Should you tip your budtender?

Anyone who has spent time waiting tables or tending bar knows that tips are an indispensable part of your income, and the stress of a busy shift can be eased or exacerbated depending on how readily your customers tip. I’ve spent the last two years living the classic combination of freelance writer by day and waiter at a local restaurant by, well, another time of day. It would appear I am in good company, as the Bureau of Labor Statistics estimates that the entire service industry employed 104 million Americans in November of this year.

Not all service jobs are created equal, though. I was never tipped during my years working retail in college, nor did I ever expect to be—and the BLS statistics include a lot of jobs under the “service” umbrella that don’t traditionally rely on tipping. But one gray area is Nevada’s newest service industry, recreational marijuana, where customers are served by specialists who know their products inside out. So, when paying for your pot, should you tip your budtender?

The view from behind the counter

“I actually worked front desk reception at an oncology clinic,” said Alise Corbin, who first started as a budtender at Sierra Wellness Connection five months ago, not long after the July 1 kickoff of recreational sales. “My experience came from a customer service background versus knowing so much about the cannabis industry. Not that I didn’t have knowledge before, but it’s not like you can really have job experience in the industry if you’re in Nevada previous to July.”

Corbin likens her job to both that of a bartender and knowledgeable retail associate. As she interacts one-on-one with customers, she is required to provide personalized information on the effects and prices of different marijuana strains. Tipping, she said, is a way to supplement her the time she spends learning and relaying that information.

Corbin said that customers have questions about the products themselves, and about the feeling that each product is likely to provide.

“They’ll tip for that, because they know that it takes time to get that knowledge and really understand people and what they feel,” she said.

Corbin believes her primary responsibility is “selling a feeling.” To do that, she helps customers sort through a dizzying number of strains and to understand the organic compounds called terpenes, which yield various aromas and effects. There’s also the matter of how each strain of cannabis might interact with each individual’s brain chemistry. She said that understanding the needs of a patient or buyer within a few minutes of meeting them can be the most difficult part of her job.

“Everyone’s body is different,” said Corbin. “So we have to do additional research to be like, ’OK, somebody with PTSD, maybe not sativas.’ Even though I personally might do well with sativas, somebody whose mind is racing—they might not do well.”

In the restaurant world, the idea of “selling an experience” is an important part of the equation. Customers don’t just tip for the food. They tip based on the entire experience, including thing like the speed of service and the server’s attentiveness. The biggest difference between traditional serving jobs and budtending, however, is the rate of pay.

“It’s above minimum wage, but hours are finicky,” Corbin said. She said she doesn’t always know in advance how many hours she’ll get or what her schedule will be like.

Most servers in Nevada are paid the state-level minimum wage of $8.25 an hour, and rely on tips to supplement that income. At the restaurant where I serve, the management staff is less inclined to keep a server on the clock if business is slow, meaning that your daily hourly wage can vary considerably—and your tips can be the difference between paying your rent on time or begging for an extension.

Possible complications

In states where marijuana has been legal for some time, the idea of tipping budtenders has raised concerns about the customer service dynamic at play. In 2016, Jake Browne, a staff writer for The Cannabist, an extension of The Denver Post, argued against tipping budtenders, intoning that it creates a pay-to-play scenario where those who can afford to tip will receive better service than, say, chemotherapy patients.

“Employees would rather work the recreational side of a med/rec store if there’s more tip revenue there,” Browne wrote. “That leaves less qualified or tenured staffers to take care of people who truly need marijuana for medical reasons.”

Browne’s ultimate point, however, is that tipping budtenders creates an environment in which it acceptable to underpay them—a scenario we servers are familiar with—and that the marijuana industry is profitable enough to provide living wages for it’s employees.

Another article written by Lisa Rough on the popular cannabis forum Leafly.com states that tipping should be considered a bonus, as opposed to an obligation, and should be based on how helpful you feel your budtender was instead of the dollar amount spent—in contrast to the 15-to-20 percent customary at restaurants.

Still, Corbin estimates that about 75 percent of her customers do tip. She said that any tips collected are distributed among employees doing equally important work who may not interact with customers face to face—like intake workers or office staff. And while she considers her tips a crucial part of her monthly budget, she believes tips are indicative of how well she does her job.

“It’s not just a dollar value,” Corbin said. It’s—did I do well today? Did I service my community in the way I was supposed to? And, in a way, money kind of reflects that—sadly.”

Being seen as a knowledgeable professional is as important to Corbin as making her paycheck, and tipping is perhaps a concrete way of having her expertise acknowledged. As buying marijuana has moved away from backrooms and parking-lot deals, where variety was usually the least of a buyer’s concerns, Corbin knows that you probably wouldn’t tip your dealer. But that’s not what she is.

“Every budtender is out there to break the stigma that pot is just for stoners and people that want to get high,” Corbin said. “It’s something that needs to be said that we’re not just dope dealers. This is actual medicine that helps people.”