Ever since recreational cannabis was legalized in Colorado, Washington and Alaska, there’s been heated debated as to the way in which cannabis edibles are manufactured, packaged, marketed and sold. As far as some are concerned, plain packaging with nothing eye-catching whatsoever is the best way to avoid tempting tots. For others, it’s a case of following the same rules as alcohol – package and market them as lavishly as you like, just be sure to stay away from anything that might appeal to younger crowds.

Cannabis gummy firm Americanna is taking advantage of the soaring infused gummy market and is set to dominate the edibles space in the future. 

BDS is a market research firm for the cannabis industry that tracks adult-use sales in Colorado, Washington, and Oregon, which represent about 50% of the national market.

Last year, gummy candies only made up 13% of the total edibles sales compared to the 26% owned by chocolate bars, according to BDS data.

“2016 is looking like a great year for edibles,” the market research firm said.

Cannabis gummies are not functional gummies

Call it a crash course in cannabis — Alberta's Justice Minister and Solicitor General is Colorado-bound to see how the state south of the border has handled legal weed.

Kathleen Ganley flies out Thursday to Denver, where she's slated to meet with the attorney general, municipal government, police and fire services, building and licensing experts, and the environmental health department.

Minutes after a group of New Jersey lawmakers entered the stark industrial Medicine Man marijuana cultivation center, an employee in blue scrubs rushed between them, pushing a plastic cart filled with pots containing a dozen leafy, two-foot-tall cannabis plants.

There was a scramble by the legislators and their aides to clear a path, and then chuckles and "wow"s.

"Oh, my God, It's like a celebrity just came through," Assemblyman Declan O'Scanlon (R., Monmouth) quipped - referring to the pot, not the worker.

Unlike long-allowed hemp seed beer, this one comes with cannabinoids.

A Colorado company says it has cleared a major hurdle to distribute cannabis-infused beer nationwide, and that it's developed the business relationships necessary to rapidly scale up production to meet what could be enormous demand.

The company, Aurora-based Dad and Dude's Breweria, says it has received federal formula approval for an extract-infused beer variety from the Treasury Department's Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau (TTB), which acts as gatekeeper for interstate beer sales.

The marijuana grow-light story sits at the intersection of semiconductor cost curves, cutting-edge indoor botany, utility efficiency incentives, outlaw pot growers, and the slow societal acceptance of a newly legal intoxicant.

And it's a very big business.

As a pediatrician, Dr. Larry Wolk was trained to treat marijuana as "bad" and "illegal" — and to counsel patients against using it. 

And that his history shaped the way he approached the introduction of legal marijuana as Colorado's chief medical officer, he said.

"I think I came into this with some biases as a result of our culture, prior to legalization," he told CBC News.

But nearly three years after legalization in Colorado, he said his thinking changed at each turn.

On almost every measure, whether it was rates of hospitalizations, consumption among teens and adults, or collisions related to marijuana, the pattern was the same: an initial increase, and then long term stabilization with no increase from the rates prior to legalization in January 2014.

Diners smoke marijuana as they eat dishes prepared by chefs in Lyons, Colorado. Brennan Linsley/AP

Science tells us that the munchies — a phenomenon in which marijuana users overeat while high — is a real thing. Pizza never tasted so good after a joint.

Now a school in Denver, Colorado, aims to add a touch of class to this stoner tradition.

The summer of 2016 turned out to be quite lucrative for Colorado’s marijuana industry.

Legal marijuana shops tallied up $126 million in medical and recreational cannabis sales in August, setting a new monthly record, according to Colorado Department of Revenue data made public Wednesday. The young industry’s previous monthly high was set just a month before, with $122.67 million of revenue in July.

At that time, economist Adam Orens, with BBC Research and the Marijuana Policy Group, attributed the sales surge to a seasonal spike:

When Colorado and Washington became the first states to legalize recreational marijuana in 2012, opponents of the measures warned that ending the longstanding prohibition on weed would wreak havoc on society. The fiscal benefits associated with taxed and regulated marijuana wouldn’t be worthwhile, they said, because more children would end up using the drug and high drivers would terrorize the roadways.