First infused pre-rolls available in Canada

Sundial, a Canadian licensed producer, has launched the first pre-rolled joints on Canada’s legal market under the Top Leaf brand.

The Caviar Cones Forbidden Lemon are a carefully handcrafted, individually inspected blend of dried and ground flowers, dry sift and wax, «for a smooth smoke with a unique flavor, an exceptional terpene profile, and a guaranteed THC content of 30 % or more,» as stated in the sales brochure.

The Forbidden Lemon strain is a cross between the terpenes-rich Forbidos and the Blue Dream stimulating and varied Lemon Haze and Florida Lemon. Other varieties will be available to Canadian consumers later this year. Top Leaf caviar cones are available in a rolled multipack of 4 x 0.5 grams in the provinces of’Alberta, from Saskatchewan and Manitoba. British Columbia, Ontario, Quebec, and the Atlantic provinces will receive their first shipments in the fourth quarter of 2021.

Why did you wait so long to distribute infused pre-rolls?

Infused joints, containing both flower and excerpts or the resin, are popular with traditional consumers and are widely available in U.S. states that have legalized cannabis. In fact, according to Headset, a U.S. market data and information company, Seven of the ten best-selling pre-rolled joints in California are infused.

Infused joints also have a following in Canada, as evidenced by their availability on the illicit market. Nevertheless, the edibles, topicals, extracts, seeds, plants, and fresh and dried cannabis each constitute a distinct category of cannabis. And while the majority of growers, processors, and sellers are authorized to work with dried flowers, only one-quarter of them are authorized to work with extracts.

For Canadian producers, adding a new category to their sales license can take six months or more, according to Trina Fraser, a lawyer specializing in cannabis law and a partner at the firm Brazeau Seller Law.

Tina Fraser says she has heard creative arguments presented to Health Canada in an effort to have kief-infused pre-rolled joints continue to be classified as a dried cannabis product, but to no avail.

«[Health Canada] says no, even if you’re just sifting it lightly and sprinkling it on top of your joint. By making it more potent than it would be [in its natural state], it becomes an extract,» she said. «So that’s really the only issue.».

Canadian cannabis regulations also prohibit packaging different categories of cannabis in the same container.

«You can’t put a candy in a package that contains flower. You can’t put a topical cream in a larger package with a cookie. You can’t combine different product categories in the same package, but there are no rules about what form of cannabis you can or can’t use in an extract,» explains Tina Fraser. «You can use any form of cannabis you want to make an extract.».

«The end result, when everything is combined, is an extract—even if one of the ingredients is ground flower,» continues Tina Fraser, adding that infused joints should also be packaged, displayed, and labeled in a way that makes it clear to potential consumers that this is a more potent product.

Quebec also imposes a cap of 30 % on THC for non-edible products. Sundial stated that its formula will be adjusted to meet these requirements when the product is launched later this year.