizens of Arizona to vote for or against the legalization of medical marijuana. Proposition 203 barely passed, earning just 50.1 percent of the overall vote.
If the state of Arizona didn’t have restrictions on the number of dispensaries that were allowed to open once the state legalized medical-use cannabis in 2011, they couldn’t hope to compete with one another. The market would have effectively made it impossible for dispensaries to sell their products at a profit.
That’s why Arizona held a state-wide lottery for dispensary licenses. Steve White, a co-founder of Harvest of AZ, won one of the few licenses given out to cannabis-minded entrepreneurs. White founded Harvest of Tempe two years after he received the license. He then managed to win another license to operate a different dispensary. In 2015, Mr. White created Harvest of Scottsdale.
At the time, Steve, a long-time friend of his, and an expert in the growing cannabis trade were the only three employees that Harvest of AZ had. White recounts that the trio thoroughly enjoyed working with one another, reminiscing that laughed their heads off.
White has survived attacks from multiple lawmakers since entering the cannabis business
Jan Brewer, the Governor of Arizona from 2009 to 2015, filed a lawsuit in an attempt to stop the Arizona Medical Marijuana Act of 2010 in its tracks. Fortunately, Brewer’s lawsuit failed, though White and company were certainly spooked by her efforts to end the use of medical marijuana throughout the state.
Later on, Bill Montgomery, the Attorney of Maricopa County, Arizona, sought to slap senseless regulations on dispensaries and physicians alike. Along with the rest of Arizona’s pro-cannabis community, Steve White was active in fighting Montgomery’s efforts. Just like with Jan Brewer’s lawsuit, their actions paid off handsomely in resisting the anti-cannabis efforts of Maricopa County Attorney Bill Montgomery.
Harvest Cannabis Dispensaries has since become one of the most successful dispensaries in the state
Currently, Harvest of AZ controls 10 licenses to operate dispensaries. The company works closely with recipients of dispensary licenses to operate cannabis dispensaries on their behalf.
These recipients who partner with Harvest of AZ simply don’t have the capital, effort, or expertise to assume the responsibilities of founding and operating a dispensary. As such, White has accumulated partnerships with seven different holders of cannabis dispensary licenses.
Steve White operates both the operations and the boards of directors that control each respective dispensary.
Mr. White’s and Harvest Cannabis Dispensaries’ license-operating strategy is unique to the trade
Several Tucson medical cannabis dispensaries across Arizona contract with individuals, partnerships, and management companies to control the daily activities and operations of those business entities. People who hold the rights to dispensary licenses receive a cut of those contractors’ profits.
Currently, the industry standard is for these brands to partner with such managerial crews but maintain separate brand identities from them.
Harvest of AZ operates a little differently than the companies mentioned above. Rather than managing another business owner’s brand, Steve White slaps the Harvest brand on all of the dispensaries he’s contracted to operate. This allows him and his partners to control all of those dispensaries’ operations. A major benefit of this system is that the holders of dispensary licenses and the members of Harvest of AZ aren’t set up to have conflicts over executive decisions.
If the owners of such licenses choose to manage dispensaries on their own or outsource managerial needs to another operator, Harvest of AZ Dispensary is able to finish out its current lease before being forced to pack up.
Mr. White is proud to say that Harvest of AZ Cannabis Dispensaries is the third-largest marijuana dispensary enterprise in the United States.