Union Square Travel Agency cannabis store teams up with Doobie Delivery to offer pre-ordered pot to your doorstep

By Steve Gelsi

One of the Big Apple's first state-licensed cannabis dispensaries will kick off a cannabis-delivery service this week to boost revenue by as much as 25% by selling legal cannabis as far out as the Hamptons this summer, MarketWatch has learned.

The move from Union Square Travel Agency: A Cannabis Store on 62 East 13th St., comes as an estimated 1,500 illegal weed shops have popped up around the city, while licensed shops roll out more slowly.

Union Square Travel Agency: A Cannabis Store has tapped cannabis-delivery specialist Doobie Delivery for its program launching Thursday to take orders at trydoobie.com.

Also Read:New York's newest cannabis dispensary Union Square opens as state rolls out social-equity model

The store plans to offer deliveries to people gathering at the Cannabis World Congress & Business Exposition at the Javits Center in New York City this week.

Union Square Travel Agency CEO Paul Yau said the company's cannabis-selling license from the state's Office of Cannabis Management (OCM) includes permission to run a delivery service.

"Delivery is just another channel to promote cannabis in New York," Yau told MarketWatch. "The OCM has a large media campaign buy legal -- this is another channel in support of that initiative and we're heavily weighing in on that."

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The state is allowing dispensaries to park unmarked vehicles for cannabis deliveries in a neighborhood during a given day. While these vehicles are described as part of an "ice cream truck" business model, they will only provide delivery services for pre-orders, with no walk-up purchases on the street.

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Average delivery time is expected to be between 30 and 60 minutes for express service, or a scheduled two-hour window delivery, with minimum orders of $25.

Deliveries to adults will be available in the five boroughs of New York City and the Hamptons over the course of the summer. The service is initially launching in Manhattan and the Brooklyn neighborhoods of Dumbo and Williamsburg.

Doobie Delivery co-founders Jessie Powell and Joseph Rubin said they launched the business partly because most of the big California delivery companies, such as Eaze, Grassdoor, Weedmaps and Caliva, had no major presence on the East Coast as adult use became legal in recent years.

"We saw that as an opportunity," Rubin said. "That's what opened the gates and got the idea steamrolling down the tracks."

The company operates in Massachusetts and Missouri and is kicking off its first deliveries in the Empire State with Union Square Travel Agency: A Cannabis Store.

New York City is particularly attractive for deliveries given its population density and because the city supports roughly 30% to 40% of the total national business for food-delivery companies such as Doordash and Grubhub, Rubin said.

"Delivery is massive in New York City, Rubin said.

Also read: Canopy Growth's stock pops after it reveals latest plan to enter U.S. cannabis market

-Steve Gelsi

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05-31-23 1748ET

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