Cannabis delivery driver Heidi Nelson with Nice Guys Delivery checks her orders with chief operating officer Monica Gray before leaving the office in San Rafael on March 21, 2020. (Sherry LaVars/Marin Independent Journal)

Dispatcher and packer Haley Strain of Nice Guys Delivery hands driver Heidi Nelson an order in San Rafael on March 21, 2020. The cannabis company says business has more than doubled since the coronavirus pandemic started. (Sherry LaVars/Marin Independent Journal)

Cannabis delivery driver Scarlett Swimmer checks her manifest before heading out from Nice Guys Delivery in San Rafael on March 21, 2020. (Sherry LaVars/Marin Independent Journal)



A Nice Guys Delivery courier heads out with orders at the cannabis products company in San Rafael on March 21, 2020. (Sherry LaVars/Marin Independent Journal)

Nice Guys Delivery chief operating officer Monica Gray monitors cannabis deliveries at the office in San Rafael on March 21, 2020. Gray says business has more than doubled during the coronavirus pandemic. (Sherry LaVars/Marin Independent Journal)

Dispatcher and logistics coordinator Allante Walker monitors traffic at Nice Guys Delivery in San Rafael on March 21, 2020. (Sherry LaVars/Marin Independent Journal)



A courier grabs a delivery sheet, face mask and gloves at Nice Guys Delivery, a cannabis service in San Rafael on March 21, 2020. (Sherry LaVars/Marin Independent Journal)

Haley Strain of Nice Guys Delivery checks a cannabis label before packing the item at the company's office in San Rafael on March 21, 2020. (Sherry LaVars/Marin Independent Journal)

Moments after public health officials announced on Monday that Marin County residents would be under a mandatory order to stay in their homes to slow the spread of the new coronavirus, Nice Guys Delivery’s online marijuana ordering system began to light up.

For the rest of Monday afternoon, about 60 new orders came in every hour, said Monica Gray, chief operating officer for the San Rafael-based cannabis delivery company.

By Wednesday, the company temporarily shut off its ordering system as employees scrambled to fulfill a backlog of purchases.

“It’s been absolutely crazy,” Gray said.

Most customers during the surge on Monday were in Marin, Gray said, but some were in San Francisco, where city officials had initially told pot dispensaries that they’d have to close during the lockdown, which began at midnight on Tuesday in most Bay Area counties. The city later reversed its stance, and has allowed the stores to stay open, but before that happened customers made a mad dash to stock up on cannabis products, lining up outside of dispensaries, and some of the businesses spilled over to Marin County retailers, Gray said.

San Rafael has deemed cannabis delivery services an “essential business,” and is allowing the companies to continue operating during the lockdown, said the city’s economic development director, Danielle O’Leary.

At the CBC Marin Alliance in Fairfax, which is the only brick-and-mortar marijuana retailer in the county, sales have also skyrocketed during the lockdown. The company only accepts patients with doctors’ recommendations for medical marijuana use at its store, but also operates a delivery service that sells to non-medical users.

“People are stocking up so they can stay home and stay well,” said Lynette Shaw, who has operated the Fairfax dispensary since 1997.

Staff members are wearing gloves and taking extra sanitary precautions at the store amid the virus outbreak, Shaw said. That includes wiping down surfaces with disinfectant every hour and offering customers hand sanitizer when they enter the building.

Delivery service operators said they are also implementing new protocols in response to the coronavirus. Nice Guys Delivery drivers are wearing gloves and asking customers to sign receipts with their own pens. They’re also encouraging customers who feel ill to pay in advance.

Ona.Life, another San Rafael-based delivery service that has seen sales rise this week, is requiring its drivers to wash their hands once every hour, and any time they enter or leave the company’s warehouse. All employees must also wear gloves. The company is encouraging customers to pay with checks rather than cash, according to a notification sent out to patrons this week.

“We hope the implementation of these mandatory protocols eases your mind as you receive your Ona order,” the company said.