Marijuana stores in Illinois have now sold over half a billion dollars worth of cannabis products according to the state.
October marked the six month in a row that Illinois had hit a marijuana sales record. Since the launch of the state’s marijuana program, it reached half a billion dollars worth of legal cannabis product sales last month.
A top regulator had said in August that Illinois is proving that its cannabis market is “recession-proof” and “pandemic-proof.”
“We were not doing this to make as much money as fast as we possibly could,” Toi Hutchinson, senior cannabis advisor to Gov. J.B Pritzker (D), said. “We were actually doing this for people,” with a focus on supporting communities most impacted by the drug war.
For the month of October, adults purchased 1,557,880 marijuana products worth a total of $75,278,200. That’s about $8 million more in sales compared to September and almost double the first month of sales in January.
The new adult-use sales figures do not include data about purchases made through the state’s medical cannabis program.
Roughly $55 million in purchases came from in-state buyers, while nearly $21 million came from out-of-state tourists.
According to Marijuana Moment, Gov. J.B. Pritzker plans to pardon more people with prior cannabis-related convictions, as he did last year, when he pardoned more than 11,000 people.
