Most cannabis operators don’t lose money because of one catastrophic failure. They lose it slowly — through small, structural decisions that compound over time.
One of the most common examples? Dry room capacity.
In a recent conversation between Tyler Bartosh of Spire Insurance Solutions and Max Jackson of Cannabis Wise Guys, Max explained how often cultivation facilities are built around optimistic assumptions rather than real operational constraints. On paper, the math looks clean: harvest every X days, dry for Y days, repeat. In reality, post-harvest processes rarely move that smoothly.
Dry rooms don’t just hold product — they control your entire harvest calendar. When those rooms are undersized, operators are forced to choose between:
- Pulling plants early
- Letting flower sit too long
- Overlapping harvests in ways that strain staff and quality
None of these decisions are ideal, and over time they quietly erode yield, consistency, and revenue.
The issue isn’t effort or expertise. It’s planning around best-case scenarios instead of operational reality.
Strong facility design starts by mapping the full year — not just harvest day. That includes drying time, cleaning cycles, labor availability, and inevitable delays. When facilities are built to absorb friction instead of assuming perfection, operators gain flexibility instead of stress.
From a risk perspective, these bottlenecks matter because they reduce margin for error. When something goes wrong — equipment failure, staffing issues, environmental swings — facilities with tight constraints absorb the damage far worse than those built with buffer and foresight.
Thoughtful design isn’t just about efficiency. It’s about resilience.
Watch Tyler’s and Max’s full conversation that’s packed with insights and top-tier knowledge about the cannabis industry below:
