“In recent years, we have been able to reduce prices significantly. We’ve not been able to keep up with the plummeting prices in Maine and Massachusetts,” said Matt Simon, director of public and government relations at Granite Leaf Cannabis, which operates two of the state’s seven dispensaries.
Pricing can change quickly and often, Simon said. In mid-February, an eighth of an ounce of flower, which Simon said is enough to roll a few joints or smoke a few bowls, can cost a New Hampshire patient $33 to $39.
Just over the border in Maine, however, the same quantity of flower started at $10 during that same timeframe. In Massachusetts, prices started at at $10. In Vermont, prices started at about $25. Prices in Connecticut started at around $25, and at $18 in Rhode Island.
“The number one complaint expressed by patients is affordability,” said Senator Howard Pearl, a Loudon Republican who is sponsoring legislation to allow medical marijuana to be grown in greenhouses (Senate Bill 468) in an effort to reduce the cost for patients.
If patients can’t afford therapeutic cannabis in New Hampshire, they’re more likely to obtain it from unregulated sources or from dispensaries in other states, where recreational marijuana is legal, Pearl said.
New Hampshire lawmakers have been trying to legalize recreational marijuana for years, but their attempts have failed to get over the finish line.
Analysis by The Motley Fool, a financial advisory company, shows the state is missing out on about $37 million a year in potential marijuana tax revenue. But Governor Kelly Ayotte, a Republican, has remained firmly opposed to recreational marijuana legalization.
“My position has been, and continues to be, that we should not legalize marijuana in the future,” Ayotte told reporters last year, pointing to concerns about mental health and road safety.
Advocates for legalization do not expect her to budge.
“She has been very clear about her position,” said Timothy Egan, the board chair at the NH Cannabis Association, who called Ayotte “the guard at the gate.”
“New Hampshire is considered the island of prohibition in New England,” Egan said.
There is one proposal in play this year that could bypass the governor’s veto. State Constitutional Amendment 19 proposes adding a provision to allow adults over 21 years old to possess “a modest” amount of cannabis for their own personal consumption. It would need at least 60 percent approval in both the House and the Senate before voters could weigh in at the general election in November 2026. Then, at least two-thirds of voters would have to approve the measure for it to take effect.
In 2025, 70 percent of Granite Staters supported legalizing possession of small amounts of marijuana for personal use in the state, according to polling from the University of New Hampshire Survey Center.
In New Hampshire — where about 17,000 people have medical marijuana cards — the dispensaries have always been operated as nonprofits, but some advocates said a for-profit model would help lower costs. Being classified as a for-profit business would help allow the dispensaries, also known as alternative treatment centers, to access lower interest rates on loans, according to Senator Daniel Innis, a Bradford Republican sponsoring the effort (Senate Bill 479).
The financing could be used to expand or improve products.
“As these businesses are forced to borrow money using that higher cost lending, those costs are passed along to who?” Innis said during a hearing on the proposal in January. “The consumers.”
Because marijuana remains federally illegal, most businesses cannot receive federal loans or access other traditional banking.
Innis said New Hampshire was not alone in initially requiring these businesses to operate as nonprofits, but many other states have since eliminated the requirement after realizing it was an obstacle to affordability.
Dispensary operators testified at a State House hearing that they get little benefit from their nonprofit status, since they’re not recognized as such by the federal government and do not receive donations, grants, endowments, or subsidies. But some Republican lawmakers met the proposal with skepticism over giving already established businesses an unfair edge.
“Ten years ago, the [alternative treatment centers] promised us they were never going to come to want to operate for profit because that was going to give them an unfair advantage,” said Senator Bill Gannon, a Sandown Republican.
The proposal is already facing headwinds, with a key Senate committee recommending in a 3-2 vote the bill be killed.
Some states have worked to keep medical marijuana less expensive than recreational marijuana, like forgoing a sales tax on medical products as one way to keep health care affordable.
Dispensary operators in New Hampshire said they need policies that will help them bring down prices.
“Patients are relying on us to provide high-quality products, and since therapeutic cannabis is not covered by insurance, they are counting on us to provide these products at affordable prices,” said Keenan Blum, president and CEO of Granite Leaf Cannabis, testifying in favor of the proposal during a hearing in January. Granite Leaf operates a cultivating and manufacturing facility in Peterborough, in addition to dispensaries in Chichester and Merrimack.
Pearl’s bill to allow marijuana to be grown in greenhouses has bipartisan support. Right now, medical marijuana can only be grown indoors. But marijuana advocates said this is the most expensive way to grow the plant, incurring hefty electricity bills for lighting and temperature control.
In recent years, similar proposals have been met with concern over how these greenhouses would be secured.
Amanda Gokee can be reached at amanda.gokee@globe.com. Follow her @amanda_gokee.
