Florist Farms

Housing Works Cannabis Co. in Manhattan became the first licensed adult-use dispensary to open in New York State on December 29, 2022. A Florist Farms product was the first one sold there, making Florist Farms part of the state's cannabis history from day one.

The claim is documented by two independent sources: CNY Central's coverage of the Cortland farm, and a Cornell CREA feature on Florist Farms that separately confirms the December 29, 2022 opening date. Cornell's account also notes the sale drew coverage from the New York Times the following day.

Florist Farms had already received one of the first adult-use cultivation licenses in New York back in May 2022, months before that first sale took place.

Florist Farms states on its own site that its farm has been USDA Certified Organic for over a decade, a certification that predates New York's adult-use cannabis market by years.

The same organic standard governs how the farm grows: fields are rotated, cover crops are planted between plantings, and pesticides are never used. These are the same regenerative practices the founders applied when the farm grew vegetables, before cannabis cultivation was legal in New York.

Florist Farms' home farm is in Cortland, New York, in the state's Central New York region. New York's Office of Cannabis Management lists an active Adult-Use Cultivator license at that location, held by Main Street Farms 2 LLC, an entity connected to co-founder Allan Gandelman. The state record does not use the brand name Florist Farms directly, but it confirms the license behind the farm.

Processing happens on the same property. Florist Farms says it covered its extraction facility in solar panels in 2022 and now runs it fully on solar power, an infrastructure detail the brand states directly rather than a general sustainability claim.

Florist Farms was founded by Allan Gandelman and Karli Miller-Hornick. The two met in 2010 during a sustainable agriculture course and became business partners in 2018, years before New York legalized adult-use cannabis.

Gandelman is also the founder and president of the New York State Cannabis Growers and Processors Association, the trade group representing the state's licensed growers and processors. That gives Florist Farms a founder who helped shape the regulatory environment the brand now operates inside.

Florist Farms is one of several brands under Farmer Group, an umbrella company Allan Gandelman and Karli Miller-Hornick co-founded in 2017. LinkedIn and The Org both list Farmer Group as the parent of Florist Farms, Head and Heal, Blotter, and Tune.

Head and Heal is a CBD and hemp wellness line. Blotter is a cannabis concentrates brand. Tune is a cannabis-infused seltzer. All four brands trace back to the same founders and the same Cortland, New York farming operation, even though each sells under its own name.

Florist Farms says its farm donates fresh vegetables weekly to local shelters and provides subsidized CSA shares to low-income members, continuing the farm's food-growing roots alongside its cannabis business.

A Cornell CREA feature on the farm credits Florist Farms and its sister operation Head and Heal with revitalizing downtown Cortland and employing over 50 local workers, with plans at the time of that report to double the workforce. Employee counts vary by source and date, so this page states the documented range rather than a single current number.