The AGCO’s Changing Public Profile
AGCO Website
Average monthly traffic to the agco.ca website increased considerably following the announcement of the AGCO’s role as the provincial regulator for retail cannabis. In the six months before the announcement, the AGCO had a total of 230,000 visitors on its site. In the six months after the announcement, the number of visitors more than doubled to 480,000.
During the peak months following the Expression of Interest Lottery (Dec 2018 – Feb 2019) the AGCO site experienced a 240% increase in average monthly visitors over the same period a year prior. Nearly half of those visitors were seeking information about cannabis.
Social Media
As a result of intense interest in cannabis regulation, the AGCO has significantly increased its outreach. For example, in just under three months between October 2018 and January 2019, the AGCO received 1,020 cannabis-related mentions on social media. In comparison, the AGCO received 400 social media mentions in the 2016-2017 fiscal year.
Email distribution list
In order to keep interested parties informed of developments in cannabis retail regulation, the AGCO invited people to subscribe to receive email alerts. From October 2018 to March 2019, the AGCO sent nearly 100 email messages in both official languages to its cannabis distribution list, which grew to over 11,000 subscribers by the end of the fiscal year. The average open rate of these emails was 59% - twice as high as the government benchmark average open rate of 26.5% (according to Mailchimp).
AGCO Media Requests
One of the AGCO’s objectives when taking on the regulation of private cannabis retail was to develop an accurate and common understanding of the key regulations and their objectives. Working with media outlets to share this information became a priority over the year. The AGCO saw a 311% increase in contacts with media outlets this year, with cannabis-related media requests spiking from December 2018 to February 2019.
Table 1 – Media Requests by Month
|
2017-2018 |
2018-2019 |
Percentage Increase |
|
|---|---|---|---|
|
September |
6 |
8 |
33% |
|
October |
10 |
11 |
10% |
|
November |
15 |
12 |
-20% |
|
December |
14 |
24 |
71% |
|
January |
16 |
115 |
619% |
|
February |
14 |
52 |
271% |
|
March |
6 |
96 |
1500% |
Outreach to Cannabis Stakeholders
AGCO Webinars
The AGCO hosted three cannabis-related webinars to support the April 1, 2019 roll out of private retail cannabis stores. These webinars provided an opportunity to educate potential licensees on what would be their regulatory responsibilities and also on AGCO’s approach to selecting cannabis licensees and the AGCO’s standards-based approach to regulation and compliance. The overall satisfaction rate from participants to these webinars was 88%.
TABLE 2 – Webinar Participants
|
|
Private Retail Part 1 |
Municipal Webinar |
Private Retail Part 2 |
Private Retail Part 3 |
Total Webinar Registrants |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
Date |
Nov 27, 2018 |
Nov 27, 2018 |
Dec 14, 2018 |
Jan 4, 2019 |
|
|
Number of Registrants |
3,896 |
415 |
2,732 |
4,113 |
11,156 |
Information Onboarding
On March 4, 2019, the AGCO hosted an information onboarding session for the 25 selected Expression of Interest Lottery applicants to build relationships between the AGCO and cannabis retail store operators and managers, and to provide additional information on the AGCO’s reporting requirements and approach to compliance and regulatory assurance. In total 45 cannabis retailer participants attended the session with an overall satisfaction rate of 100% for this session.
Municipal Conferences
The AGCO also participated in several municipal conferences, including the Rural Ontario Municipal Association conference and the Ministry of Municipal Affairs Northern Clerks Forum, to provide information on the newly regulated cannabis retail industry. These were opportunities for the AGCO to answer questions from municipal stakeholders such as city councilors, local police forces, municipal licensing and bylaw officers.