TerraVida Holistic, Pa.’s largest marijuana retailer, plans to open up shop in West Virginia
Through the purchase, TerraVida expands to a neighboring state for the first time.
TerraVida Holistic Centers, a medical marijuana firm based in Jenkintown, has acquired West Virginia Kindness, a medical cannabis retailer, as part of a plan to open a store in the Mountain State this fall.
West Virginia Kindness was recently awarded a dispensary permit from the state of West Virginia’s Office of Medical Cannabis. WV Kindness may license brands from TerraVida, and the acquisition marks TerraVida’s first foray outside Pennsylvania.
The price of the deal wasn’t disclosed..
WV Kindness will operate a 5,000-square-foot dispensary in Huntington. It is to partner with local marijuana growers and processors to obtain products for sale. The company plans to open the new dispensary in the fourth quarter of 2021 and hire 35 people.
West Virginia became the 29th state to approve medical marijuana in 2017, but it has taken four years for the state to issue licenses to dispensaries. It recently did so, handing out 100 licenses.
Chris Visco, president and CEO of TerraVida, founded the largest medical cannabis retailer in Pennsylvania. Currently the female-owned company employs 168 workers and has three retail shops in the Philadelphia suburbs: Abington, Malvern and Sellersville.
Through the WV Kindness acquisition, Visco aims to introduce medical cannabis to the West Virginia market for pain treatment, anxiety and other health conditions.
Visco opened her first TerraVida Holistic location in 2018. Visco said she personally paid for the plan to expand south, paying application fees and securing a building in Huntington.