Cannabis Musings - October 16, 2025
Being and nothingness.
Friends, just a quick note on that news that Target is now selling some hemp-derived THC beverages up in Minnesota. Is it interesting? Yes. Is it a win for the so-called “intoxicating hemp” industry? Incrementally, somewhat yes. Does it help legitimize the product? I guess that depends on what product we’re talking about. Is it somewhat surprising that major national and multinational corporations are handling and selling a product whose existence is reliant upon a loophole (read this before you email me) that has a non-zero chance of being closed entirely if some in Congress get their way (assuming Congress ever gets around to appropriation bills or a renewed Farm Bill), and violates the Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act? Oy vey.
Readers know that we here at Cannabis Musings have been intoxicating hemp skeptics for a long time now, but we’ve never dismissed it as a thing. Most recently, we talked about the lack of reliable, consistent, standardized, real-time sales data, making it even harder to credibly assess the category within the miasma of hype and ocean of SKUs. More locally, Minnesota has been all meshugah for hemp since it accidentally (but not really) somewhat legalized cannabis in 2022, and the products are already well-established in the state, so query whether Minnesotans are going to notice that Target is also stocking them, and whether industry analysts will be able to measure whether the products are actually selling there.
And yet, it’s hard to deny that it’s kinda nifty that Target is touching these products. Back when hemp-derived CBD was going to be the next big consumer product (that was six years ago!), major retailers wouldn’t touch consumable CBD out of fear of running afoul of the same Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act that the industry is now completely pretending doesn’t exist. Apparently, reducing inflammation is too risky, but psychoactive/psychotropic effects are totally kosher. I’m guessing that Target underwrote the risk by observing that the Federal government hasn’t shut down the alcohol retailers and distributors that are touching these products. Things really have changed.
It’s gotten fairly impossible to predict where this goes. Not that it’s ever been a productive exercise to prognosticate when it comes to anything cannabis. Just like non-hemp cannabis, hemp products are still subject to the whims of both Congress and state governments – everything is completely tentative and dependent upon the grace (or hope for the continued inaction) of our elected leaders allowing hemp-derived THC, but not any other kind of cannabis-derived THC, to exist and proliferate. Similar to how the feds could, if they wanted, entirely shut down the state-licensed cannabis industry tomorrow, Congress could do the same with the hemp loophole (maybe not tomorrow, because that would require the Federal government to open back up first, so don’t take that literally).
I just don’t know how you build and scale a sustainable industry that way. It sure didn’t work for state-licensed cannabis. Now, hemp has the benefit of being aligned with, and backed by, the money and lobbying power of the alcohol industry, the upside of its Faustian bargain, which gives it much more of a fighting chance to obtain the legal stability that it needs. And alignment with the alcohol industry could help it avoid the marketing and growth mistakes of craft beer and hard seltzer (or, that alignment could also fuel the drive straight into those same walls). It’s all too soon to tell whether all of this works, but what I do know is that nothing really matters anymore anyway, so why not?
(One thing I do know is that you should read the letter issued yesterday by Adam Smith, Executive Director of the Marijuana Policy Project. It’s a much-needed clarion call for the industry.)
Be seeing you.
© 2025 Marc Hauser. None of the foregoing is legal, investment, or any other sort of advice, and it may not be relied upon in any manner, shape, or form. The foregoing represents my own views and not those of Jardín, B&Y Ventures, or anyone else who employs/hires me.
Well put. One piece missing from the bigger picture: big brick-and-mortar retailers are already shaping local cannabis policy—and they want their cut. Circle K is next and showing THC data in Florida & Georgia.
Are stand-alone dispensaries viable post-federal legalization? My view: unlikely. As you hinted back in May, cannabis won’t escape the three-tier logic that’s governed alcohol since the Federal Alcohol Administration Act era: clear separation of tiers, strict trade-practice rules (tied-house, consignment, exclusive outlets, commercial bribery), and—if recent federal drafts are any guide—taxation at first sale designed to prevent “control groups” from gaming revenue. Those guardrails crushed bad incentives in alcohol; cannabis could face the same teeth.
Retail dynamics point the same way. Age-restricted goods live in physical retail because that’s where effective age-gating scales; delivery networks aren’t built for it. Pharmacies already lost the broader CPG battle to grocery and big box; don’t expect cannabis to be different. THC beverages are the wedge: a traffic driver for chains seeing softness in RTD cocktails and craft beer.
Watch 2026: A well-funded THC beverage—priced, packaged, and promoted like beer, on the floor next to it in Ohio and Texas—will be the real test. Brands aligned with AB-wholesaler networks gain both route-to-market and political cover to keep the 2018 Farm Bill pathway open while importing alcohol’s compliance model. That makes them meaningful stakeholders in cannabis—and policy.
TL;DR: Cannabis isn’t getting a sweeter deal than alcohol. Plan capital and strategies accordingly.