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Cannabis brand incorporates recyclable, child-resistant packaging
2019-05-23

From: Packaging World


When upgrading its packaging for CA compliance, cannabis brand Garden Society finds tamper-evident stickers and child-resistant boxes and cartons that maintain the botanical
aesthetic.

Garden Society launched in Sonoma County, CA, in 2016 with the mission of delivering high-quality cannabis edibles and pre-rolls to women looking to relieve pain and stress and live life more fully. The company emphasizes the use of biodynamic farming methods, fair trade, and locally sourced ingredients, and conveys a natural, sophisticated feel through their botanical graphics and packaging.


New regulations


California’s Proposition 65 requiring child-resistant packaging for cannabis products went into effect in July 2018. The startup sought a sustainable child-resistant box, but Karli Warner, Garden Society’s Co-Founder, says many were hard to use or didn’t have the desired materials.


“Cannabis packaging is really challenging. Right now, there aren’t great sustainable options,” says Warner. At the time, the only sustainable box option was too costly for a small startup. “We bootstrapped the company until September of 2018. We already use high-quality ingredients in the edibles, so we couldn’t price ourselves out of the market by using extremely expensive packaging.”


Adding to the complication, Warner and her co-founder, Erin Gore, wanted individual chocolates in a formed tray, meaning that the tray had to fit both the chocolates and the ASTM-approved box.



Interim solution


To stay on the market in 2018 as they worked toward more permanent packaging, Garden Society incorporated child-resistant mylar bags. “Mylar bags have gotten us through the gap while packaging companies have had time to form new box configurations. While the bag is not necessarily on point with our brand, it’s getting the product out to our consumers,” explains Warner.



Label and sticker challenges


Jan. 1, 2019 marked the release of the state’s final regulations, while testing requirements began six months prior—both dates signified changes for cannabis brands. Garden Society had been testing their products all along, but as the labs came onboard with the new regulations for content and contaminant testing, their preparation methods were in flux.


“Because of all of this change, we were having to regularly re-sticker cannabinoid content levels. You’d print an entire roll of stickers and end up having to throw them away because a piece of information was missing,” says Warner. They found ways to repurpose some of the materials as case stickers to avoid waste. “It was definitely an adventure,” she adds.



Retailer specificity


Another challenge the team faced is that each dispensary or retail partner has their own interpretation of the regulations. “Some retailers accept the labels as we have them printed. We had to make a decision internally about what we were going to print, and we make small adjustments for certain retailers as needed,” notes Warner.


Now that operations and testing methods have stabilized—their Certificates of Analysis (CoA) return as expected—the company is not re-stickering much anymore. But that’s one reason why Warner and Gore opted to use stickers instead of custom-printed bags, which can take at least six weeks to print and require large-quantity orders to make them cost-effective. The company is now moving toward custom-printed packaging.

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