Cannabis-Infused Drinks are Here to Stay

As reported by a number of news outlets recently, Coca-Cola has announced their plans to expand their range of beverages to include CBD-infused concoctions. As the soft drink titan gears up for this exciting new chapter in their history, an existing player in the nascent CBD beverage market has spoken of the challenges of marketing drinks containing the cannabis extract.

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Health and Wellness

Coca-Cola is preparingto finalise their partnership with a Canadian cannabis company to develop a range of drinks containing CBD, a compound extracted from hemp of cannabis. Coca-Cola is hoping to market the drinks as part of a new health-and-wellness range.

CBD has already been linked with numerous health benefits, such as fighting pain, depression, and anxiety. In fact, the majority of cannabis’s now widely accepted health benefits are mediated via CBD. Unlike THC, the other main compound found in cannabis plants, CBD doesn’t induce any kind of high in the user. As a result, it is not regulated in the same way that THC, and the cannabis plants itself, are.

Love Hemp

However, Love Hemp, an existing brand of CBD-infused water, has highlighted the difficulties of marketing products in this space. While there is a growing body of accepted medical evidence of the numerous health benefits offered by CBD, the company is still unable to make any health claims about its products. Instead, they rely on the continuing positive coverage of CBD and the benefits it offers.

Despite the difficulties, Love Hemp has already gained an appreciable foothold in the UK market. It is sold by a number of major retailers, and many others have expressed an interest in stocking this novel beverage. While some consumers are still concerned by the connection CBD has to cannabis, Love Hemp’s products are produced from hemp rather than cannabis. Since hemp contains no THC, there is no chance of any traces making their way into their products.

Existing Products

As well as these CBD-infused drinks, CBD has also been available for some time in a number of other forms.The market for CBD oil UK is continuing to grow, helped by the multitude of products now available that contain the compound. These include e-liquids for vaporisers, CBD-infused foods, and topical oils.

With Coca-Cola now entering the fray, it seems all but certain that CBD products will be in the mainstream before long. The market for CBD beverages remains small and relatively niche, but the entry of the world’s largest drinks company into the market can only benefit it in the long run.

Proponents of CBD’s medical benefits will no doubt be delighted at this latest sign of growing acceptance of the substance. Whether this will translate into the kind of market growth that many are hoping for still remains to be seen. However, even without the entry of monolithic brands like Coca-Cola, strong market performance indicates that consumers are becoming more accepting of CBD-containing products.

With the medical benefits of cannabis now well established and, more importantly, widely accepted, there has never been a better time for CBD to flourish.