MICHIGAN, USA — For the first time in Michigan, jobs in the marijuana industry have declined over a three-month period.

While consumers enjoy the perks of historically low cannabis prices in Michigan, Chief Operating Officer Recardo Saco from Noxx Dispensaries said for cannabis businesses it’s a whole different story.

“What’s happening is that when you have enough dispensaries that are competing with each other, and then you’ve got, you know, a ton of growers that are also competing, the growers are saying, well, how can I beat this grower and get a better price?” said Saco.

Michigan’s marijuana industry is experiencing a historic first, with job numbers declining since November.

Michigan State University Human Medicine Professor, Jamie Alan believes the cannabis industry is trending downward due to a competitive and saturated market.

“I think we may have reached the maximum amount of people who would like to use marijuana at this time,” said Alan.

“There’s a lot of product. People are not buying it, and so we’re seeing huge amounts of reduction in retail prices and of course, that’s going to drive profit margins for these companies. Unfortunately, they’re probably going to have to be cutting the jobs,” said Alan

According to an online data base, Monitoring The Future, marijuana use among teens has declined since 2022. Alan said that medical marijuana sales have also decreased, and there’s growing uncertainty around the substance.

“We have a lot of people in prison for minor offenses with cannabis, and many of those people are people of color, and those populations are already afraid for a number of really significant reasons right now, so I can understand why there is increased anxiety and potentially increased fear around cannabis right now,” said Alan.

Saco said Noxx’s dispensaries in Michigan haven’t been affected by the job decline and he hopes the cannabis industry will recover soon.

“We have our up and down weeks, but we’re not seeing, you know, our sales really suffer,” said Saco.

“I don’t think that there’s any risk of us downsizing. I think, if anything, we might need to hire a little bit more for the summer months,” said Saco.