Local smoke and vape shops said Arkansas’ delta-8 ban led to decreased sales, but some are restocking after a federal judge paused the ban from taking effect.
An employee from Vapor World on Oak Street, Dalton Black, said the ban dropped the store’s sales by 30%.
Black said the store shipped the delta-8 products back to its warehouses in Rogers, Arkansas, and Dallas, Texas, after the ban passed.
“We just sent it off, and we assumed that they were going to send it off to other locations because we’re a franchise store, and we have 180 locations,” he said.
He said the warehouses sent the store about 10 boxes of products, worth about $5,000, for the employees to restock after they got word of the ban’s lift.
Black said before the ban passed the Arkansas legislature in April, most of their customers were using the products for medicinal purposes, which was particularly popular with older people.
“It’s just for pain, anxiety, trying to get off of whatever kind of pharmaceutical pills that they didn’t want to be on,” he said.
Black said there was confusion among customers with concealed carry licenses who didn’t realize that since Aug. 1, medical marijuana cardholders can legally acquire a concealed carry license.
“Some people think that as soon as you get that card, you’re not allowed to buy guns at all,” he said.
Black said gun owners were purchasing delta-8 products instead of applying for a medical marijuana card.
“The people that are like that are used to cannabis that’s almost like a different substance than what we have now,” he said.
“I think it’s a great thing for people that don’t want to go out and get their medicinal marijuana cards,” Black said. “But let’s be honest, cannabis should be recreationally legal anyway. We’re the natural state for a reason.”
A manager from Cloud 9 Smoke Shop, at 2850 Prince St., named Mary, who didn’t feel comfortable disclosing her last name, said Sept. 18 the store is restocking delta-8 products.
Mary said before the ban, a customer regularly bought delta-8 gummies for her 86-year-old father, who had cancer.
“He can get up and play with his grandchildren,” she said. “It takes care of his pain, and he has a quality of life.”
She said sales went down because “people [were] constantly coming in asking for it and were very upset that they couldn’t get it,” but she didn’t know the exact percentage.
A manager at Crazy J’s, located 2625 Donaghey Ave., named William, who didn’t share his last name, said Sept. 12 the store did not have delta-8 products in stock.
“We pretty much sold what we could and gave the rest to employees,” he said.
A federal judge blocked Arkansas from enforcing Act 629 of 2023, which banned the production and sale of delta-8, -9 and -10 products, because it violates the U.S. Constitution’s commerce and supremacy clauses and 2018 federal Farm Bill, according to the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette.
U.S. District Judge Billy Roy Wilson issued the ruling during an Aug. 23 motion hearing in federal court in Little Rock after a group of hemp product-makers from Arkansas, Colorado and Texas filed a lawsuit July 31, the day before the delta-8 ban went into effect.
Wilson granted a preliminary injunction, which blocks the state from enforcing the law while the case is decided.
The Arkansas Democrat-Gazette reported the judge said there’s a good chance Act 629 would be overturned as “void for vagueness” and that the bill’s terminology, such as “continuous transportation,” “synthetic substance” and “psychoactive substances” would confuse “even an exceptionally intelligent reader.”
Wilson denied the state’s request to dismiss the case and set a trial for Aug. 27, 2024.
The plaintiffs are Bio Gen LLC of Fayetteville, Drippers Vape Shop LLC of Greenbrier, the Cigarette Store LLC of Colorado and Sky Marketing Corp. of Texas.
The plaintiff’s attorneys Abtin Mehdizadegan and Allison Scott argued the ban put their clients in financial jeopardy over the production and sale of products that the federal government deemed legal under the federal government’s 2018 Farm Bill, which removed hemp with less than 0.3 percent dry weight delta-9 THC as a controlled substance.
The lawsuit names the defendants as Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders, Attorney General Tim Griffin, the Arkansas Department of Finance and Administration directors, the Tobacco Control Board, the state Department of Agriculture, the state Plant Board and the 28 prosecuting attorneys of the state.
Wilson said Arkansas can pass more restrictive laws on the production of hemp inside the state’s borders, but forbidding the transportation through the state violates federal law.
