Cannabis businesses are booming. They’re also having a hard time getting insurance.
Cannabis businesses are booming. They’re also having a hard time getting insurance.
Cannabis is legal to buy and sell in about 20 states, but at the federal level it is still very much illegal. And that poses challenges for cannabis business owners looking to get insurance.
If you live in a state where it’s legal, yes, you can get insurance for your cannabis business. It’s just going to be expensive.
“I believe it was more than $10,000,” said Miriam Wood, owner of The Tea House, a dispensary in White River Junction, Vermont, that opened in late December. She says her insurance company required almost half of the total premium as a down payment.
“It was difficult, we weren’t licensed, we didn’t have any revenue coming in,” she said.
These policies can be so expensive because cannabis laws vary state to state. So companies have to offer specialized policies, explained Peg Brown, a deputy commissioner at the Colorado Division of Insurance.
“Much of the insurance that’s available for cannabis is in what we call the surplus lines market,” said Brown.
This is a type of insurance often used to cover unusual things like a singer’s voice or a dancer’s legs or a storefront full of pot and cash. A group of regulators is working to standardize state policies but, Brown says, the easiest fix would be for Congress to change federal law.
There’s a lot happening in the world. Through it all, Marketplace is here for you.
You rely on Marketplace to break down the world’s events and tell you how it affects you in a fact-based, approachable way. We rely on your financial support to keep making that possible.
Your donation today powers the independent journalism that you rely on. For just $5/month, you can help sustain Marketplace so we can keep reporting on the things that matter to you.
