Weed shopping is a sensory experience that requires you to employ your tactile sensation, sight, smell, and sometimes taste to establish product quality. Besides your senses, in-house “budtenders” and fellow shoppers can also help you settle on high-quality products matching your needs.
However, the need for social distancing during the pandemic eliminated the engaging in-store customer experience; hence online shopping became the only viable option. Ironically legal cannabis sales skyrocketed during the pandemic, meaning consumers trust online dispensaries’ weed quality as much as their local cannabis stores.
Here are some of the reasons consumers trust weed delivery services’ product quality.
Compliance With Regulation Authorities’ Public Health And Safety Requirements
Marijuana delivery service providers are an integral part of Canada’s legal cannabis industry. Therefore, they must comply with Health Canada’s product quality requirements stipulated in the Cannabis Act.
According to Canada’s Cannabis Act, the Federal government and Individual provincial governments must ensure only high-quality and safe products enter the market. In conjunction with provincial regulatory bodies, Health Canada ensures that cannabis cultivators adhere to strict cultivation policies, including avoiding chemical pesticide use. They also monitor factors like standardized cannabinoid potency and stipulate the best production processes for processed cannabis products.
While Health Canada offers general guidelines, provincial regulatory authorities decide how to implement the guidelines within their jurisdictions. For instance, in Ontario, the government-run Ontario Cannabis Store (OCS) is the sole wholesale distributor by law. Therefore, all licensed weed dispensaries and delivery services in Mississauga and other municipalities in the region only sell products certified by the OCS as high-quality. Second, regulatory bodies also have a tracking system that monitors the entire legal cannabis supply chain, preventing illicit weed from entering the legal market.
Independent Lab Test Results
One vital regulatory aspect that Health Canada has in place is mandatory cannabis testing for active pesticide ingredients. The regulatory statute lists the compounds subject to compulsory testing and stipulates acceptable limits for each compound. Mandatory independent lab testing facilitates product quality control and empowers cannabis consumers to make informed purchasing decisions.
Besides the mandatory lab tests for pesticides, licensed weed producers and manufacturers also enlist licensed third-party labs to test their products further. The independent labs test each batch of products for cannabinoid level, heavy metal content, herbicides, pesticides, fertilizers, microbes, and chemical solvents using a chromatograph.
Independent lab testing initiated by licensed entities in the legal cannabis supply chain heightens transparency within the cannabis industry. Licensed weed delivery services grant consumers access to such lab reports; others go a step further and avail consumer guides on interpreting such results.
Product Content
As earlier stated, weed shopping is a sensory experience; however, since you cannot use most of your senses online, weed delivery services post comprehensive product content. Product content entails any copy and accompanying graphics that help a consumer visualize a product sold online.
Licensed weed delivery services post accurate product descriptions highlighting product specifications like cannabinoid content, terpene profile, cannabis strain, ingredients, expected effects, and recommended uses. They also post high-quality product and product label images and videos, allowing you to evaluate product quality visually.
Customer Reviews
On-page and off-page customer reviews and social media engagements also help prospective consumers establish product quality. By reading about other users’ experiences with specific weed delivery services, you can learn whether their product descriptions are accurate or exaggerated.
Alternatively, you can also visit cannabis forums and ask fellow consumers to recommend the best weed delivery service based on product quality serving your locality. However, be wary of unscrupulous delivery services that use review bots to bolster their image online. Bot-generated reviews often lack human avatars and feature a series of mechanical-sounding reviews.
Good Open Inventory and Product-handling Practices
The cannabinoids in weed and other cannabis products tend to lose potency with time. For instance, THC breaks down to CBN over time, and in a year, AAAA+ weed rich in THC would have a much lower ranking if tested.
Because of this, weed delivery services monitor consumer habits closely to ensure they stock fast-moving products. The government’s tracking system also monitors product inventory to prevent low-quality weed from making its way into the legal market or being diverted to illicit markets.
However, given that consumer habits are dynamic, what consumers want today may change tomorrow. So, trustworthy weed delivery services are open about their inventory policies. Customer-centric inventory practices for slow-moving weed is holding sales or giving it away as a complimentary gift while it still has a reasonable shelf life.
Regarding product handling, cannabis is sensitive to air, light, and moisture; therefore, limiting exposure to these elements preserves the product’s quality. Notable weed delivery services have custom-built storage facilities that limit exposure; they also restrict access to the facilities to parties processing orders. The product-handling policies also extend to the type of packaging used while in transit.
Conclusion
Verifying the quality of weed sold online may seem complex, but it is possible. Moreover, once you review the factors above, you will establish trustworthy weed delivery services and have potent weed consistently delivered to your doorstep.