After its parent company purchased a Florida pot purveyor, RISE Dispensaries said it plans to open two cannabis stores in Palm Beach County next year, including the first marijuana dispensary in West Palm Beach.

RISE Dispensaries is a unit of Green Thumb Industries, a Chicago company that on Thursday said it paid $58 million for KSGNF, one of 11 companies the Florida Department of Health allows to sell marijuana.

Green Thumb Industries is part of a wave of out-of-state companies spending big money for a foothold in Florida's budding marijuana market. Scythian Biosciences Corp. of Toronto said this summer it will pay $93 million for cannabis licensee 3 Boys Farms of Ruskin. Another company, MedMen, recently paid $53 million for another state-approved marijuana operation, Treadwell Simpson Partnership of Eustis.

RISE Dispensaries officials wouldn't disclose the precise locations of its new retail locations, but they said one is in downtown West Palm Beach. The other is in an unincorporated area west of Delray Beach.

RISE Dispensaries said its stores are typically 2,500 to 3,500 square feet.

West Palm Beach officials in June agreed to allow marijuana dispensaries to operate in the city. City Commissioners voted unanimously to allow dispensaries and to regulate them no differently from pharmacies, except that cannabis stores can't operate within 500 feet of a school.

Since Florida voters overwhelmingly legalized medical marijuana in 2016, four state-sanctioned pot shops have opened in Palm Beach County. Trulieve operates dispensaries in Boynton Beach and in an unincorporated area near West Palm Beach. Knox Medical and Curaleaf have facilities in Lake Worth. Another dispensary, GrowHealthy, plans to open a dispensary on Okeechobee Boulevard in unincorporated Palm Beach County later this year.

Green Thumb Industries runs RISE dispensaries in Maryland, Massachusetts, Nevada and Pennsylvania.

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The company's interest in Florida follows strong growth in the state's regulated cannabis industry. As of Nov. 2, 143,298 Floridians had permission to buy marijuana from state-regulated sellers of weed. There were 68 dispensaries operating statewide and more than 1,800 physicians approved to give patients permission to use pot.

As new investment floods into Florida's medical marijuana market, one wild card remains: Just how much legal weed will Floridians consume?

BDS Analytics of Colorado and The Arcview Group of California estimate that Florida's medical marijuana market will approach $1.1 billion in 2020. Forecasts by two other analysts predict Florida pot sales will remain below $1 billion in 2020.

BDS Analytics' projection is based on 350,000 Floridians signing up for the pot program and spending an average of nearly $259 a month, said Tom Adams, principal analyst at BDS Analytics.

However, those consumption patterns could be hampered by the limited types of pot products for sale in Florida's dispensaries. So far, Florida doesn't allow the sale of marijuana that can be smoked, although Orlando attorney John Morgan has sued to overturn that rule.

Nor does Florida permit "edibles" -- the cannabis-infused candies, cookies, drinks, granola and other items sold in pot shops in California and Colorado.

That leaves only "concentrates," cannabis oils and extracts taken orally or inhaled through a vaporizer. Weed remains illegal at the federal level, leaving states to create their own rules.

In addition to limiting the type of products that can be sold, Florida also insists that one company handle the product from the farm to the store. That prohibits dispensaries from selling a variety of brands. In another challenge, many municipalities and landlords gave cannabis dispensaries the cold shoulder.

jostrowski@pbpost.com

@bio561