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Last Updated: Thursday, October 1, 2026 at 07:06 PM
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Up in Smoke: First Retail Licenses for Marijuana Distributed in Denver

Pot will be sold, legally, for recreational use. This isn't a joke.

Something that might really blow your mind, man: Marijuana will be sold legally in the U.S.

The place? Denver. The city's Department of Excise and Licenses issued more than 40 retail licenses to cannabis growers and certain shop owners. They can start legally selling pot for recreational use to people age 21 and older starting on Jan. 1, 2014.

Colorado's Marijuana Enforcement Division has approved 348 marijuana business licenses in the state but many won't be open on Jan. 1 due to local licensing requirements, the Associated Press reports.

If you own a business in Colorado, don't immediately panic that your workers will be showing up stoned. State laws give employers the right to have any type of drug policy they choose. In other words, if your new hire waltzes in on Wednesday stoned out of his mind, or if he fails a drug test, you have the ability to fire that person if being high on marijuana is against your office policies.

While penalizing employees for using legal substances outside the workplace might seem unjust, for now "employers hold all the cards," Curtis Graves, a staff attorney for the Mountain States Employers Council, said in

Related: Should Your Salary Be Made Public?