Inside the UK's Grey Market: Hash, Carts, and Social Media Dealers

Ten Years Ago: The Old Cannabis Market

In ten years, the cannabis market in the United Kingdom has changed dramatically. Ten years ago, the average cannabis user had access to poorly made “soap bars”, today the demand is for higher quality cannabis products from abroad. The main types of products sold in the old and current marketplaces are described below. Product Types The “Old” Market The “Grey” Market Reality Hashish Low purity, often cut with plastic or henna. High-purity dry sift, frozen hashish sourced from Morocco & Spain. Flower Bagged in plain cling wrap. Branded Mylar bags with qr code lab testing results. Concentrate Non-existant. Vape Carts and high potency extracts including live resin and shatter. Edibles Homemade Brownie baked goods. Professional edible products such as Nerds Rope or Stoner patches which are often fakes.

Instagram to Telegram: How Social Media Became the New High Street

Dealers have turned to social media to advertise their product line — Instagram storys featuring vibrant videos of frosty bud set to UK Drill Music. However, the purchase occurs somewhere else. The preferred messaging app for these transactions is Telegram. This app serves as a digital catalog where users can find automated bots for placing orders, verified customer reviews, next-day delivery promises via Royal Mail, etc. If you were to browse a few of these channels, it would appear identical to purchasing shoes online from an independent store.

Danger of the Cali Myth

There is an enormous portion of the UK grey marketplace based upon the “Californian” brand. Many people are willing to pay £60-£100 for a 3.5 gram bag of cannabis if it arrives in a colored pouch with a seal. There is however a catch. You can purchase 1,000 blank “Cali-style” pouches on sites such as DHgate.com or Aliexpress.com for pennies. Most of the “cannabis imported into the UK” is actually produced in the homes of families living in suburban areas of the Midland counties. Once harvested, the product is placed inside fake packaging designed to create a 200% mark-up based upon its fake packaging alone.

The Cart Crisis: A Public Health Time Bomb

Vape Carts represent one of the most concerning sectors of the grey market. Although they are extremely easy to use and offer great discretion, they are difficult to validate. In contrast to regulated markets found throughout North America, most of the Vape Carts available for sale on UK streets are home-made. “The largest threat in the UK today is not so much the cannabis plant itself but rather the chemical components associated with Vape Carts,” states Dr. Paul Dargan, Senior Toxicologist at Guy’s Hospital, London. “Unregulated Vape Carts can contain vitamin e acetate as a thickener, which increases the risk of severe lung damage when heated and vaped. More recently, we have seen synthetic cannabinoid (spice) being added to vape cartridges as an inexpensive substitute for THC.”

Police vs. Postman

Law enforcement officials face a “whack-a-mole” challenge in combating a gray market that utilizes postal services as a primary distribution method. Thousands of vacuum-sealed packages containing cannabis are shipped daily through Royal Mail sorting centers. Unless a package emits an unusual odor or leakages occur during transit, law enforcement agencies face significant challenges in identifying and seizing the vast majority of “stealth” mail order cannabis shipments passing through these facilities.

Navigating the Grey Area: Frequently Asked Questions

• Does Medical Grade on Telegram really exist?
  Very rarely. Some vendors obtain high-quality products; however, anyone can generate labels stating “medical grade”. The only means of acquiring genuine medical-grade cannabis in the UK is by obtaining a prescription issued privately from a licensed pharmacist.
• Why don’t the police stop Telegram channels?
  Encryption and the fact that many channel admins operate from outside the UK make it a jurisdictional nightmare. When one channel is banned, a “backup” link is usually sent to thousands of followers within minutes.
• What is ‘Landlocked’ hash?
  It’s a term often used for hash that has been smuggled over land routes rather than sea, supposedly preserving the terpene profile and quality better than older methods.