With a history of being cannabis friendly and 175 licensed retail stores as of July 6, 2018, Portland, Oregon, is one of the best places to acquire ganja in the entire world. With a surplus* of cannabis logged into the states seed/clone-to-sale retail tracking system, prices have dropped to dramatic levels with plenty of stores advertising low prices around the $3 per gram level. If the cheapest cannabis doesn’t interest you, there are top-shelf strains still selling for $10, $12, or even $14 around the state, as well as extracts, concentrates, edibles, drinks, and other products in a favorable consumer market.

There are a lot of excellent retail stores to choose from and the High Times‘ Lauren Yoshiko provided her ten favorites, in no particular order as: Farma, Oregon’s Finest, Cannabliss & Co., Virtue Supply Co., Five Zero Trees, Serra, Jayne, Bridge City Collective, Jeffrey’s, and Panacea. Here’s what Yoshiko had to say about Cannabliss, who has three locations in Portland, and two more around the state:

Come to visit a dispensary in an old fire station, stay to shop from one of the largest, friendliest selections in town. You’ll still have to enter through one of the large doors big enough for a truck to pass through and walk past the fire pole dissecting reception. Cannabliss has made a habit out of building out unique shops, with a Eugene shop located in an old sorority house. They’ve become a family of five shops with a competitively-priced menu and merchandise branded with enough subtlety that people actually wear it. High-profile growers like Pruf Cultivar and Ten Four Farms are available for $10/gram, which is $1-2 dollars cheaper than other shops. It’s also the first functioning rec shop to get fictional screentime, the familiar brick exterior and budroom getting a scene in HBO’s Here and Now when a character needs to take the edge off.

Whether you are attending the International Cannabis Business Conference this September 27th and 28th (and if you are in the cannabis industry, or are thinking of joining, you really should!), or visiting Portland, Oregon, another time, there are plenty of great retail stores to choose from. While legalization certainly brings plenty of regulatory headaches for industry participants, these unnecessary burdens will hopefully get ironed out over time, it cannot be denied that consumers are beneficiaries of the regulated system in Oregon with choices and prices that even the most optimistic cannabis community members could have guaranteed. With competition incredibly tough (175 cannabis stores in a mid-sized city!), Oregon-based cannabis businesses are certainly poised to flourish once federal prohibition ends and the industry is truly treated like its wine and beer counterparts.

* Whether there is a surplus of cannabis is really a matter of perspective. If you’re a producer trying to sell pounds at top dollar, a cannabis surplus is certainly an obstacle. If you’re the US District Attorney with jurisdiction over Oregon, you may complain about a surplus, but cannabis legally cultivated and registered in the state’s tracking system really should be the least of your concerns compared to all of the issues facing your office. Finally, if you’re a consumer or a patient on a limited budget, then a surplus is a welcomed thing that brings prices down to a more affordable level.