After state legislators clarified the legal limbo of CBD oil during their recent session, businesses across the county are now cashing in on the renewed legal status. Some are new to the CBD oil business while others have been selling it for years.
The legal status of CBD — also known as cannabidiol — oil in Indiana was in question late last year after Indiana Attorney General Curtis Hill wrote a legal opinion in November that stated the product was considered illegal, since it’s a derivative of marijuana, which is illegal under federal law.
CBD supporters, however, argued that the substance was legal so long as it had a minute percentage of THC, the active ingredient in marijuana that gives users their high.
During this year’s General Assembly, state lawmakers sought to clarify the legal position of CBD oil and its sales. In March, Gov. Eric Holcomb signed Senate Bill 52 into law, legalizing CBD oil with less than 0.3 percent of THC, so long as it met certain labeling requirements.
Since the passage of the bill, CBD oil is now becoming increasingly popular in Morgan County with more than half a dozen sellers and counting.
One such Morgan County resident is Jennifer Western of Camby. Western sells CBD oil online through a Las Vegas-based company — Hempworx CBD Oil. Western said that she began selling CBD after seeing positive results for herself and her family.
Western has been selling CBD since June 2017, before the legal controversy last year began. She said that using Hempworx CBD allowed her husband to return to work much sooner than normal following surgery, and served as an effective supplement for helping her daughter manage attention-deficit, hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). After seeing how helpful it could be for others, Western wanted to spread the word.
“I was for looking how I could give back to other people,” Western said. “I’m trying to get the word out to people in Mooresville and Plainfield.”
Western is one of many in Morgan County selling CBD after seeing success from personal use.
Shawn Broyer, owner of Wood and Cotton Co. in Martinsville, has been selling a brand of CBD oil called 7 Full Spectrum Hemp Oil for about a week, and said that not only has she seen a strong consumer interest, but she’s seen benefits from the product in her own life.
“My husband has chronic back pain, gets injections every three months,” said Broyer. “We started the CBD oil for that reason. He’s had no back injections since.”
She stated that the CBD oil was also very effective in treating her anxiety and worked well enough to replace her daughter’s Concerta, a medication for ADHD.
Like Broyer, Brani Dean, owner of Bronze and Bling in Martinsville, takes CBD oil personally in addition to selling it. Dean said that she has been selling two kinds of CBD for about four weeks, the 7 Full Spectrum Hemp Oil and the Ultra Cell CBD Oil, the latter of which is pet-friendly.
“People are giving it to their pets for seizures, arthritis and anxiety,” said Dean.
Dean also noted that another benefit of the product was that CBD contains no known side effects and has zero medication interaction, allowing individuals to take it as a supplement alongside their regular medication.
Naptown Vapors, with a location in Martinsville as well as Indianapolis, has been one of the longest sellers of CBD oil in Morgan County, only temporarily removing it from shelves last year amid the legal limbo.
“It was never actually illegal,” said Naptown owner Todd Scott.
It’s Scott’s contention that the legal issues surrounding CBD were only around because Eli Lilly, an Indiana-based pharmaceutical company, would lose money due to the benefits of CBD drawing more people away from pharmaceutical drugs.
Naptown employee Bailey Inabnitt agreed that CBD oil would directly compete with prescription drug companies like Eli Lilly, noting that using CBD oil has helped him stop using prescription drugs in his own life.
“I used prescription anxiety medication for years and ever since I’ve started using CBD, I don’t take those any more,” Inabnitt said. “We’ve had a lot of people come in and get off prescription painkillers for back pain.”
Inabnitt touted the many versatile uses of CBD, which the body produces naturally.
“It’s really good for anxiety, depression, pain management. You can use it for all sorts of things,” he said. “Your body naturally creates it in small quantities, but adding an external to it promotes the body to use it more.”
For CBD purveyors, the product’s popularity is only growing, and rightly so — the benefits are clear.
“It helps people not only in Indiana, but across the world,” Western said.