At 3 p.m. on Saturday, Sept. 28, Will Leibee will open the new Back Home Cannabis Dispensary that will legally be selling cannabis on the corner of Routes 213 and 209, Main Street in Stone Ridge.

It’ll be the fourth legal cannabis dispensary to open in Ulster County. The others are Big Gas in New Paltz, Royal Blend in Rosendale and a storied dispensary in the Town of Ulster called Etain, which first opened as a women-owned medical dispensary in 2016 and then was sold in 2023 to RIV Capital who converted it into a recreation dispensary.

Back Home Dispensary has gone through its own journey. It’s an offshoot of Back Home Farm, a successful USDA-certified organic farm run by Leibee on the old Boices dairy farm on Lucas Turnpike alongside the Rondout Creek. Leibee opened the farm in 2018 to grow vegetables for sale in restaurants and farmers’ markets sprawling from Manhattan’s Union Square to Saugerties and Woodstock, as well as the High Falls food coop.

In 2020 Leibee obtained a cultivator license to grow marijuana on Back Home Farm. In 2022, this was extended to cannabis and last month he was granted a microbusiness license allowing him to grow and process cannabis, and to open a dispensary selling the product.

Leibee teamed up with another local farmer, Kira Kinney of Evolutionary Organics of New Paltz, to purchase additional farm lands for growing both vegetables and cannabis, and the pair built a new building to house a dispensary and other retail services at the corner of Route 209 and Lucas Turnpike. Leibee said the building “will likely open to the public in a couple of years.”

According to Leibee, in December 2022 a Back Home cannabis product called Gorilla Glue was the first to be sold in New York State’s first legal cannabis dispensary, Housing Works in Manhattan. Last year, while waiting out approval to open its dispensary, Back Home Farms created the Kingston Cannabis Showcase, the first show of its kind to legally sell cannabis in Ulster County.

Saturday’s grand opening, said Leibee, will have music “along with many surprises.” Leibee is hoping that the first legal buyer of cannabis in New York State, Brooklyn’s Kens Woodin, who purchased that Gorilla Glue back in 2022, will be in attendance.

“We'll be rolling out a lot of new products in the future, and work hard every day to stay at the forefront of the industry,” commented Leibee. “For starters, this weekend we're opening up with 20-plus varieties of flower, vapes, pre-rolls, and edibles – something for everyone.”

The dispensary prices, said Leibee, “some products are less expensive than those found in commercial dispensaries that don’t grow or process their product.” Back Home Dispensary’s products will be extensive and, in addition to their own products, will include some directly sourced from an assortment of top tier NY growers and producers.

“It was a bit of a rush putting the dispensary together in the last few weeks when we got our license in August,” said Leibee last weekend. This was after putting the Back Home Cannabis Dispensary sign up so the Office of Cannabis Management in Albany could hopefully view it before the weekend and approve the opening. That approval came through at the last minute, on Thursday night before the opening.

The carefully laid-out store displays multiple wall photographs showcasing the so-far short but unique history of Back Home’s role in the New York cannabis industry.

There will be no human security guards, product menus will be virtual, and there’ll be three cashier stands.

New products from different producers will continue to arrive over the next few weeks, said Leibee. “Our plans are to stay a small family farm without any Wall Street or investor ownership. Cannabis is best served fresh, local, high quality and grown with love.”

Back Home Cannabis Dispensary is located at 3056 Route 213 alongside the Marbletown Animal Hospital. The store will be open 11 a.m. until 8 p.m. seven days a week. Telephone ordering and a delivery system will commence in a couple of weeks, said Leibee. Cash or debit cards (no credit cards) can be used. Visit the Back Home Instagram for their latest offerings: @back_home_farm.