Market Matching: Why Live Resin’s Popularity Should Not Have Been A Surprise

These days, knowing the vape trends and patterns that are currently defining your market isn’t enough. Brands need to know where their markets are headed so they can anticipate trends and capitalize on them as they unfold.

Simply put, there’s never been a more pressing need for a service like Greentank’s Market Matching in our corner of the industry. Let’s look at how Market Matching can help, using vape extraction type market shares as an example.

When we first started offering this complimentary service to our partners in January 2020, distillate extracts accounted for approximately 2 out of every 3 cannabis vape products sold in the US. In distant second place were CO2 extracts with 17.1% of all vape unit sales and just on its heels were live resin products with 14.75% of the pie. Rounding out the remaining extract types at the time were BHO (butane hash oil), HTE (high-terpene extracts), and RSO (Rick Simpson Oil), whose combined unit sales made up roughly 1.6% of the market.

On the surface, this data might have signalled to brands that given its second-place standing, CO2 extracts were a strong play going forward. Data without context, however, can often be quite misleading and have disastrous effects if acted upon without careful and thorough consideration.

A deeper dive into this category would have revealed that despite accounting for a record-high 3.1m sold units in 2019, the market share of CO2 units had actually decreased to 17.1% from 25.6% in 2018. That trend continued in 2020, with the number of CO2 units sold across all US markets surpassing the 4.7m mark but its market share further declining to 13.1%. In 2021, it’s been more of the same. CO2 extracts have fallen below 10% market share for the first time and run a serious risk of becoming obsolete in the next few years.

On the flip side, the data would have also shown that live resin products, although ranked third in terms of unit sales at the time, were poised to make a big leap in the cannabis vape space. Not only had the amount of live resin unit sales in the US tripled in 2019 from its 2018 totals, its market share had also vaulted by 6 points to 14.75% of all vape sales. Most brands that identified this trend and acted accordingly did extremely well in 2020, as the amount of live resin units sold quadrupled from 2019 and its market share spiked to 26%! As anticipated, both metrics are on the rise once again in 2021.

That’s not to say that live resin vape products are a sure-fire play for any brand in every market. Every market is unique with its own set of vape sale trends and consumer interests.

In California and Pennsylvania, for instance, live resin products are immensely popular, currently accounting for 27.5% and 24.9%, respectively, of all vape products sold. In California, that percentage is up from 17.3% last year; in Pennsylvania, it’s down from 29.5%.

And yet, Pennsylvania is the only US market we track where the market share of live resin products has gone down since 2020.

In Oregon, live resin products have increased to 22.4% of the market from 15.9% a year ago. In Nevada, they’ve vaulted to 16.8% from 7.6%. Even in Colorado, Michigan and Washington, where live resin extracts made up less than 10% of all vape sales last year, the popularity of the category is up at least 2%. A small sample size, to be sure, but an interesting note nonetheless!

Savvy brands—especially those operating in CA, PA, OR and NV—would be wise to take notice and do their due diligence. If you find the above insights useful, think about what other crucial market insights you might be missing out on.

There’s a world of vape data out there that goes beyond extraction types. Contact us today to book your Market Matching consultation or to speak with one of our industry and product experts, and we’ll break it all down for you.