If you want to take advantage of Canada's legalization of pot, but don't want to then get behind the wheel, Conrad Floyd has an offer for you - whether American, Canadian or tourist from somewhere else.
Floyd has purchased and is renovating an old and worn hotel on Lundy's Lane in Niagara Falls, ON into a luxury place to get stoned. He said the hotel will eventually have wide-screen TVs, comfortable beds and pot as a gift to visitors. He has no license to sell.
The hotelier said he knows the concept works.
"I tried this kind of thing in Hamilton. I had a few empty apartments and I redid them and furnished them and I made them cannabis friendly and I put them on Airbnb and they booked immediately," he said, "and right away the light bulb went off and it was just like, okay, I need 30-40 more of these units."
Seeing a market, he started the plan to renovate what will be called the Pink Elephant Inn when it opens in a few months. While Americans seem likely customers to avoid border customs, Floyd said Canadians will also.
"To spend the weekend and they can't smoke in their hotel rooms. They gotta go outside and smoke. They can't smoke in the bar. It's basically enforced exactly like tobacco is right now, right?" he said. "So I wanted a place where people can be in their hotel room, lying in their bed watching Netflix and smoking cannabis or ingesting cannabis, however they would at home."
Floyd said he is also working on an alternative to driving while high.
"We're trying to actually work a deal with an electric bike company, so that with your room, you would actually get an electric bike to encourage people not to drive while they're ingesting cannabis," Floyd said.
Floyd said the Province of Ontario will be offering more licenses to sell legal weed and he is applying.
