It’s official! The Evergreen Market is now offering health coverage to their retail store employees. Cannabis employee health insurance has been offered to salaried and corporate employees, however, The Evergreen Market will be one of the first to offer employee health insurance to it’s budtenders. Certainly, this is a huge step on the road to commoditizing cannabis. As the industry itself becomes more normalized, employee health insurance options are an incredible symbol of how far we’ve come in a marginalized work space.
Why is cannabis health insurance exciting?
To be a budtender has, in recent years, meant overcoming a stigma. It has meant hurdling obstacles that other industries 
do not have to jump. However, being a cannabis employee and proudly proclaiming that yes, your employer does offer employee health insurance shows our communities that it is a legitimate industry and worthy of the growth it will continue to experience. Most small businesses are unable to offer employee health care. With this push in the cannabis industry, we are no longer a “small business”. We are no longer a marginalized industry or a stigmatized one. As a result, cannabis as a career is beginning to be seen and attended to by the communities we serve in a way that emphasizes our growth and benefit.
What have we overcome?
Cannabis employee health insurance is not something those of us from the medical days ever thought possible. Through perseverance and maintaining a culture of health, wellness, and community outreach the Evergreen Market will be one of the first cannabis employers to set the tone for the whole industry when it comes to Washington State and employee health care. The more business owners in cannabis that offer employee health insurance, the farther along the road to commoditization we’ll be. Cannabis can create a higher quality of life for anyone. A higher quality of life for its employees is a must in order to build up this industry.
Coverage for retail employees will begin on January 1st of 2019.
Written by: Elan Gratrix
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