Up in smoke? Are the 25 Ontario Cannabis Licence Winners a total joke or case of sour grapes?

When the results of the Ontario cannabis retail licence winners were announced, one of the first discussions I had on Twitter yesterday evening was.. “Who the hell are these 25 winners?”

As a result of me posting the full list of winners last night, my website search logs (keywords people enter on Google) were filled with the names of the actual winners this morning. Who are these people?

The Second Cups of the world who want to convert their coffee shops to marijuana stores weren’t on the list, none of the bigger players who have expressed interest in opening stores were either. What happens to all of the retail cannabis jobs that have been posted over the last couple of months? Does this all disappear?

Watch – Ontario pot license lottery winners revealed. Abi Roach predicts disaster

The idea of having only 25 pot shops open in Ontario for April 1st didn’t make any immediate sense. If you had $75 in your pocket, you could enter the lottery for a chance of getting one of those 25 location licences.

The rollout of the OCS was a complete disaster here in Ontario, I’m not sure by the looks of the 25 winners on the list that this will be any different.

These 25 pot shops now have the responsibility of rolling out the Ontario retail plan in their hands, are these people even capable or have the experience to pull it off?

Or was this a totally fair way to make sure everyone had an equal chance for a licence and simply a case of sour grapes for those who didn’t win?

Doug Ford and Caroline Mulroney have been quick to place this responsibility of their decision on how we’re selecting the winners via the lottery system on the AGCO and the federal government.

Watch – Yesterday, Caroline Mulroney says it’s ‘frustrating’ that feds are unable to meet cannabis demand

The reality is that there’s a severe shortage of cannabis to sell across Canada and why Ontario limited the initial rollout of retail locations to 25. We saw proof of this last week when Cannabis NB had to cut 60 jobs because they have no pot to sell – but is Ontario putting their best foot forward with a list of 25 winners that seem to have zero experience in making this successful?

Can/will one of the 25 lottery winners sell their licence to a bigger and more established company? We saw people sell their shops on the first day of business in other provinces, how much could a cannabis retail licence be worth?

All of these questions will be answered for April 1st when these shops have to be open, it could turn out to be the biggest April Fools joke of all time.

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With almost 60,000 total lottery entries, 25 Ontario Cannabis Licence Winners announced today! (Full List)