Since joining architecture firm RDC in 2019, principal Virginia Maggiore rapidly has expanded the firm’s retail store rollout and planning practice, helping multiple cannabis-sales license holders and direct-to-consumer retailers customize their physical stores and brand presentations. Maggiore, who has 20 years of retail real estate design and operations experience, spoke with Commerce + Communities Today editor-in-chief Amanda Metcalf and contributing editor Steve McLinden.

A lot of cannabis businesses, of course, are new retailers, right?

Yes, they’re chasing the green wave, but it can be a complex business to enter. I hit them with a lot of hard questions: Who’s your customer? What’s your experience? What will your transactions be like? What are you selling? How are you selling it? We need to incorporate these all into a store design.  We’ve developed some brands from scratch, but we’ve also taken one dispensary and created standards for multiples. This way, they’re not reinventing the wheel every time.

What about the look of the shops?

Brand identity is crucial. License holders generally want their cannabis shops to be nondescript with the right paint and colors. Exteriors can’t seem like they’re trying to attract minors. Gone are the days of that head-shop look with neon lights, glass cases and lottery tickets. You also need to account for the unique customer flow and lighting that go into these businesses. Owners must ask themselves how to set themselves apart as a brand if they’re selling the same products as someone down the street. The cannabis retailers often have an online presence already, so we’re charged with bridging that online-to-offline gap. It involves understanding their brand pillars and applying those in physical form.

When did you start designing cannabis shops?

I started after joining RDC at a time when many firms weren’t accepting this type of business. I had to work my way through a lot of unique regulations and nuances. But the more stores I designed, the deeper understanding I had of what’s involved, such as the security aspects, which are unique because this remains a cash business. We’ve designed approximately 15 dispensary locations with about three more in the works and many more pending license approvals. Those going into the cannabis space really need to find someone who knows all the hurdles and what they need to build into their plans. There’s a lot more to this besides just setting lines on paper. My retailers are happy that I have the kind of retail, design and brand experience to get their stores open.

When this business started coming to you, did you ever imagine it was going to grow so fast?

I did realize it could be a channel of my business indefinitely. I work with many other specialty retailers, and I’ve been in this business long enough to know the fundamentals are basically the same. Whatever you’re selling, it starts with the same foundation. Then you apply the other knowledge layers to the design and layout.

Is it unusual for someone in your specialty to have this kind of branding and advisory experience?

It is. Architects for most tenant improvements are typically just architects. They know building codes and how to get you a permit, but to really understand the business and full life cycle of a store is unique. It helps that I’ve managed everything from design conception to facility maintenance. I sure wouldn’t let a design team design anything into a store that would have to be fixed later. You also have to understand the budget and the chain of command and other things on the brand side.

What unique needs do cannabis stores have?

They need to know both what the police department requirements are and the local regulations are. These relationships are very different than, say, a restaurant’s relationship with the health department. All states and municipalities write their own legislation, and these can involve very subtle differences.  It’s time-consuming, but I study them carefully. If I miss one thing, it can hold up a license application. You may only get one shot. A city might be giving out 13 licenses and have 800 applicants.

Do regulations differ one police department to another?

Some want a buzzed entry after you show an ID so you’re not actually in the dispensary until you’re put there. In L.A., they take your ID when you’re already inside; they don’t require a separate lobby space. Some may also need a lobby at the back door so when staff or delivery drivers or anybody else arrives, there’s a separate, buzzed entry.

How much space do shops keep for sales floor versus the back of the house?

I compare it to shoe retailers, which have about a 50/50 split. Go into a Foot Locker, and you see one of every shoe displayed. Of course, a cannabis store isn’t able to put out products because of the law, so they need plenty of backroom storage. Most shops have a concierge service model with a digital menu. Back-of-the-house space also goes to management and security.

The New York recreational cannabis market is about to blow up. Are there similar markets?

New Jersey, which legalized it before New York, has been active. I’m getting more calls from New Jersey than ever, so I think it’s starting to shake there. But it takes a while, sometimes years, for every city to write their rules. Chicago is growing. Connecticut has legalized recreational cannabis, but they haven’t released any applications or legal language. Rhode Island is still just medical, but the two medical shops they have are doing incredible sales. It’s apparent recreational is going to do crazy business there. Not only is New York about to blow up, they’re making sure that equity license owners criminalized in the past for cannabis get first dibs on licenses. They’re also setting up dispensaries as generic spaces. They use state-owned real estate and state funds to build out dispensaries, then lease them in turnkey condition. You just come in with product, put a sign out and start operating. I think that’s brilliant, so different. The industry has had a big [capital] gap for smaller equity applicants, and this helps bridge that.

Doesn’t the turnkey approach take away your work?

(Laughs) I would love to be a part of the thought process of how to determine how to set up those stores and how to brand them, whether they need certain types of refrigeration, cases or shelves and so forth and how to set them up so they’re truly generic.

What other types of specialty retailers do you work with?

We have apparel, shoe and furniture companies. People typically come to me with a successful online brand, saying they want brick-and-mortar, but they don’t know what their physical presence would be. We have a workshop for them called Bridge Branding where we find out what’s important to them and to their customers, then relate that into a store aspect. We have a furniture retailer called Joybird that’s been a direct-to-consumer online brand only, now rolling out brick-and mortar locations. Joybird has been selling sectional couches online for years, but physical stores make sense for them. Personally, I won’t buy a couch online I haven’t sat on. They have that touch-and-feel aspect. You enter and sit down and see their fabric options, but they don’t have on-site inventory. We’re doing the same for a diamond company called Clean Origin. We developed their interior store design concept and started rolling out new stores across the country. I definitely see an uptick in online brands wanting physical stores as showroom that are branded customer touchpoints.

You must have to work with a variety of objectives, budgets and desires for all your client designs.

Yes, you have to determine if they want such things as marble, tile or polished concrete for flooring, what kind of square footage they want, if they want a mall or a street location; the latter has more variables. You need to know their ideal customer dwell time. Some shops want to get people in and out for more churn. Others want a community environment where customers can mosey around in a self-guided discovery experience. If I can learn their objectives early on, I’ll set up their spaces quite differently.

How important is the merging of online with offline for your clients?

It’s huge. If a consumer can get all their product online, you need to know why they’ll come to your store. Then there’s the hospitality aspect. Will customers get, for example, a special tote bag when they leave? Will you want to add a coffee bar that makes them feel like they’re hanging out? Will you be cross-branding? Do you want a brand activation space? Do you want to educate customers? We designed a fully functional cannabis grow room in a retail store in downtown L.A. called Artist Tree. There are educational graphics around the outside so customers can learn about the life cycle of the plants. They also dedicate part of their retail stores to gallery space, partnering with local artists to have rotating collections. This is the essence of their brand.