Brooklyn’s cottage tech industry is at an all time high!
A Cobble Hill company that makes a portable vaporizer beloved by stoners is finally able to market its gadget as a high-end pot-smoking device, after the state’s medical marijuana program launched last week.
“Before today, if you were to buy our product with the intention to consume cannabis, you would be buying paraphernalia, and you can’t do that legally,” said Roger Volodarsky, a Coney Island native and chief executive officer at Puffco. “Finally, that is an option now. You can walk into a dispensary and speak openly about what you plan to use it for.”
Volodarsky and his team at Puffco have enjoyed critical and popular acclaim ever since the summer of 2015, when both marijuana-enthusiast magazine High Times and attendees of the 2015 Cannabis Cup named their flagship product, the Puffco Pro, the best portable pot vaporizer pen of the year.
The Puffco Pro is already sold openly in states with friendlier pot laws — especially Oregon and Colorado, where weed is legal. But in New York, where no lawful means of imbibing the herb existed until now, the Brooklyn-designed vape pen could only be sold for use with tobacco and various other aromatic extracts.
Essentially, sellers who spoke with customers about using Puffco products to vape grass could open their business to a world of legal trouble, according to an attorney.
“They would have to say ‘marijuana is an illegal substance, and we sell this for the use of smoking tobacco,’” said criminal defense lawyer Adam Perlnutter. “It’s much different now.”
Now registered medical Mary Jane patients can have frank conversations with vaporizer vendors, and will no longer have to rely on innuendo to learn more about the product and its competitors, according to Puffco’s creative director.
“It allows for the b——- to be dropped,” said Eduardo Whittington. “Now we can have a conversation.”
