New Loan is most likely for new Farm-Gate Retail LocationAfter reading through the Ontario Government's changes to the application process that they released on December 12, 2019, it now makes sense why JWCA secured that financing so quickly after stating they were on course for profitability. The Ontario government will begin accepting Retail Operator Licenses including from Licensed Cannabis Producers on January 6, 2020. (1 Week Away!)
There website states that "Note that the first application received will not necessarily be the first issued as a number of factors determine the length of processing, including application deficiencies, the number of interested parties to be reviewed, the applicant’s responsiveness in providing required information, and the extent of the due diligence investigation."
This tells me that licensed cultivators will most likely be at the top of the list for meeting the AGCO's Criteria, so JWCA will have a solid application with adequate staff on hand to ensure it meets the AGCO's strict requirements. As well, KW is severely underserviced with still no Licensed retailers opened as of yet, which makes it even more important to grant them an application ASAP.
The next step will be the Retail Store Application, which opens on March 2, 2020 with the first Store Authorizations from this open application process expected to be issued beginning in April, at an initial rate of approximately 20 per month.
This means JWCA will have approximately 4 months to get this store built and operational to be open within the next 4-5 months. Im thinking this additional loan is designed to ensure they are not diverting funds from the other loan they recieved to help make this hapen and ensure it can open as quickly as possible.
Here is a good link to their AGCO's press release regarding farm-gate stores.
https://news.ontario.ca/mag/en/2019/12/ontario-opening-cannabis-retail-market.html?utm_source=CannabisIQ&utm_medium=Email&utm_campaign=Dec14