Cookies, the iconic cannabis brand from California, recently announced that they will be opening stores across Europe, the first being in London and Vienna.
The iconic American brand builds on its partnership with Israeli cannabis company Intercure, which has already opened a Cookies flagship store in Tel Aviv. Together, the two companies will open Cookies branded CBD and medical cannabis stores, with a view to transforming them into pharmacies to serve the growing European cannabis market. Intercure operated Cookies stores in Israel with a similar business model.
The first Cookies store is slated to open in London in the spring, although there are no details on where to open. The company has announced that in order to keep red tape as much as possible, it will start by selling only its own brand of CBD products, with the pharmaceutical portion of the business to be opened up as UK regulations evolve. .
Discussing the deployment and initial product offering with BusinessCann, Intercure CEO Alexander Ravinovitch said, “Vaping is a very important part of the strategy, so we will also be launching some high quality products for vaping. Ultimately, and as its licensing and regulations develop, Intercure plans to evolve these stores into what we call a pharmacy base. Once the regulations are in place, we will also be able to serve the patient community with products that are high in THC. We will start with medical products and we have a wide range of them. We believe that in the UK and Austria there is huge potential and support for Cookies branded products. “
Mr Ravinovitch went on to highlight how the UK medical community must first build confidence in cannabis as a safe and effective treatment if the UK is to replicate the success of the Israeli medicinal cannabis market.
“We believe that what happened in Israel, the process that we have seen here in Israel coming from the tight, ultra-medical and very strict regulations, and the opening and building of trust within the communities of doctors and patients, will occur in Europe. “
He went on to say, “Regulations are very important. Regulation goes hand in hand with support from physicians and the physician community. And I think once you’ve got the right regulations in place and the medical communities have enough confidence in BPF medical cannabis products, we’ll likely see the same trends in all of the major territories. Israel is a few years ahead of all other international markets and truly represents the future of international cannabis. The local competitive landscape is very active there, and we have seen growth from the start. This sort of paved the way for support from the physician communities, and also from the patient side. “
On his Instagram, Berner, founder of Cookies, also specified that a store would open in Portugal.
