Flower, Concentrate, or Cartridge: What’s Moving in Canadian Dispensaries Right Now

There is no single answer to "what should I be stocking?" — but there is a strong format-by-format read on what is moving in Canadian retail right now. Here is what we are seeing across our brokered transactions in 2026, with practical implications for a wholesale buyer planning the next four months.

Dried flower: bifurcating fast

The dried flower category is splitting. Premium flower — denser bud structure, top-shelf terpene profiles, organic where it can be sourced — is moving as fast as ever. The eighths are flying. Pink Kush, Atomic Sour Haze, Dessert, anything with a recognizable name and high terpene loading is the easiest sale on a Canadian retail floor.

Mid-tier flower is steady. It moves, the margin is acceptable, and it anchors the menu for value-conscious customers. There is no need to abandon this tier; just do not try to grow it.

Budget-tier flower is the part of the market in real trouble. Sub-$25 eighths are running at margins that do not justify the shelf space. The customers buying at this price point have largely shifted to pre-rolls and value-tier cartridges, where the unit economics for them are better. If you are still ordering deep on budget eighths, you are subsidizing a category that consumer demand has moved past.

Wholesale read: Lengthen the premium flower menu, hold mid-tier flat, shrink budget flower by 30 to 50 percent and redirect that shelf space.

Pre-rolls: the single fastest-moving category

Pre-rolls in 2026 are the unambiguous winner. Mixed-format multipacks, infused pre-rolls, and premium single-strain pre-rolls are pulling foot traffic, basket size, and repeat purchase rates that no other category matches. The retail customer for pre-rolls is broader than the customer for flower — younger, more occasional, less price-sensitive — and they buy more often.

Our mixed indica/sativa pre-roll multipack is the fastest-moving SKU in our 2026 brokered catalogue. Single-strain pre-rolls from a known LP are reordered roughly twice as often as the equivalent dried flower SKU.

Wholesale read: Pre-rolls should be a top-three category on every retail order. If they are not, your menu is mispriced for current demand.

Cartridges: stable, mature, format-sensitive

The 510-thread cartridge market has stabilized at a high baseline. Cartridge volume is not growing as fast as it was in 2022 to 2023, but the customer base is loyal and the unit economics are clean. Compliance is the differentiator here — buyers are increasingly selective about cartridge source, fill quality, and absence of cutting agents.

Premium cartridges, especially CO₂-extracted single-strain fills from organic input flower, are growing inside the otherwise stable category. Budget cartridges are flat or declining.

Wholesale read: Carry a tight, quality-focused cartridge menu. Three to six SKUs is plenty for most retail counters. The customer for cartridges shops for brand and consistency, not selection breadth.

Concentrates: the standout growth category

Live resin, rosin, hash rosin, badder, and shatter are all growing, but live resin and live rosin are growing fastest. Customers who buy concentrates buy more often and at higher unit prices than any other retail customer. They are also the most informed customers on the floor — they know the LP, the input flower, the extraction method, and the strain.

For retailers who have not built a serious concentrate menu, 2026 is the moment. The growth is real, the margin is excellent, and the customer base is sticky.

Wholesale read: Add at least two to four premium concentrates to any standing order. Treat live resin allocation the way you treat premium flower allocation — secure it early in the month.

Edibles and beverages: outside our wholesale scope, but worth watching

Brokered transactions on edibles and beverages remain a smaller part of our flow, but consumer demand on beverages in particular continues to grow. Retailers building seven-day-of-the-week menus increasingly need a serious beverage offering. If your provincial framework allows the SKU breadth, this is a category worth building.

The practical synthesis

Move shelf space toward pre-rolls and concentrates. Hold premium flower. Reduce budget flower. Keep a tight cartridge menu. Watch beverages. The retailers running this playbook in 2026 are the ones we are quoting larger orders to, and their reorder cadence is shorter than it has ever been.