May 25th–May 31st, 2023 phoenixnewtimes.com phoenix new Times State Licensed Dispensaries & Doctor Cer tifications 27 A Dope Decade Harvest celebrates 10 years of cannabis consumption in Tempe. BY GERI KOEPPEL I nside a small storefront in a strip mall in south Tempe there’s an open feel with wood flooring and natural light. Pops of lemon yellow pull your eye to light-wood cabinetry. Plexiglas jewel- box displays showcase products, a row of cash registers are lined up along the right side and friendly salespeople stroll around. Just about the only difference from any typical shopping experience is that customers have to show their ID in the lobby. This isn’t your usual boutique. It’s Harvest of Tempe, one of the first cannabis dispensaries to open in Arizona. Though the initial seeds for Harvest were sowed in 2011, it marked 10 years of business on East Elliot Road just west of South Kyrene Road during a day-long cele- bration on May 20. Events included give- aways, a penthouse afterparty and a ribbon cutting with Tempe Mayor Corey Woods and Steve White, cofounder of Harvest and now president of Trulieve, which acquired Harvest in 2021. The anniversary also provided an opportunity to reflect on the victories along the way to legal weed in Arizona in 2020. “People outside Arizona said it’s not going to pass, it’s a red state,” White said. “They don’t fully appreciate the libertarian nature of the state.” And even after the ballot initiative passed in November 2020, operators faced uncertainty. “If I look back and I’m honest, I ques- tioned whether or not we would get that first store open,” White said. “At the time, the county prosecutor was promising anyone who opened a store was going to prison. You had those kinds of things. You were basically preparing for the potential loss of liberty.” Ten years later, Harvest is now part of a cannabis company with the largest retail footprint in the nation. It has nearly 190 dispensaries, including 15 Harvest and five Trulieve locations in Arizona, with another opening next month in Apache Junction. Trulieve also has the most licenses in Arizona at 21 and operates 4 million square feet of cultivation space across its multi- state operation. When Harvest of Tempe opened in 2013, White said, Tempe police had concerns about crime and worked with the store on security measures, including installing exterior concrete flower planters to keep vehicles from crashing through the front windows, cameras and bulletproof glass, which made it difficult to provide interaction between customers and staff. The police and property owner also didn’t want the smell of weed wafting into adjacent suites, so Harvest changed the ventilation system for the store. Harvest also installed a vault, which White said was an innovation many dispensaries have since replicated. Since it opened, the store has doubled in size from 1,280 to about 2,500 square feet, and the product lines have expanded greatly. When Harvest opened as a medical dispensary, there were no licenses to grow cannabis in Arizona. The company had to get weed from a caregiver network. “That didn’t change for a couple of years once licensed grows had properly scaled,” White recalled. So Harvest carried just a few strains of cannabis. “We did about eight transactions that first day and I think five of them were employees and/or investors,” White laughed. “Over time, we got a lollipop, we eventually got a brownie and then we created a vape pen.” “Then you saw the proliferation of different product options come in around 2016, and then it just exploded after that,” he added. | CANNABIS | Geri Koeppel Harvest of Tempe offers a friendly shop environment.
