LOS ANGELES -- When it comes to consuming cannabis without inhaling it, the options have exploded. In the early years of California's legal weed scene, most non-smoking, non-vaping products fell into a couple key categories: sweet-treat edibles (brownies, chocolate bars and gummies), beverages (sodas, tonics and teas) and topicals (balms, patches and ointments).
Today, dispensary shelves bristle with a bewildering array of foods, flavors and delivery methods that make it possible to get cashed-out on condiments, glazed-eyed on gravy and stoned by sipping on a drink straw. And if some of the products currently in development make it to market on schedule, the next few months will see the range of THC-infused options expanding to include chewing gum, instant mashed potatoes and confetti cake mix.
Long Beach-based Equity Brands, one of the two partner companies behind the recently introduced Northern Lights cannabis concentrate drinking straw and in-development chewing gum (the other is the licensed manufacturer, Lynwood-based Natural Plant Extract of California), is bullish on novel — and discreet — ways to consume cannabis. "We're also working on jawbreakers, Jell-O shots and a Skittles-like format," said Equity Brands' co-Chief Executive Sebastian Velmont. "Once we perfect the gum, those are the other [products] we're going to release that we feel will will shake up the industry and bring variety to a category that's [mostly] chocolate and gummies."
