In recent history – like less than 12 months ago – Grassdoor, Ganja Goddess, NuggClubMD were all competing for the weed subscription business in The Bay Area. Bring me my weed, we demand it!

But Grassdoor ran out of money and became embroiled in lawsuits about text marketing and labor issues with their drivers. Ganja Goddess, site name: the goddess delivers has gone quietly defunct, and now NuggClub claims to be The Only Cannabis Subscription Box out here in Cali.

My my my, how things change in the blink of an eye.

Now that I have quit smoking weed, I am saving a bunch of money, and I’ve also become more aware that the subscription model is pervasive, seemingly everywhere. Even over on Substack, the goal is to get people to subscribe and pay for a newsletter. You’ve got to be kidding me! And don’t get me started talking about streaming services. I stick to what’s free on YouTube (believe it or not,) and even there I subscribe to over 75 channels.

Is subscribing is the new browsing, only with a fee?

I recently started buying protein powder in an effort to control calories but still get my protein. It’s on subscription, of course. Amazon had a button you could put in your house to refill your regular purchases automatically, but, not anymore.

I think print magazines were the forerunners of this model, right? While my favorite magazines like Creative Non Fiction and Lowrider have gone out of the print business, (moving to digital only,) the cannabis purveyors have tried to take up this monthly model, ad nauseum.

Thanks Chris Benedict Valencia, a photog on Flickr, for the image of the subscribe button

Of course, NuggClub isn’t the only game in town, but I did subscribe for a while and wrote about it in this post. There is a whole big long list of them here, and I wish them luck. It’s hard to differentiate yourself in a crowded market, and I gotta figure what goes in the box is stuff that doesn’t sell in the dispensary anyway. With cannabis at least, it’s a solution without a consumer problem.

Last week the FTC mandated that cancelling a subscription must be as easy as it was to sign up. Yea, that’ll be the day.