How did pre-rolls go from discount bin to top shelf delicacy?

• 1. Where it all started
• 2. Vapes, another convenient format
• 3. The next step: extracts

Long before any form of legalization, the concept of legal weed was always imagined with pre-rolls at the forefront. It makes sense considering the world’s longtime love affair with tobacco and the popularity of joints, and so when people pictured what cannabis would look like without prohibition, they drew mock-ups of green cigarette packs and blunts sold like cigars.

Where it all started

For the first decade plus of legalization those pre-roll expectations were realized, but typically as a low-quality, discount product that ended up as freebies. These days though, pre-rolls are having a moment, going from the bottom of the barrel to dispensary top shelves. In a microcosm of legalization’s early shifts, the pre-roll explosion is a reminder of the cannabis community’s obsession with quality over quantity and a desire to connect with their consumption. 

The expectation of convenience joints sold like cigarettes arrived as soon as legalization hit in early medical markets like California and recreational states like Colorado and Washington. But cannabis is not tobacco, and while pre-rolls were certainly selling, it turns out that weed smokers like to see, smell, feel, and roll their own flower - a much more intimate relationship with the plant than most cigarette smokers have with their plant of choice. So while the best buds were saved to be sold in eights and ounces, pre-rolls were packed with smalls, shake, and trim and handed out as dispensary freebies and discount options for tourists and inexperienced smokers.

“Pre-rolled joints have quickly become the hot dogs of Colorado’s recreational marijuana industry,” one Colorado smoker wrote in 2015. “They’re cheap to make, easy to consume and extremely convenient — but do you really want to know what’s inside? Customers leaving dispensaries with a complimentary joint may feel as if they’ve just won the lottery — but they may not feel the same after smoking it.”

Moving from the illicit market to the legal scene, weed sales became all about seeing to believe. Flower was displayed in large jars and picked from deli-style, with customers able to smell strains and look at buds. You can’t look at the weed inside a pre-roll, you can’t really smell it, and once ground and rolled, weed is likely to dry out, making it harsh and unpleasant, especially if, like most early pre-rolls, they were packed with mid or low-tier product.

Vapes, another convenient format

Similarly and at the same time, vape cartridges were hitting the industry like a tidal wave, taking an even bigger sector of the convenience market and giving operators an even more profitable way to turn dirt weed, last year’s leftovers, and trim unrecognizable to customers. 

It didn’t take long for the same unscrupulous practices that made pre-rolls into the hot dogs of joints to turn THC vapes into an even more insidious mystery mix. This time, instead of just selling off bad weed, vape producers in the illicit market started cutting their oils with Vitamin E Acetate, causing a spate of illnesses directly tied to THC vape use. As cannabis legalization birthed new product markets, it was becoming clear that product quality was going to be a necessary selling point for not only flower, but vapes, pre-rolls, and everything else in a dispensary.

It was quick, but as the market matured and brands started differentiating themselves by quality, the premium pre-roll replaced the trim rolls and started flying off shelves. Strain specific with exclusive flavors, joint tubes with original art, and hand rolled with custom filter tips, the key to selling ready-to-smoke weed was to go the cigar route instead of the cigarette model. 

“Thankfully, the technology now exists to manufacture real, rolled joints at a commercial scale,” RollPros CEO Kyle Loucks says. “Fresh, sticky bud, coarse grind, even density, and perfect airflow are all hallmarks of this new era of pre-rolls. Roll is the key word there. Good joints are rolled, not stuffed.”

Hand-rolled joints became a luxury that customers were willing to pay top dollar for. Unlike the old dispensary freebies packed loosely in cones, hand-rolled joints denote a quality of flower that would warrant a roller’s time and a quality of smoke that simply can’t be achieved with a cone. 

The next step: Extracts

Enter the infusion. Trippy sticks, tarantulas, twax, donuts, hash holes, or just infused joints - the blend of concentrates and flower in a ready to smoke roll changed the game.

The introduction of the true top shelf joint came with the culture’s shift towards solventless hash rosin, the creme de la creme of cannabis concentrates. Rolling a joint with a snake of clean, terpy rosin in the middle so that the doobie burns long and slow with a perfect hole of melted hash in the center took the pre-roll industry to new heights. Not only are the extremely potent hand-rolled joints luxurious, but like premium cigars, most smokers simply lack the skill necessary to roll their own. At retail - both legal and in the traditional market - hash holes can cost over $100. But with limited edition collaborations like sneakers or trading cards, hash holes are still hard to come by in some cities.

"We’re always pushing the envelope," Fidel, the man behind Fidel’s Hash Holes, one of the industry’s most popular hash hole brands, told Los Angeles Magazine. "I'm trying to find the tastemakers that may grow fire flower and I can pair with my rosin. Or vice versa, pairing my flower with their rosin. Try to really venture out there. Current day relevance is about collaborations, just as much as it is about a superior product."

Of course, there are still plenty of brands mixing cheap distillate concentrate with bottled terpenes and low grade flower - a new spin on the tried and true trash to cash model - but the most discerning smokers - the kind of stoners who used to forsake the pre-roll - are now buying more hash holes and premium pre-rolls than ever, supporting a market of boutique rollers and brands stepping the pre-roll game to new levels.

It may not be the same as rolling your own, but pre-rolls have come a long way in legalization’s short timespan, and there’s no telling what the future holds for the next big trend in ready-to-smoke joints, but we’ll be waiting to spark it up.