Exclusive: Leafly Launches Cannabis Lab Testing Certification Program

Cannabis information company Leafly on Tuesday will announce its Leafly Certified Labs Program, Benzinga has learned exclusively.

The program aims to identify cannabis testing labs that are consistently accurate and compliant.

It also seeks to ensure all the data available on Leafly.com — most notably the Leafly Cannabis Guide visualizations recently unveiled in October — are sourced from these trustworthy labs.

The company will also announce a list of founding members Tuesday:

• Anandia in Canada.
• CannTest in Alaska.
• ChemHistory in Oregon.
• Confidence Analytics in Washington.
• Modern Canna in Florida.
• PSI Labs in Michigan.
• SC Labs in California.

Nick Jikomes, Leafly’s principal research scientist, told Benzinga that one outcome the company hopes to drive with efforts like the Leafly Certified Labs Program is “helping people understand that there’s much more to the quality of cannabis products than potency alone.”

Many consumers believe that buying the product with the highest testing percentage means getting the most bang for their buck, which leads brands to "shop around" lab results, he said. 

“Science shouldn't work that way, and the more we can help people develop a holistic understanding of this amazing plant, the better off both consumers and labs will be.”

To better explain the need for this program, Leafly shared some of its results.

“This is our independent analysis and testing done by Leafly scientists,” a company spokesperson told Benzinga. “We found there’s a wide variation in lab results; most noticeably, the average total THC levels differ and there are some blatantly skewed distributions."

All images courtesy of Leafly.