Canopy Growth is selling its old chocolate factory pot facility to Hershey

globalnews.ca:

The town of Smiths Falls, Ont., is having a full-circle moment as pot producer Canopy Growth announced Thursday it would sell its primary cannabis cultivation facility — once a factory for Hershey Canada — back to the prodigal chocolatier.

The move will see Canopy Growth, which announced plans to wind down operations at the 1 Hershey Dr. facility in the spring in a bid to streamline operations, agree to sell the property to Hershey at a price of $53 million.

Shares of Canopy Growth were trading higher at the market open Thursday following the announcement.

Canopy Growth notably operated the old chocolate factory as its headquarters as it scaled up through the cannabis boom tied to the legalization of recreational weed in Canada. In a nod to the site’s history, Canopy Growth also rolled out a line of pot-infused chocolate bars a few years ago when edibles were also legalized.

Hershey Canada built the factory on the street that still bears its name in 1964 and sold it in 2007, according to a spokesperson for the company.

The town of Smiths Falls, which once relied on jobs from the Hershey factory, saw an employment surge with Canopy Growth’s boom. The subsequent decline in the cannabis industry saw the pot producer announce it was cutting 800 jobs across Canada, or more than a third of its workforce, in the spring.

Canopy Growth will retain a footprint in Smiths Falls as it centralizes its post-harvest production in a separate facility across the road from 1 Hershey.

Jason Reiman, Hershey Canada’s chief supply chain officer, said in a statement Thursday that the purchase is a “strategic investment” in the growth of its Canadian operations.

Global News reached out to Hershey Canada for details on hiring and production