| Graphic: WeedMaps |
Buying bud on a budget? WeedMaps has a deal for you.
WeedMaps, known for directing medical marijuana users to nearby dispensaries in states which allow it, has borrowed an idea from Groupon, the popular coupon-swapping website, and is now offering daily coupons and discounts on medicinal cannabis, reports Jeremy A. Kaplan at Fox News.
While the service has been called “Groupon for ganja,” site founder Justin Hartfield was quick to point out the differences between the two.
“It’s only like Groupon in the sense that there’s a new deal every day,” he told FoxNews.com. “We’re not accepting money from end users.” Groupon customers buy merchandise online, he explained, meaning subscribers rely on the daily coupon website itself to handle the transactions.
With WeedMaps’ Daily Deals, users sign up for a daily email from the site and take the secret codes it supplies straight to the dispensary to make their pot purchases. The site negotiates directly with dispensaries themselves to get cut-rate pricing, sometimes with deals as much as 50 percent off regular prices, according to Hartfield.
“With our discounts, the customer redeems that discount at the dispensaries themselves,” Hartfield said. In other words, WeedMaps isn’t selling any weed, they’re just pointing at a great deal — “Right now, over there.”
“We’re helping patients find their best medicine for the best price,” he told FoxNews.com.
The new service has been live for a little more than a week, and Hartfield said more than 3,000 people in 12 regions have already signed up for it.
The deals themselves may require some translation for those unfamiliar with stoner lingo, according to Fox News. One recent offering, for example, read “South Long Beach – Free 8th of JADE with 40 min. donation for all new members donating 40 or more.”
That means “get a free eighth of an ounce of the Jade marijuana strain, with a $40 minimum donation,” explained Hartfield, offering what he jokingly called a “stoner to English” translation.
“Thanks for the Daily Deals coupons,” a fan wrote on WeedMaps’ forums. “As soon as I hit the Central Denver tab on WeedMaps, this Daily Deal coupon pops up and tells me that I’ll save $40 on a quarter oz.”
But the same fan reported that he “was so pumped on the quality of the meds he forgot to ask the bud tender about redeeming his 10% coupon.”