Cannabis vendor diligence — when to fire a vendor, when to keep them

Price is one signal among six. A vendor who’s 8% cheaper but a 65% fill-rate is more expensive than the 8%-higher vendor at 95% fill, because the gap between ‘ordered’ and ‘received’ is what the operator pays for in stockouts.

1. 1Reference check 3 active operators. Not the vendor’s suggested ones — operators YOU pick from the WSLCB / OLCC public licensee list. Ask: fill rate over the last 12 weeks? COA timing? Last 3 stockouts — communication on each? Recall in the last 12 months — how did they handle it?
2. 2Their last recall. If they’ve been in business >3 years, they’ve had at least one recall. If they say ‘no, never’ — either they’re lying or they’re a brand-new operator. Either way, dig.
3. 3Their COA process. Who’s the lab? How long between harvest and lab? Do they retain the COA URL on the manifest, or hand-attach to email? Ask for a sample COA from their most recent lot.
4. 4Their account-rep tenure. ‘How long has my rep been with you?’ If the answer is <6 months, expect rep-churn pain in the first 12 months of the relationship.
5. 5Their wholesale-portal demo. Have them walk you through the buyer-side portal as if you were placing an order. The sophistication of the portal is the floor of how organized they are operationally.
6. 6Their cancellation terms. If you need to fire them in 60 days, what does that actually look like? Is there a contract minimum? Are there carry-over invoice obligations? Get this in writing before the first PO.

1. 1Fill rate < 80% for 4 consecutive weeks. Not one-off shorts (those happen). Sustained miss = systemic issue, not seasonal. Vendor either fixes the cause or you fire.
2. 2Recall handled badly. Operator finds out from WSLCB before the vendor calls. Lot list arrives 48+ hours after the recall starts. Disposal documentation incomplete. Per /guides/cannabis-recall-handling-first-four-hours: the recall response IS the diligence test. Failing it is a fire-on-spot.
3. 3Lab-fail re-test pattern. Vendor’s product fails post-shipment lab re-test (yours or downstream). One failure is bad luck; two in 6 months is a process problem at the vendor. Three is a fire.
4. 4Account-rep churn + replacement quality drop. New rep doesn’t know your account, doesn’t answer in 24h, mis-bills the wrong store. The vendor’s back-office is signaling. Often this is the early warning before the vendor itself shuts down or gets bought.

• Document the trigger. Activity log with dates, fill-rate numbers, recall-response timestamps. WSLCB doesn’t care about vendor disputes but a documented audit trail protects you in any downstream claim.
• Settle outstanding invoices first. Don’t fire mid-payment-cycle. Pay what you owe; clean break. Cannabis B2B is a small community + the next vendor will hear about an unpaid balance.
• Phone call + email confirmation. Phone first (relationship). Email same day with the cancellation in writing (legal). Cite the trigger but don’t litigate it — ‘The relationship isn’t a fit for our shop’ is enough.
• Pull from menu within 48 hours. Out-of-relationship product on the floor is a customer-experience risk if there’s any unresolved quality concern. Sell-through OR consign back to the vendor; don’t hold past the cancellation date.
• Update vendor-portal SSO + revoke access. Per /guides/cannabis-data-discipline-cybersecurity, terminate the vendor-portal credential the same day. Vendor reps should not have ongoing read access to your data after the relationship ends.