For the first time in D.C., cannabis dispensary workers ratified a union contract with their employer—a landmark not just for the dispensary’s employees, but also for the city’s nascent marijuana industry.

The employees work for DC Holistic Wellness, a one-year old dispensary located in Ward 7’s Deanwood neighborhood. “I am extremely proud to be a part of this historic moment,” Robert Pizzi, a metric analyst for DC Holistic Wellness, said at a contract signing on Wednesday. “This, in many ways, is one small step for the cannabis industry and a giant leap for workers everywhere.” 

Represented by United Food & Commercial Workers Local 400, the dispensary’s 13 employees will enjoy five-year contracts, with three raises baked into their salaries a year, one of which must include an hourly wage raise of 50 cents to $1 every six months. (They’re starting at a base pay of $16 per hour.) The contract also mandates healthcare and retirement benefits.

Unlike many union contract negotiations, which often see employees fighting against hostile and unwilling bosses, DC Holistic Wellness owner Norbert Pickett actually suggested that his workers pursue unionization. He reached out to UFCW’s Jeff Ferro about eight months ago to jump start the process, he says. (Pickett says that, after suggesting unionization, he allowed his employees to independently decide whether they wanted to organize and stepped back from the process. The National Labor Relations Act broadly forbids employers from interfering with or engaging in employees’ unionization efforts.)

“I wanted to protect employees,” Pickett, who has operated the dispensary for one year, told DCist. “I wanted to make jobs and opportunities available for people that normally wouldn’t have [them], or who have been held out of the cannabis [industry], like the Black community.”

That’s particularly important for Pickett’s employees, 99 percent of whom, he says, are minorities. (The union contract specifies that, at any given time, 35 percent of the staff must be minorities.) In particular, Pickett says he wants to help the women and people of color who work for him access union-sponsored training and apprenticeship programs so they can have long-term careers, not just short-term jobs. 

Pickett says he wants to “increase the standard” of what’s expected of dispensaries nationwide. “We’re setting the bar higher,” he says.

And while employers are often notoriously hostile to the idea of their workers unionizing, Jonathan Williams, communications director for UFCW’s Local 400 branch says that is often not the case in the cannabis industry. “There are a lot of owners [in the cannabis industry] that are very interested in union contracts,” he says. “It’s not always the case that we’re in a combative situation with an employer.” 

That’s because employers benefit from their employees’ unionization efforts, too: Recognizing a five-year contract lets them, for example, budget for salary increases and other operational costs. Williams also says that, in his experience, unionized workers tend to stick around longer because of the benefits, allowing employers to see less staff turnover.

Pickett says he’s most looking forward to employees having access to free trainings and apprenticeships so that they learn transferable skills to start their own dispensaries and cultivation centers. “I feel this is a way for us to create new careers in our community, especially since [the Black community] has been persecuted and arrested for this plant,” he says.

The ratification comes just days after the D.C. Council introduced a bill that would allow anyone convicted of a felony or misdemeanor marijuana charge to work in cultivation centers or dispensaries, reversing a decades-old ban. The bill would also create an incentivization program for residents who apply for licenses to start dispensaries, cultivation centers, and cannabis testing labs that are more than 50 percent owned by returning citizens. It was co-introduced by Councilmembers Robert White (D-At Large), David Grosso (I-At Large), Brianne Nadeau (Ward 1), Vincent Gray (D-Ward 7), and Trayon White (D-Ward 8).

Bryan Jackson,  a Ward 7 resident who’s now the store’s general manager, says that he’s worked “every role [at DC Holistic Wellness],” from “front desk, to delivery driver, to sales, to marketing, to ordering and processing.” Before working at the dispensary, Jackson worked with the U.S. National Arboretum in a seasonal position as a student intern coordinator helping with a community garden. 

Jackson met Pickett last year, when he was looking for work, and has been with DC Holistic Wellness since its opening in August 2019. Jackson, who runs a hydroponic produce farm in Ward 5 called District Flora, wants to become a certified master grower—a manager who is a cannabis and horticulture expert. He says he hopes the learning and hands-on experiences from the apprenticeship program, which is a benefit spelled out in the union contract, will help him move closer to owning his own cultivation center. 

“I’m going to get my [UFCW] 400 tags, and I can’t wait to pull up on the block and show all my boys,” Jackson says. “I’m a union man now.”