'Part of history.’ Cherokee dispensary starts first recreational cannabis sales in Southeast

This weekend, a pocket of North Carolina became the first in the Southeast to have legal recreational marijuana sales.

General Manager of Qualla Enterprises Forrest Parker said over 4,000 people were served at the dispensary during opening weekend.

"It was just an absolutely humbling and insane turnout," Parker told BPR on Monday.

Long before the doors of the Great Smoky Cannabis Company opened at 10 a.m. on Saturday, a line with hundreds of people snaked through the dispensary’s parking lot in Cherokee.

Dispensary workers with the Eastern Band of Cherokee tribe started checking IDs and lining up the first 40 customers so that the recreational marijuana purchases could take place when the clock struck ten.

“We’re going to let you about 40 of you guys in and you can start shopping so that you guys are some of the first people to (legally) buy cannabis in North Carolina,” a Great Smoky Mountain Cannabis Company worker explained to the crowd.

Once the doors opened, the crowd outside continued to grow – with nearly 1,000 people waiting in a line that eventually crossed Paint Town Road. Saturday’s celebration of the first legal recreational marijuana sales in North Carolina came just three years after the Eastern Band of Cherokee first approved opening a retail dispensary for medical cannabis.

Faith and Richard Lynch from Denver, N.C., arrived at the dispensary at 8 a.m., hoping to be some of the first in the door. The pair stayed in Cherokee overnight. Faith Lynch said she has a medical card that allows her to purchase marijuana for medicinal reasons, but the pair wanted to be a part of the milestone moment when recreational weed sales happened.

“It's about time,” she said. “North Carolina needs to get off their behinds and get ready and let's go.”

“This is probably the bump in the road that's going to make North Carolina go medical at least,” Richard Lynch added.

TJ Plumber says he goes by Wild Horse. He is an enrolled tribal member with a medical card.

“We’re just here to have a good time and celebrate a day of history,” Plumber said.

The Eastern Band of Cherokee is able to sell marijuana as a sovereign tribal nation but as soon as a customer steps off of tribal lands it is illegal to possess marijuana, according to state and federal laws. In 2023, the tribe voted to allow the legal sale of recreational marijuana. This followed a 2021 decision to sell medical marijuana. That vote launched the creation of Qualla Enterprises, the tribe’s cannabis company, which operates the cannabis farm and the dispensary.

On Saturday, Ben Cordell, of Greenville, S.C., lined up at 1 a.m. – to be the first in line, according to The Cherokee One Feather.

The dispensary brought in a high-profile guest for the occasion. Nathan Apadoca aka Dogg Face went viral four years ago when a video showed him vibing on a skateboard while listening to Fleetwood Mac and drinking cranberry juice.

“Legalization of weed should be everywhere worldwide,” Apadoca said Saturday.

Apadoca says he’s a lifelong stoner. He is also a Native Mexican and part of the Northern Arapaho tribe. He says it is important to support Native cannabis ventures.

“Native Americans are making a noise in America right now. So it's good to be a part of everything native as well and just to be a part of this, making history federally and statewide, you know what I mean? Being native and being here,” he said. “It's just crazy seeing the line and the drive-thru is just insane.”

Inside the over 10,000 square-foot retail facility, Qualla Enterprise employees and Tribal Council members watched on with pride. In addition to cannabis gummies and infused drinks, some shoppers bought t-shirts that read: “I was part of history.”

Tribal Council member Tom Wahnetah (Yellowhill) is the liaison between Qualla Enterprises and tribal council. Wahnetah said expanding dispensary sales through recreational marijuana is a crucial part of the tribe’s economy.

The Eastern Band of Cherokee’s main revenue comes from two casinos: Harrah’s Cherokee Casino and Valley River Casino. The casinos bring in the majority of the tribe’s revenue and employ over 4,000 people in Western North Carolina. In recent years, the tribe has focused on diversifying its income - especially after having to briefly close the casinos during the 2020 pandemic.

“It's very important because gaming has popped up all over Tennessee, Virginia and probably soon in South Carolina and Georgia. So we have to diversify more our revenue streams to support our people in our programs,” Wahnetah said.

“We've been here for over 10,000 years and cannabis has been here forever. We've used it ever since the Cherokee have been around. We've used cannabis as rope, as twine, as clothing. And it's medicine, that's what it is,” Wahnetah said.

He says that the Eastern Band is ready to partner with North Carolina government leaders if the state ever decides to legalize medical marijuana.

Tribal Council member Boyd Owle (Birdtown) agrees. He said that so far the tribe has invested about $50 million into its cannabis venture.

“We spent the money now, we got to see, you know what to return to be,” Owle said.

Owle said he was with the group that went to visit NC Governor Roy Cooper to talk about selling cannabis.

“They gave us their blessing and said you'll be a great pilot program for the state of North Carolina,” Owle said. He added that there is already a piece of property that the tribe is considering if the farm needs to expand.

Asheville resident Kendall Thomas didn’t have far to drive to visit the dispensary on Saturday.

“I've been waiting for this,” Thomas said, saying he’d been waiting for “half my life.”

Thomas said he was mostly interested in cannabis flower and vapes so the cannabis consultant named many of the flowers available like Guava lemonade, Tropicana cookies, Key Lime Pie, and Blue Goji.

Thomas went with a sativa Blue Goji.

Stacy and Steve Wood drove from Charlotte for the first day of recreational marijuana sales in Cherokee. Stacy Wood said she has a medical card, obtained, in part, because she is a breast cancer survivor.

“I'm a frequent visitor here. I have a medical card, but my husband has never had the experience before so he wanted to come, so I stood in line for him,” Stacy Wood said.

BPR spoke with them as they ate the cannabis-free samples of Fruity Pebbles Rice Crispy Treats, chocolates, cookies and more.

“The most satisfying part of all of this experience to me is I know that I'm purchasing stuff that is not going to be laced with anything crazy, that it's going to be legitimate,” Stacy Wood said.

A big part of the offering at the dispensary is a wide selection of edibles. Before the opening, Director of Production Jeremy Smith said he was working on a new special treat for the big day.

“We make everything from scratch in-house. We've fortified and put together our recipes over the past two years. [We] just try to be as creative as possible,” Smith said. “Right now, one that we're R&D is our new peach fizzy gummies. It's kind of like a play on an orange soda gummy. We made our own in-house Pop Rocks.”

Smith worked in the food industry for nearly two decades.

But he said making dessert was something he was worried about.

“The idea of baking, pastry, exactly measuring, there's no fun in that. There's no creativity. But in all seriousness, there is a lot of creativity and a lot of fun things that you can do such as these candies that I made here and things like that,” Smith said.

“We have close to 80 different (products) and that's between baked goods, chocolates, candies, gummies. And then we have a face and body cream for our topicals. We have a pain relief salve. We even have an intimacy massage oil.”

The dispensary had over 300 different products in total on opening day, according to Qualla Enterprises general manager Forrest Parker.

On opening day, Smith showed off the gummies in their final form.

“They are a vibrant orange color and then they have these large crystals on the outside that are crunchy … When you eat them, they pop in your mouth,” Smith said.

The variety of cannabis goods brought people from all over the Southeast region. The dispensary served more than 1,000 people on its opening day.

Wayne Nesmith from Cashiers was among them. The Navy veteran said he had been waiting for this day for a long time.

“I've been waiting for this forever. Next to my kids being born, this is the greatest day of my life,” Nesmith said.

“It's the only thing that never let me down. Women come and go but weed is forever.”

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