A new Burb cannabis store location will open in Vancouver, next to the University of British Columbia campus.
It will be the eighth (and final) Burb store in B.C. A licensee can hold a maximum of eight non-medical cannabis retail store licences in the province. All product in-store is tested and approved by Health Canada as the legal requirement.
The now-approved application for the store has overcome significant opposition from nearby community members who gathered nearly 1,900 signatures in an online petition, a news release said.
However, the UBC student body was overwhelmingly supportive according to Burb’s CEO, John Kaye, including the Alma Mater Society (AMS)‚ a student society representing more than 56,000 students.
A competing petition in favour of the store managed to collect more than 2,000 signatures, a news release said. The store is likely to go up before next holiday season, said Burb’s CEO, John Kaye. Other store locations are in Port Moody, Langley, Vancouver, Victoria, Maple Ridge and two in Port Coquitlam.
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Kaye said the Metro Vancouver Regional District (MVRD) board of directors made an informed decision that supports the voices of students as well as the principles of legalization in Canada.
“We feel very excited about it, it’s obviously right up at the university campus right near the bus loop there, so a really good location. It will be the only access point for students that’s convenient,” he said. “The student community is overwhelmingly supportive of our brand and the store going up, we know anecdotally that cannabis is used for wellness, mindfulness, patience and calming sometimes.”
Kaye emphasized he is glad to bring safe, legal access to cannabis to the community.
“No underage people can come into our store, it’s very highly regulated,” he said. “Where we’re at in the market with supply and demand legal stores have incredible quality at really good prices at this point.”
Approval was certainly subject to pushback from the community, Kaye said, noting concerns the air would be “degraded” at the university camps, as well as moral objections to cannabis.
“The proximity, the location is really special, there are no stores in that area, you have to go through a big, long stretch of forest just to access the university grounds,” Kaye said. “For us, it’s also special because we feel we’re killing that stigma. I understand dealing with things like anxiety, although our store is a non-medical store, there is definitely anecdotal evidence that cannabis supports a wellness lifestyle.”
