Illegal Stores Are Taking Missouri Jobs

In 2024 the DCR reported Missouri’s legal cannabis industry employed over 20,000 people.

Those jobs are now at risk and cuts have already begun.

Illegal Cannabis is being brought in from out of state, with some products sourced from China.

As sales for these black market products continue to increase, legally operating companies in Missouri producing regulated cannabis products now have to shrink their labor force.

These are the industry jobs that are being terminated as a result of decreased sales:

• Cultivation: Indoor and greenhouse cultivators employ horticulturists, IPM technicians, irrigation specialists, trimmers, post-harvest supervisors, and facilities engineers. These teams manage plant health, yields, and consistency under rigorous standard operating procedures. Each harvest translates into dozens of predictable, year-round roles—many with benefits and pathways into management.

• Manufacturing & Processing: Infused-product manufacturers (edibles, vapes, tinctures, topicals, beverages) hire extraction techs, food-safe production leads, packaging teams, sanitation crews, QA/QC specialists, and R&D formulators. Missouri’s manufacturing footprint has grown with adult-use demand, enabling new jobs in process engineering, equipment maintenance, and supply-chain planning.

• Laboratory Testing: State-certified labs employ chemists and microbiologists to test for potency and contaminants (heavy metals, pesticides, residual solvents, mold/mycotoxins). This is highly technical work that anchors consumer safety and it’s employment that only exists in a regulated market where testing is mandatory.

• Distribution & Logistics: Licensed transporters, wholesalers, and distributors provide secure movement and inventory reconciliation, hiring drivers, route planners, compliance specialists, and warehouse teams.

• Retail (Dispensaries): Budtenders, shift leads, store managers, inventory specialists, compliance managers, security, and HR—the work you see at the counter is supported by back-office roles that keep audits clean and shelves stocked. The concentration of dispensaries in Kansas City’s counties demonstrates how these retail roles cluster locally.

• Corporate & Support Functions: Finance, payroll, legal, marketing, IT, and data analytics—professional services that scale as companies grow to multiple facilities.

• Public-Sector & Compliance Adjacent: Regulators, auditors, and third-party consultants (training, safety, security) form another orbit of jobs that expand in step with the licensed market. DHSS’s annual program reporting chronicles the increasing scope of compliance, enforcement, and licensing—work that inherently supports more professional roles.