The commercial cannabis industry has experienced rapid growth in the last decade, but have the security solutions that keep the people and property safe within that industry grown alongside it? Retail dispensaries and grow farms experience unique security challenges that can be hard for traditional security solutions to solve, but Edgeworth Security’s comprehensive state of the art security solution, Remote Guarding, can be the answer to the unique needs of both grow operations and dispensaries.
Commercial cannabis remains a cash-heavy industry due to restrictions on traditional banking services available to legal cannabis-related businesses. These cash stores found at commercial cannabis facilities plus the high street value and concealable size of the cannabis products makes commercial cannabis sites uniquely vulnerable to theft, burglary, and robbery. This vulnerability to crime, including dangerous robberies, makes a proactive and highly effective security solution a necessity to protect the people and products of grow operations and dispensaries.
State governments also have strict regulations on the security of dispensaries and grow farms. However, even with security systems that meet these standards, commercial cannabis businesses are still plagued by burglaries and robberies.
Here are only a few examples of real crimes that have occurred throughout the country:
- A grow farm in Oregon was robbed, with the thieves taking 423 pounds of marijuana and 1,400 pounds of cannabis oil over the time period of three hours. The owner suspects the crime was a two-day operation, with the thieves casing out the farm on a Saturday, and breaking in on a Sunday. The owner was cooperating with police and asked the public to come forward if they had any additional information about the crime.
- A medical marijuana dispensary in Painesville, Fl was broken into, with suspects breaking through drywall and concrete to get at a vault containing both cash and product. It was later discovered that the suspects had cut the wires of the security alarm. The managers were notified of a loss of connection, but law enforcement was not called to the scene.
- Over one weekend, most of the dispensaries in Berkeley, San Francisco, and Oakland were robbed and vandalized in a spree committed by one or more large groups of armed men. Several facilities were stolen from multiple different times in that short period of time.
- Two Trulieve medical marijuana dispensaries in Florida were broken into by a trio of burglars. They entered the first location, stole an unknown quantity of inventory, and then drove to the second location and did the same thing. Police asked the public to contact them if they had any relevant information.
- An attempted armed invasion robbery at a Californian cannabis business resulted in an exchange of gunfire with the location’s armed security guards, and two of the business’ employees were hit in the crossfire. Tragically, one of the employees later died from her injuries.
- A dozen armed and masked men broke into a Californian cannabis facility and vandalized the location, grabbing several bags of marijuana at the same time. The on-duty guard locked himself in a room and called the police. The group fled when police arrived on the scene, and only three were caught as they attempted to flee. Detectives are working to identify the other suspects, as well as possibly connecting the crime to similar ones committed in the area.
While the security challenges that the commercial cannabis industry face are indeed great, Edgeworth Security offers a solution that can ensure the security of the property, product, and—most importantly—people that inhabit the industry. With Remote Guarding, Edgeworth Security is often able to stop a crime even before it happens.
With Smart Camera technology that monitors the property 24/7, Remote Guarding uses machine learning to identify the typical rhythms of the location to be better equipped to detect a deviation from the norm. When a deviation is detected, Remote Guarding’s artificial intelligence sends a digital alert to our highly trained security agents in our monitoring center, who immediately begin to manage the situation. They handle each and every alert with the utmost care, determining what actions are needed to bring the incident to the best possible conclusion, and immediately launch into action towards that conclusion.
If a live agent determines that there is illegal or unwanted activity occurring, they issue a Voice Down command, informing any unauthorized personnel that they are being watched and recorded; 93% of incidents end there with the intruder fleeing the property. In the rare cases that the Voice Down command does not succeed in scaring off the trespasser, law enforcement is notified of the incident and is able to apprehend the suspect 99% of the time, thanks to our relationships with local law agencies ensuring speedy response times.
Here are other ways Edgeworth Security can improve the safety of a site:
LOITERING
- When it comes to serious crimes of such nature, criminals often take the time to research and loiter around businesses they plan on stealing from to increase their chances of not getting caught. With Remote Guarding set in place, Edgeworth Security would not allow these criminals the chance to gather intel; as soon as they were marked as exhibiting unusual behavior, our live agents would have issued a direct Voice Down command to leave the property immediately. This tagging and addressing of loitering behavior could have prevented the incidents in Oregon, Florida, and California.
TRESPASSING
- Even where the robberies were opportunistic random events, Edgeworth Security could have changed the outcomes for those cases as well. Remote Guarding would have notified our monitoring center as soon as the criminals crossed over the beam of prohibited areas of the property. The monitoring center is also alerted when the system detects camera tampering or when power is cut to the system, allowing our agents to address the issue as soon as it happens. If Edgeworth had been partnered with the dispensary in Painesville, our agents would have called law enforcement immediately after the cameras were disconnected, and with our 99% apprehension rate, it is unlikely that the perpetrators would have escaped.
PEACE OF MIND
- Another benefit to Remote Guarding’s presence on the property is the peace of mind it offers to the people that inhabit those spaces: customers, employees, and owners alike. With a decrease in loiterers, people will feel safer walking into the property than before. Reliable employees will be more willing to stay if they feel they aren’t working in dangerous conditions. If Edgeworth Security had been present at the crimes sites described above, the people who got hurt may not have been.
While the commercial cannabis industry faces challenges unlike any other industry, Edgeworth Security is prepared to confront and overcome any and every security challenge your property comes up against. Remote Guarding has been proven to stop crime even before it occurs, something that traditional security systems cannot claim, even those that meet cannabis state security requirements. Edgeworth Security not only meets those strict state security requirements, but exceeds them. Edgeworth Security offers a high tech security system unlike any other, and with it, unparalleled peace of mind.
Contact one of our experts at 412-334-1961 to learn more about Edgeworth’s proactive, bespoke security solution.
