I have a lot of conversations with people that wish to ‘re-brand the marijuana industry.’ I have heard that a lot lately, and re-branding the marijuana industry means different things to different people. But I am often left thinking at the end of those conversations that the people that want to re-brand the industry basically want to make marijuana more interesting to demographics that don’t represent the bulk of the marijuana consumer base. I have always felt that while yes, branding is a good thing in the marijuana industry or any industry for that matter, I don’t see any major shifts happening in the makeup of the marijuana consumer base.
I think that most marijuana consumers will always tend to look more like me than they will tend to look like the guy on Wall Street, despite the desires of people entering the business side of the marijuana world from corporate America. Attempts to re-brand marijuana often border on insulting to the average marijuana consumers, which is a lesson that more and more marijuana companies learn everyday. A report was recently released in Colorado which found what demographics make up the largest percentage of Colorado’s marijuana consumer base, and as I expected, it’s not older corporate types. Per Marijuana Business Daily:
Colorado cannabis business owners need to look no further than a recently released survey from the state to find their primary demographic: young males who haven’t attended college and are in lower income-tax brackets.
More than 17% of men currently use cannabis in the state vs. 10% of women, with the average at around 13% among all adults in Colorado, according to the survey, conducted by the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment.
The survey also found that nearly 30% of 18- to 24-year-olds in the state currently use cannabis, by far the highest percentage of any age group.
Obviously, people from all walks of life consume marijuana. However, some demographics consume marijuana more than others, and in the case of Colorado, young males who have yet to attend college are by far the biggest consumers of marijuana in the state. Knowing facts like this is important, and can mean the difference between success and failure in the marijuana industry. People can spend all the time that they want targeting older demographics with Ivy League educations, and try as hard as they can make the marijuana industry all about that crowd, but at the end of the day those people miss their mark.
