Cannabis Retail Employee Turnover – Cannabis News, Lifestyle

High employee turnover is always an issue for retail managers, but what about employee turnover in cannabis retail? Also known as “budtenders,” cannabis retail workers are on the front lines of the cannabis industry. They are the people customers interact with the most. A good budtender can tell you which strains are good for what, which are the most popular, which are the tastiest terpenes, etc.

Headset as data compiled to study employee turnover in retail cannabis stores. Headset is a cannabis analysis company. Their data comes from real-time sales reports connected to cannabis dealers through their POS systems. For cannabis retail employee turnover, they compiled data from Arizona, California, Colorado, Illinois, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Nevada, Oregon and Washington State. They also pulled data from Alberta, Ontario, British Columbia and Saskatchewan.

They found in Canada and the US that 55% of budtenders will quit by the end of their first year. In Canada, nearly a third of employees were hired and then left in the same year. The situation is even worse for retailers in Colorado and Oregon with lower customer loyalty.

In both countries, a quarter of all budtenders hired last year did not survive the first four weeks on the job. That means the budtenders who are good at their job and enjoy it are still working.

Employee turnover in the cannabis retail trade

In Canada and the US, most budtenders who have worked in the past year have also been hired in the past year. Employers hired only 40% of workers more than a year ago.

As you can see from the chart, about 55% of budtenders in Canada and the US will quit within the first 12 months. Employee turnover trends are higher in Canadian cannabis retail, but this is a slight increase compared to the US.

The US Bureau of Labor Statistics reports that the turnover rate in 2021 was 47.2% for all industries. This means that employee turnover in the cannabis retail industry is higher than the US national average.

Budtenders hired more than 12 months ago have identical turnover rates in the US and Canada. About 60% of them left the industry in the past year. The similarities are also present in new hires. In Canada, about 54% of new hires resigned, and 50% of American new hires transferred.

A third (32.5%) of all Canadian budtenders who started work sometime in the last year left before their first 12 months were up.

Bell curves of individual markets and budtenders

We can see the ins and outs of employee turnover in the cannabis retail sector by dissecting the data into individual markets. Retailers in Illinois, for example, are better at retaining their experienced budtenders longer than 12 months, since 55% of cannabis retail employees were hired more than a year ago.

In contrast, retailers in Colorado and Oregon are having a harder time retaining their employees. Budtenders in these states typically start and end their employment within 12 months.

In Canada, cannabis retail employee turnover is suffering the same fate. However, Alberta is an anomaly. Although they retain better with new hires, they have lost more experienced budtenders than other Canadian provinces.

Despite an average cannabis retail employee turnover of 55%, there are still stores with low turnover rates. In Canada and the US, about 20% of stores had an annual sales rate of less than 40%. But to be fair, more than 30% of stores in both countries had turnover rates above 60%.

In summary, employee retention is a challenge for the cannabis industry, especially in cannabis retail.

What is happening to staff turnover in cannabis retail?

Cannabis retailers would do well to have efficient training programs for new hires, as these need to be used frequently. In both countries, of the budtenders hired last year, only 49% are still working in the US and 46% in Canada.

A quarter of budtenders (23% in the US, 24% in Canada) don’t even complete their first month on the job.

That said, good budtenders are likely to stay. This trend is not surprising as people who are good at their job tend to stick with it. Also, many budtenders rely on tips. So whoever is more agreeable, extroverted and conscientious will do better. Likewise, those who enjoy budding but are not as successful with customers may get angry and quit because other budtenders are so efficient.

However, hiring managers would be wise to be more specific as to the reasons for high employee turnover in the cannabis retail industry. And then implement strategies to retain trained employees, as constant hiring and training is costly and time-consuming.