How I walked into 2 stores in Southwest Virginia and bought marijuana over the counter

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Hunger led me to discover a store in Southwest Virginia that is openly selling marijuana, one of perhaps dozens of such operations that are trying to find ways around state laws that allow personal possession of cannabis but ban outright sales.

Cardinal’s Susan Cameron has a news story today about how these stores are proliferating and appear to be more numerous than they were last fall when law enforcement raided many of them in an investigation that claimed “a pattern of money-laundering.”

Here’s my account, and what led to this latest story.

I had an afternoon speaking engagement in Abingdon in mid-July. (I’m happy to speak to your civic group, too; just let me know .) Around lunchtime I got off Interstate 81 in Marion and was driving down the main commercial strip on Main Street, weighing my options, when something caught my eye — a store called the Zarati Shop.

That was the name of many of the stores that were raided last September as state and local authorities investigated “adult share” stores where customers could buy a legal product — a T-shirt, a hat, a sticker — and then be “gifted” some cannabis. Virginia law allows for personal possession but prohibits selling weed, making us the only state in the country with that distinction. Attorney General Jason Miyares last year issued an opinion that “gifting” and “sharing” operations are simply sales in a different form and thus violate that law; that’s what helped put last September’s raids into motion.

The Zarati Shop I had once visited in Roanoke County last summer when we were reporting on these stores — see my previous column — has long since closed. But this Zarati Shop in Marion was open. I turned around and went into the store to investigate.

When I entered, an employee — one of three working that day — checked my ID. The place smelled of marijuana. I was the only customer present. I was invited to look around (the wares included shirts, hats and various paraphernalia) and check out the lounge, which was outfitted with a big-screen TV. To test whether the store was back in the “adult share” business, I picked out a hat (which had no price tag) and asked how much it was.

The clerk behind the counter told me it was $25.

I paid $25 in cash but was offered no “gift.” I did notice that the clerk asked for my first name and entered into it a computer — nothing else was asked, and there was no requirement that I give a real first name (I did).

I then asked about the price board by the counter, which listed prices for various categories of, well, something. The clerk directed my attention to four vials on the counter, each one with a sample of green buds in it. Those samples corresponded with the descriptions on the price board.

I asked how much THC — tetrahydrocannabinol, the active ingredient in cannabis that produces the “buzz” — was in each one. Another clerk said the store didn’t know. I paid $10 for the smallest amount available for the premium blend that was named “Kush.” I was directed to another part of the store, where I was to wait on the guy who had checked my ID when I came in. A sign on the wall advised what to do if pulled over by police. The ID checker soon emerged and handed me a small sealed bag that contained a green bud and a black plastic vial. I pointed to the sign on the wall and asked how I should handle this purchase while driving. The ID checker said to treat it the same way I would alcohol — just as a driver shouldn’t have open alcohol in the car, I was best advised to keep the purchase in the glove compartment. He specifically advised me not to smoke it while driving, but invited me to stay and smoke it in the lounge.

I thanked him, put my purchase in the trunk and drove on to my speaking engagement in Abingdon. When I was done, I asked around and soon discovered that the Zarati Shop there remains open, located just outside the town limits on U.S. 11. Red plastic cups in a chain-link fence out front spelled out “Zarati Strong.” As I got out of my car, two customers were coming out of the store, each one holding a small plastic bag.

When I entered the store, an employee checked my ID and gave me a small card that said “Membership Card” and included a checklist of categories, which were presumably different blends. This store was bigger and had at least four employees: one at the door, two behind the counter and one in a back room. One clerk attended to various types of paraphernalia — pipes and bongs. I got in line for the clerk who was standing in front of the price board. The price board was similar to the one in Marion, but more specific. Blunts were $20, pre-rolls (meaning pre-rolled cigarettes) were $10.

There were three people ahead of me in line. When it was my turn, I pointed to the board and said I wanted $10 (the minimum price) worth of the premium blend called “O.M.F.G.” The clerk took my membership card, asked me for my first name, wrote it on the card and noted what and how much I wanted, then told me to wait until my name was called.

Soon someone came out of the back room, called my name, checked my membership card and handed me a sealed bag of green buds. He directed me to turn in my membership card when I left. The employee by the door took it, tore it up and told me I’d get a new one on my next visit. When I left, there were six people lined up for the clerk by the priceboard, and more people were coming in.

I had now purchased $20 of … well, I assumed cannabis, but none of these places actually said what they were selling. I found a Roanoke lab that was willing to test these purchases. It turns out instead of two samples I actually had three — that mysterious black vial included in the Marion purchase contained a pre-roll. Unfortunately, I hadn’t bought enough of whatever I’d purchased to do a full test for things such as pesticides, mold and other impurities — that requires at least 3 grams and my purchases were about 1 gram apiece. However, I was told the samples could be tested for 11 different cannabinoids, which would be sufficient to confirm whether this was, indeed, what we old-timers used to call marijuana before the marketplace came to adopt “cannabis” as the preferred term.

And so I waited.

A little biology: Hemp and marijuana are different forms of the same plant, much like how sweet corn and field corn are both corn but one you feed to your family and the other you feed to cows. What makes the difference with cannabis is the amount of THC — hemp has little to none, which is why that form of the plant has historically been used for making rope, canvas and, nowadays, lots of other things. Anything with more than 0.3% THC is considered marijuana. If you’re ever bought a legal hemp-based item, you might have noticed that the package lists (or should list) what the THC content is — that’s something that is supposed to get tested to make sure the products are legal.

These test results came back as I suspected: All three samples were well above the legal limit for THC.

The Marion bud — the lab termed it “flower” — tested at 1.03% THC.

The unexpected Marion pre-roll tested at 2.94% THC.

The Abingdon flower tested at 1.02% THC.

That means the Abingdon and Marion flowers were 3.4 times the legal limit; the Marion pre-roll was almost 10 times the legal limit. That’s just the existing THC level; when heated, another chemical in the samples would convert to THC, driving the levels even higher.

I shared the test results with the state Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services, which regulates legal hemp in Virginia. Here’s what I received back: “All of the samples you provided have a Total THC over 0.3%, which means by law that this is marijuana and the sale of this product is illegal in Virginia.”

I also sent the certificate of analysis to Trent Woloveck, chief strategy director for Jushi, a Florida-based cannabis company that operates in seven states and holds the state license for medical marijuana dispensaries in Northern Virginia. His take: “It’s the equivalent of the flower that I grow in my facilities,” he said. The scientific details in the analysis lead him to believe this is cannabis that was grown in a greenhouse. “That testing profile isn’t grown outdoors,” he said. “The Marion flower — when you look at the flower, it has bag appeal.” (In other words, it looks good.) “The trichomes, the white sticky stuff on the outside of the flower and the bud structure itself — that’s a flower that’s been cultivated indoors. It’s shorter, stockier. When plants are grown outdoors, they grow high and tall and lanky, so you don’t get good bud structure.”

Another figure in the analysis also drew the attention of those who I had look at the results. That was the amount of THCA, tetrahydrocannabinolic acid, the chemical precursor of THC. That cannabinoid won’t get you high but, when heated, it converts to THC, which will, at a rate of 0.877. That means the total “buzz” content of all these samples is quite high, no pun intended. The lab’s certificate of analysis computed the ultimate THC potential of these samples at 17.56% for the Marion pre-roll, 17.56% for the Abingdon flower and 24.24% for the Marion flower — meaning if someone smoked these, they’d be inhaling THC at 58.8 to 80.8 times the legal limits.

Chad Johnson, an assistant professor of pharmaceutical science at the University of Maryland and co-director of that school’s Graduate Studies in Medical Cannabis Science and Therapeutics, looked at the certificate of analysis and described these samples as “strong” and “quite strong.” He said it was impossible to judge what effect smoking this product would have on someone “since cannabis affects everyone differently based on a variety of factors,” but the THC levels here were such that “they would certainly have some noticeable effects on the user.”

All this raises a question that you’ve probably already wondered: How are these stores able to openly sell cannabis when state law forbids this? Susan’s news story provides more details on that but the short version appears to be in the membership card I was handed when I visited the Abingdon store. If these are “membership” operations, can stores legally sell cannabis to their members? The attorney general’s office says no. When I asked specifically about these operations, spokesman Ian Lichacz referred me to Miyares’ opinion from last year and added: “The general gist is that whether it is membership based or not it is still illegal gifting.” The Marion store didn’t give me a membership card but did enter my first name — nothing else — in a database. I’ve since noticed cannabis-themed stores in the New River Valley that have signs that more explicitly state that they are a “private” membership club.

Since this is an opinion column, let me state my opinion: This “membership” gambit is pretty weak. Does entering my first name — nothing else — in a computer really constitute a membership? I couldn’t tell if the clerk in Abingdon entered my first name into a database, but the “membership card” I was handed at the door was only in my possession for a matter of minutes. Even if my first name was entered into a database, there might be plenty of others with the same first name. How would the store know the difference between me and the next Dwayne who walks in? By contrast, a friend recently treated me to lunch at a restaurant in Roanoke, and the cashier asked for my friend’s membership card. She didn’t have it with her, so the cashier looked up her membership on a computer, but only after my friend had given her name and phone number. It’s easier to buy cannabis than it is to qualify for a free iced tea at a chain restaurant!

The real answer as to how these stores are allowed to operate may be the one that Woloveck gave: Law enforcement has no incentive to crack down. “They don’t care because it’s such a waste of time and resources,” he said. “There are a lot worse things going on.”

He likens this to how law enforcement deals with illegal sales of alcohol, up to a point. “They’re not spending their time going out finding moonshiners because 99% of people are buying alcohol through the legal market.” There’s one big difference, though, he said. “Moonshiners aren’t opening up a retail store on Main Street to sell their peach moonshine.”

That’s why he and others in the legal cannabis market are so upset about these cannabis stores, be they “sharing” or “gifting” or running membership operations. They’re taking advantage of market demand that is denied to those who would happily go through the trouble of getting licenses and paying whatever taxes and fees are required. Gov. Glenn Youngkin vetoed a bill this year to set up a legal market for retail sales, saying he didn’t want “a cannabis shop on every corner.” The reality is we have them anyway — maybe not on every corner, but at least one in every locality along Interstate 81 from Montgomery County to the Tennessee state line. Bristol has at least five within 11 blocks on State Street in Bristol alone and at least nine in all.

“The notion that cannabis isn’t already in these communities is just false,” Woloveck said. “There are more cannabis stores now than if they were regulated — if the governor had signed the bill on his desk.” That legislation would have limited the licenses for retail cannabis stores to 350. For comparison purposes, the Alcohol Beverage Control board has 404 stores statewide. Bristol has two ABC stores, but at least 4.5 times as many cannabis shops.

That legislation the governor vetoed would have taxed sales — no tax was added to any of my purchases — and also set up a testing regimen so that consumers know what they’re buying. “You’re not drinking a bottle of alcohol if you don’t know if it’s 20 proof or 40 proof or 100 proof,” Woloveck said. There’s no way here for consumers to know what the THC level is; you just spark it up and hope for the best.

Consumers also have no way of knowing whether the product is safe in other ways. A sample that Cardinal had tested last year contained enough bacteria that it was deemed unsafe for human consumption. What about these samples? Are there pesticides? Heavy metals? Mold? We don’t know because I didn’t buy enough for that level of testing (I don’t claim to be an expert in these matters!). That’s why last week I went to a store in the New River Valley, signed up for a “membership” and, after I bought something else in the store, the clerk “shared” a bag that contained more than 5 grams worth of, well, something green. That sample is now at the lab for a wider panel of tests. Those results may take more than a week. When we get those back, I’ll let you know.

The politics of cannabis

The proliferation of these cannabis stores in Southwest Virginia is politically fascinating, because these are some of the strongest Republican localities in the state yet Republicans have been the most opposed to legalization — or at least the type of legalization that was on the table this year. Why are cannabis stores doing so well in Republican counties? This is a topic I address in this week’s edition of West of the Capital, our weekly political newsletter that goes out on Fridays.

I’ll also look at how JD Vance’s reference to “childless cat ladies” led me to some unusual data that suggests Virginia is no longer a Southern state.

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