Missouri Study Questions License Cap But Flags Ownership Concentration Concerns

Study Finds No Evidence of Over-Concentration

Missouri regulators say the state doesn’t need to issue more licenses to grow, manufacture or sell marijuana because the legal cannabis market is meeting consumer demand. But the statewide study behind that conclusion couldn’t answer a key question: whether a small number of companies controls a substantial share of Missouri’s marijuana businesses.

The study, released last week, examined cannabis purchasing habits, monthly consumer spending and sales in both regulated and unregulated markets. New York-based Cannabis Public Policy Consulting LLC found no evidence that Missouri’s statewide or regional cannabis markets are over-concentrated based on how sales are distributed among licensed facilities.

The researchers could not determine how concentrated ownership was among cannabis businesses because they lacked usable data on who owns the licenses and whether multiple dispensaries operating under different licenses belong to the same company.

Ownership Data Gap Limits Findings

“Ownership-based analyses would provide a more comprehensive assessment of market structure by evaluating concentration across common ownership groups,” the report states.

The report’s conclusion that Missouri’s legal cannabis market is meeting consumer demand rests on an analysis of sales distribution among licensed facilities. Because the researchers lacked usable ownership data, the study could not evaluate whether sales are concentrated across common ownership groups rather than across individual licensed facilities.

The absence of ownership information means the study’s assessment of market structure is limited to facility-level sales distribution. The report indicates that evaluating concentration across common ownership groups would provide a fuller picture of how Missouri’s cannabis market is organized.

Regulators Plan To Track Ownership

Division Director Amy Moore acknowledged that limitation in a statement following the study’s release, saying the agency plans to incorporate ownership data into future analyses.

Moore’s statement followed the release of the study by Cannabis Public Policy Consulting LLC, which examined cannabis purchasing habits, monthly consumer spending and sales in both regulated and unregulated markets across Missouri.

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