Ample growth opportunities in the U.S.
In its second quarter, Curaleaf opened five new stores in Illinois, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and Maine. This brings its total to 107 stores nationwide. Peers Trulieve and Green Thumb have 100 and 65 stores nationwide, respectively.
Management expects recreational sales in New Jersey to begin in late 2021, ramping up by the first half of 2022. Curaleaf has three stores in the state. Management is also excited about the Connecticut and New York adult-use market, where retail sales are slated to start by the second quarter of 2022 and early 2023, respectively.
The company also expects to have a total of around 60 dispensaries in Florida by the end of 2022. This could help Curaleaf put up a good fight against Trulieve, which is currently dominating the Florida cannabis market with 85 stores. Curaleaf also intends to open eight new retail dispensaries across Arizona, Florida, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania by the end of 2021.
Looking ahead, Curaleaf's management anticipates an incremental market opportunity of $3 billion from Pennsylvania and Maryland by 2023 (once they legalize recreational marijuana).
Curaleaf also invested in several strategic acquisitions in 2020 that are yet to show their full potential. One of them in particular, the acquisition of hemp cannabidiol (CBD) company Grassroots, could prove to be very beneficial in the long run. The acquisition, completed in July 2020, expanded Curaleaf's presence in 23 states with 135 dispensaries licenses and 22 cultivation sites with 1.6 million square feet of current cultivation capacity. It also acquired the cannabis oil brand Select from Cura Partners in February 2020 for $948.8 million. This brand has now grown from 800 outlets at the start of 2020 to 1,700 retail outlets by the end of the fourth quarter of 2020.