Katelyn Baker
Well-Known Member
Urbana - Year one: 500.
Year four: 5,000.
That the goal for how many registered patients will be doing business at the newest medical cannabis dispensary opening in the area, NuMed Urbana. And if tenfold growth in four years sounds overly ambitious, Ben Rediger, the Morton-based consultant hired by the owners, believes it's realistic based on a recent expansion of Illinois' medical cannabis program and what is still a vastly untapped market.
"Every single person that lives in Champaign-Urbana has a friend or relative who knows somebody who has a qualifying condition," he said.
It's Rediger's job to educate doctors and prospective patients about medical cannabis and grow customer numbers for NuMed, and he said there are more than 50,000 people with qualifying medical conditions living in state police District 10 - the district in which NuMed holds its dispensary license.
But the total number of applications approved for qualified patients throughout all of Illinois is just a fraction of that number - 11,100 - as of Oct. 5, according to the state Department of Public Health.
NuMed Urbana will be one of two medical cannabis dispensaries in a nine-county area of East Central Illinois where those 50,000 with qualifying conditions live.
There were two dispensary licenses granted in District 10, an area that takes in Champaign, Coles, Douglas, Edgar, Macon, Moultrie, Piatt, Shelby and Vermilion counties, with the other one going to Phoenix Botanical, which opened in Champaign this past spring.
Current numbers of registered patients at individual dispensaries in the state aren't available, but as of the state's latest progress report June 30, there were 221 patients registered to Phoenix Botanical and 33 approved medical cannabis users living in Champaign County.
Earlier this summer, Illinois' Compassionate Use of Medical Cannabis Pilot Program was extended through Jan. 1, 2020 - opening up potential for more growth, Rediger said - plus post-traumatic stress disorder, a condition that affects nearly 8 percent of the U.S. population, was added to the list of about 40 qualifying conditions for medical cannabis use.
"It's much bigger than us," he said of the medical cannabis industry. "It's the future."
Opening Monday
Set to open at 11 a.m. Tuesday at the former Blockbuster Video building at 105 E. University Ave., U, NuMed Urbana invited the public in for two previews this past week.
Even before the first preview, people were knocking on the doors and Rediger couldn't resist a chance to let them in and show them around a bit. The first preview brought in "a steady stream of people," he said.
The majority were folks who have qualifying conditions, but weren't yet registered as patients, he said.
"It gives me and NuMed great confidence that Champaign-Urbana will explode with patients after we get integrated into the community," Rediger said.
NuMed Urbana isn't expected to be much of a tax revenue-generator for the city of Urbana, since the city only stands to collect 1 percent on a prescription drug tax, according to city Finance Director Elizabeth Hannon.
"We don't expect it to be a significant number," she said.
NuMed Urbana is one of three medical cannabis dispensaries being opened by the same Wheaton-based owners, two of whom include CEO Robert Fitzsimmons and Chief Operating Officer Brett Walrod.
Fitzsimmons said the next dispensary to open after Urbana will be in East Peoria, with that opening likely to be in November, and one planned for Chicago will likely open in the first quarter of next year.
A retired lawyer involved in real estate, private equity and public affairs, Fitzsimmons is the executive chairman at the real estate investment firm Next Generation Capital Partners and a founding principal of Next Generation Public Affairs.
NuMed has a long-term, medically focused view, and is going to take the time to develop therapies that are appropriate for patients' needs, Fitzsimmons said.
It already has relationships with nutraceutical and pharmaceutical companies that can be active in the medical cannabis space once regulatory hurdles are cleared, he said.
"The focus is not what's on the shelves' today, but what the patient needs tomorrow," he said.
The 35-year-old Rediger, who operates a consulting business called Education to Grow, was hired by the owners this past June to work with their Urbana and East Peoria dispensaries, he said.
What became his own passion for this industry started when he was attending a roofing convention in Las Vegas about five years ago and wandered into a neighboring cannabis convention, he said.
The week after cannabis was legalized in Colorado, Rediger said he and the Urbana dispensary's agent-in-charge, Jayme Brewer - a long-time friend from Morton - went to Denver together to see if they could get into a medical cannabis business convention.
The more he studied, Rediger said, the more his interest in the medical side of the business grew, and that's where he along with NuMed owners see the most potential.
Education to Grow is Rediger's third try at a medical cannabis consulting business in a market that has inched along, less ready than he has been to move forward faster, he said.
"I saw what it was going to be at a very early stage," he said.
Rediger did an analysis when there were 750,000 people in Illinois believed to be qualified users - he now believes it's more like 1 million - and projected it would take $50 million in education spending to get Illinois to $1 billion in medical cannabis revenue and 300,000 medical cannabis users over four years.
But available funding has fallen well short of that, and the education has been sorely lacking, especially at the physician level, he said.
From July 1, 2015 to this past July 30, nearly 1,800 doctors in Illinois submitted written certifications for qualifying patients to buy medical cannabis, with most certifying fewer than 25 patients each, according to the state's June update. Severe fibromyalgia was the top debilitating condition among qualified patient applicants statewide, with cancer the second-highest.
The plan
What's going on inside NuMed Urbana can be monitored at any time by state regulators via nearly security 50 cameras, and information about what patients buy - including the product and dosage - will be provided by NuMed to their doctors, Rediger said.
Patients will see packaging of such cannabis medicine products as salves, tinctures, patches and candies at a display counter, where they'll make their purchase choices, but their orders will be filled from a back room that's off-limits to the public.
Rediger said he sees community education events for new cannabis dispensaries attracting a lot of people in the cannabis industry. His plan is to go to the sources of potential medical cannabis patients, giving talks at patient support groups in the area.
He also hopes to speak at local churches, on the premise that churches are full of people with qualifying conditions and their pastors might not feel free to lend medical cannabis their support.
When Rediger talks about big potential in the medical cannabis industry, he includes more than finding the patients and employing people in cannabis dispensaries and cultivation centers. He sees a potentially large industrial hemp product industry and valuable medical cannabis research waiting to be done.
C-U, the University of Illinois, local hospitals and NuMed are prime partners for that medical research, he contended, and "I believe a community like Champaign-Urbana is prime to teach various aspects of cannabis medicine."
Fitzsimmons said NuMed is open to a research relationship with the UI, but doesn't have one yet, "not that we didn't try." But he also understands the UI is conservative.
Rediger said he views medical cannabis as the future of medicine in America, and he calls it "the penicillin of our generation."
"So much can be done," he said.
News Moderator: Katelyn Baker 420 MAGAZINE ®
Full Article: Medical Cannabis Dispensary Has Growth Potential
Author: Debra Pressey
Contact: 1-800-660-7323
Photo Credit: Thom Morris
Website: The News-Gazette
Year four: 5,000.
That the goal for how many registered patients will be doing business at the newest medical cannabis dispensary opening in the area, NuMed Urbana. And if tenfold growth in four years sounds overly ambitious, Ben Rediger, the Morton-based consultant hired by the owners, believes it's realistic based on a recent expansion of Illinois' medical cannabis program and what is still a vastly untapped market.
"Every single person that lives in Champaign-Urbana has a friend or relative who knows somebody who has a qualifying condition," he said.
It's Rediger's job to educate doctors and prospective patients about medical cannabis and grow customer numbers for NuMed, and he said there are more than 50,000 people with qualifying medical conditions living in state police District 10 - the district in which NuMed holds its dispensary license.
But the total number of applications approved for qualified patients throughout all of Illinois is just a fraction of that number - 11,100 - as of Oct. 5, according to the state Department of Public Health.
NuMed Urbana will be one of two medical cannabis dispensaries in a nine-county area of East Central Illinois where those 50,000 with qualifying conditions live.
There were two dispensary licenses granted in District 10, an area that takes in Champaign, Coles, Douglas, Edgar, Macon, Moultrie, Piatt, Shelby and Vermilion counties, with the other one going to Phoenix Botanical, which opened in Champaign this past spring.
Current numbers of registered patients at individual dispensaries in the state aren't available, but as of the state's latest progress report June 30, there were 221 patients registered to Phoenix Botanical and 33 approved medical cannabis users living in Champaign County.
Earlier this summer, Illinois' Compassionate Use of Medical Cannabis Pilot Program was extended through Jan. 1, 2020 - opening up potential for more growth, Rediger said - plus post-traumatic stress disorder, a condition that affects nearly 8 percent of the U.S. population, was added to the list of about 40 qualifying conditions for medical cannabis use.
"It's much bigger than us," he said of the medical cannabis industry. "It's the future."
Opening Monday
Set to open at 11 a.m. Tuesday at the former Blockbuster Video building at 105 E. University Ave., U, NuMed Urbana invited the public in for two previews this past week.
Even before the first preview, people were knocking on the doors and Rediger couldn't resist a chance to let them in and show them around a bit. The first preview brought in "a steady stream of people," he said.
The majority were folks who have qualifying conditions, but weren't yet registered as patients, he said.
"It gives me and NuMed great confidence that Champaign-Urbana will explode with patients after we get integrated into the community," Rediger said.
NuMed Urbana isn't expected to be much of a tax revenue-generator for the city of Urbana, since the city only stands to collect 1 percent on a prescription drug tax, according to city Finance Director Elizabeth Hannon.
"We don't expect it to be a significant number," she said.
NuMed Urbana is one of three medical cannabis dispensaries being opened by the same Wheaton-based owners, two of whom include CEO Robert Fitzsimmons and Chief Operating Officer Brett Walrod.
Fitzsimmons said the next dispensary to open after Urbana will be in East Peoria, with that opening likely to be in November, and one planned for Chicago will likely open in the first quarter of next year.
A retired lawyer involved in real estate, private equity and public affairs, Fitzsimmons is the executive chairman at the real estate investment firm Next Generation Capital Partners and a founding principal of Next Generation Public Affairs.
NuMed has a long-term, medically focused view, and is going to take the time to develop therapies that are appropriate for patients' needs, Fitzsimmons said.
It already has relationships with nutraceutical and pharmaceutical companies that can be active in the medical cannabis space once regulatory hurdles are cleared, he said.
"The focus is not what's on the shelves' today, but what the patient needs tomorrow," he said.
The 35-year-old Rediger, who operates a consulting business called Education to Grow, was hired by the owners this past June to work with their Urbana and East Peoria dispensaries, he said.
What became his own passion for this industry started when he was attending a roofing convention in Las Vegas about five years ago and wandered into a neighboring cannabis convention, he said.
The week after cannabis was legalized in Colorado, Rediger said he and the Urbana dispensary's agent-in-charge, Jayme Brewer - a long-time friend from Morton - went to Denver together to see if they could get into a medical cannabis business convention.
The more he studied, Rediger said, the more his interest in the medical side of the business grew, and that's where he along with NuMed owners see the most potential.
Education to Grow is Rediger's third try at a medical cannabis consulting business in a market that has inched along, less ready than he has been to move forward faster, he said.
"I saw what it was going to be at a very early stage," he said.
Rediger did an analysis when there were 750,000 people in Illinois believed to be qualified users - he now believes it's more like 1 million - and projected it would take $50 million in education spending to get Illinois to $1 billion in medical cannabis revenue and 300,000 medical cannabis users over four years.
But available funding has fallen well short of that, and the education has been sorely lacking, especially at the physician level, he said.
From July 1, 2015 to this past July 30, nearly 1,800 doctors in Illinois submitted written certifications for qualifying patients to buy medical cannabis, with most certifying fewer than 25 patients each, according to the state's June update. Severe fibromyalgia was the top debilitating condition among qualified patient applicants statewide, with cancer the second-highest.
The plan
What's going on inside NuMed Urbana can be monitored at any time by state regulators via nearly security 50 cameras, and information about what patients buy - including the product and dosage - will be provided by NuMed to their doctors, Rediger said.
Patients will see packaging of such cannabis medicine products as salves, tinctures, patches and candies at a display counter, where they'll make their purchase choices, but their orders will be filled from a back room that's off-limits to the public.
Rediger said he sees community education events for new cannabis dispensaries attracting a lot of people in the cannabis industry. His plan is to go to the sources of potential medical cannabis patients, giving talks at patient support groups in the area.
He also hopes to speak at local churches, on the premise that churches are full of people with qualifying conditions and their pastors might not feel free to lend medical cannabis their support.
When Rediger talks about big potential in the medical cannabis industry, he includes more than finding the patients and employing people in cannabis dispensaries and cultivation centers. He sees a potentially large industrial hemp product industry and valuable medical cannabis research waiting to be done.
C-U, the University of Illinois, local hospitals and NuMed are prime partners for that medical research, he contended, and "I believe a community like Champaign-Urbana is prime to teach various aspects of cannabis medicine."
Fitzsimmons said NuMed is open to a research relationship with the UI, but doesn't have one yet, "not that we didn't try." But he also understands the UI is conservative.
Rediger said he views medical cannabis as the future of medicine in America, and he calls it "the penicillin of our generation."
"So much can be done," he said.
News Moderator: Katelyn Baker 420 MAGAZINE ®
Full Article: Medical Cannabis Dispensary Has Growth Potential
Author: Debra Pressey
Contact: 1-800-660-7323
Photo Credit: Thom Morris
Website: The News-Gazette
