(This story has been updated from an earlier version to clarify that the announced deal was signed with a distributor, not 7-Eleven’s corporate offices. Read more about the deal and the confusion here.)

One of the nation’s best-known convenience store chains, 7-Eleven, could carry CBD products in up to 4,500 franchise locations across the United States by the end of 2018.

Phoenix Tears, a Denver company that makes hemp-derived CBD oils and oral sprays, announced the distribution deal Tuesday.

The Denver company made the 7-Eleven deal with the help of MarketHub Retail Services, a distributor that works with 7-Eleven franchisees.

“This agreement confirms our belief that CBD’s status as a mainstream wellness option has arrived,” Janet Rosendahl-Sweeney, founder of Phoenix Tears, said in a statement.

The 7-Eleven rollout will begin in places that have legalized recreational or medical marijuana – California, Colorado, Florida, Illinois, Maryland, Massachusetts, Nevada and Washington DC – and are considered friendly territory for cannabidiol retailing.

The CBD products are derived from hemp, not marijuana.

Phoenix Tears plans to have its CBD products in 7,000 7-Eleven stores over the next three years.

For CBD producers, convenience stores represent an enormous new market.

Roughly 155,000 convenience stores operated in the United States in 2017 compared with only about 43,000 drugstores, according to the Virginia-based National Association of Convenience Stores.

Distributing CBD in 7-Eleven stores will “address the growing consumer demand for effective, safe CBD-based products that can now be easily sourced over the counter,” said Blake Patterson, president of MarketHub Retail Services.