Cannabis Is Not Chill: The People, Pressure, And Purpose Behind Retail

Most people assume working in cannabis must be pretty relaxed. Behind the bright menus and glass counters, however, is a business built on strict regulations, constant inspections, expensive inventory, impossible deadlines, and the expectation that somebody will always know what to do when everything starts going wrong at once.Christopher Sciarappa spent years managing dispensaries in New York, Massachusetts, and Connecticut. In Cannabis Is Not Chill, he tells the stories behind the job: opening stores, surviving inspections, dealing with customers at their best and worst, making mistakes that came with very real consequences, and learning how lonely leadership can become when everyone is looking at you for an answer and nobody is coming to help.The pressure is only half the story. There were customers who returned just to say thank you, coworkers who made terrible days bearable, employees who grew into people they never imagined becoming, and victories that meant more because of how close everything had come to falling apart. There was also the satisfaction of solving the problem, protecting the people beside you, and watching a store succeed because you refused to give up on it.Cannabis Is Not Chill: People, Pressure, and Purpose is an honest account of what it feels like to carry an entire building on your shoulders while trying to convince everyone, including yourself, that you have it under control. The stories are tense, ridiculous, painful, and often funny because sometimes laughing was the only useful thing left to do. The job followed Christopher home and left a few scars, but it also gave him something he had spent years searching for: a reason to be proud of himself.