'Finally, this place is here': After delays, O'Leary cannabis store nearly ready to roll

P.E.I. Cannabis staff were happy to give O'Leary's mayor andMLA a sneakpeek inside the new store on Wednesday as it prepares for its grand opening on Friday.

It will bethe fourth cannabis store to open on P.E.I since legalization on Oct. 17th joining Charlottetown, Summerside and Montague.

The O'Leary store will open three months later than the other stores due to a number of delays associated with theconstruction of the town's brand new building.

"The delays and all that stuff, it happened,"saidO'LearyMayor EricGavin.

"But finally, this place is here.And you can see it.It's a beautiful, beautiful, spot here."

The O'Leary storeisthe only one of province's four that's actually paid for and owned by the town and that had to be built from scratch.

Gavin saidwith that constructioncame multiple snags and delays and three months of missing out on a financial boost for the small town.

"The eight to 10 people working here, them jobs were not here, now they are here," said Gavin.

"And it's the foot traffic.It's the people coming here to purchase stuff here, that may stop to get a quart of milk or get a bag of chips.... That's what we were missing here."

P.E.I. Cannabissaidit's lost money over the past three months by not having the O'Leary store open.

It's stillbeen paying rent to the town whilenot generating any revenue from pot sales.

Zach Currie, director of cannabis operations with P.E.I. Cannabis,said it's hard to calculate just how much money's been lost.

"I would say certainly we're noticing in some of our trends that our Summerside store is a little busier than we anticipated," he said.

"You know, to be able to say what the lost revenue was, is something we'll certainly take a look at and evaluate."

Currie said,much like the mayor, he's relieved to finally get the O'Learystore open and to have it start making money for the town and the province.

The fourth store looks andwill operate the same way as the other three cannabis storesin the province.

Currie said so far the province-wide model seems to be working and they will adjust it as other products and cannabis types become available for retail.

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