In fact, if you stand on the 13th step of the Colorado state capitol building in Denver, you are exactly one mile above sea level .
Denver is one of the country’s oldest legal marijuana markets, and it’s also the most recent city in which vertically integrated cannabis company Columbia Care might hit a jackpot.
Even if not, consolidation is happening across the industry, and Columbia Care has been making acquisition moves to build its presence and expand its footprint.
In September, Columbia Care closed its acquisition of The Green Solution, the largest vertically integrated cannabis operator in Colorado at the time.
Earlier this month, the company targeted states, where there are a limited number of vertically integrated licensed operators, in and near the mid-Atlantic when it completed the purchase of multistate operator Green Leaf Medical.
With the acquisition of Medicine Man, Columbia Care is setting itself up nicely by incorporating the assets of another vertically integrated operator, including four operational dispensaries and a 35,000-square-foot cultivation facility capable of producing 3 million grams of dried flower per year — all in the world’s second-largest cannabis market.
For its part, Columbia Care announced record first-quarter results in May, including 316% quarterly growth in gross profits year over year — to $37.7 million — supported by 220% year-over-year quarterly growth in revenue to reach $92.5 million.
That’s a 557% improvement over the first quarter of 2020 and a 189% increase over the balance at the end of 2020.
And in the medical cannabis market, it has operator licenses in 14 of the 44 states where some form of medical cannabis is legal — that leaves 68% of states for the taking, including growing markets in Oregon, Oklahoma, and Michigan.
Having a solid footing in Colorado certainly provides Columbia Care with a great head start toward becoming entrenched as the leading cannabis operator in all legal state markets.