High Tide Inc., the high-impact, retail-forward enterprise built to deliver real-world value across every component of cannabis, announced today that its Canna Cabana retail cannabis store located at 1383 Wilson Road N, Oshawa, Ontario will begin selling recreational cannabis products and consumption accessories for adult use. This opening marks High Tide’s 155th Canna Cabana branded retail cannabis location in Canada and the 51st in Ontario, Canada’s largest province.
Located on the shores of Lake Ontario, Oshawa is “the automotive capital of Canada” and is the Canadian headquarters of General Motors. At the eastern edge of the “Golden Horseshoe,” Oshawa is the largest municipality in the Durham region. The city has grown into an education and health sciences hub with three major post-secondary institutions located within its borders. Durham College is an 8-minute drive from this new Canna Cabana and houses a student population of approximately 12,000. This brand-new storefront is located in a major power centre, steps away from a national grocery chain, a national discount retailer and several quick-service restaurants.
“Oshawa, with its automotive manufacturing roots, is an exciting new market for Canna Cabana, and our real estate strategy again stands out with this location. This Canna Cabana store stands to benefit from the extensive consumer traffic generated by the multiple well-established national retail brands already located within this power centre, giving us an opportunity to grow our ELITE and Cabana Club membership base, which currently sits at over one million members across Canada,” said Raj Grover, President and Chief Executive Officer of High Tide.
“As the largest city in Durham, Oshawa is an excellent place to showcase our innovative discount club model, which includes friendly budtenders serving our club members in an open and retail-friendly shoppable layout alongside our proprietary Fastendr technology. I am confident that the quality and strength of this new store, coupled with similar high-quality locations in our construction pipeline, will support our previously stated goal of achieving positive free cash flow by the end of this calendar year. I look forward to sharing more news in this regard when we release our third quarter financials in mid-September,” added Mr. Grover.
Appointment of Permanent Chief Financial Officer (CFO)
The Company also announces the appointment of Sergio Patino as permanent CFO, effective August 1, 2023. Mr. Patino has served as interim CFO since February 28, 2023. He is a Chartered Professional Accountant (CPA, CMA) and has a Master’s in business from the University of Alberta. He first joined High Tide as a Financial Consultant in November of 2022, bringing over 20 years of global experience across multiple industries. Prior to joining High Tide, he was Chief Financial Officer for the Americas of a large Mining Construction company. Prior to that, he led the transformation of a global Supply Chain group. He has work experience in Finance, Strategy, Supply Chain, Project Accounting & Controls, Process and Systems improvement, gained from roles held in large publicly traded companies in the Oil & Gas, Mining and Heavy Construction industries.
Employee Stock Options Grant
In addition, High Tide announces the grant of 80,000 incentive stock options (the “Options”). Each Option is exercisable at the closing price of the Company’s common shares listed on the TSX Venture Exchange (the “TSXV”) based on the last trading day immediately prior to this press release, expires three years from the date of grant, and vests over a two-year period. Each Option is exercisable to purchase one common share of the Company and are being issued pursuant to the terms of the Company’s Omnibus Plan, which became effective on June 2, 2022.
About High Tide
High Tide is the leading community-grown, retail-forward cannabis enterprise engineered to unleash the full value of the world’s most powerful plant. High Tide (HITI) is uniquely-built around the cannabis consumer, with wholly-diversified and fully-integrated operations across all components of cannabis, including: Bricks & Mortar Retail: Canna Cabana™ is the largest non-franchised cannabis retail chain in Canada, with 155 current locations spanning British Columbia, Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba and Ontario and growing. In 2021, Canna Cabana became the first cannabis discount club retailer in Canada.
