I recently opened an eighth package of flower and immediately noticed something off: much less bud than I expected. I took it straight back to my balance, and weighed the contents at 2.53 g – nearly a full gram off from 3.5 g, the nominal value for an eighth of weed. I was shocked.

I have tested a lot of flower in Mass, and never found a package so light. When I posted about it on social media, a representative from the cannabis brand quickly reached out for more information, but I also learned of someone else who cares about light packs of weed.

The National Council on Weights and Measures is a professional nonprofit that sets commercial standards. They have a Cannabis Task Group, and they want to hear from consumers who have complaints. To quote their initial response, “Weights and measures officials take a very simplistic approach to complaints of short-weight cannabis products. They treat it no differently than any other consumer product.”

To learn more, I spoke with Don Orwiler, Executive Director of NCWM. Orwiler is from Nebraska, and admits he doesn’t know much about cannabis himself, but he gave me some great background on the organization’s engagement with this market. He also told me, “I’ve heard there are a lot of discrepancies in that space.”

We discussed the process consumers should follow if they receive an underweight product. The NCWM is a national organization of weights and measure officials, with jurisdictional agreements in most states. On their website, one may scroll way down to the “State Directors Contact” window, select one’s state from the dropdown menu, and get the name and email of their local director. That’s whom they should contact to file their complaint.

When describing the consumer experience, be sure to share details such as the place and date of purchase, the brand, and batch numbers so that the incident can be traced to its source. It’s also important to note whether you contacted the company, and how they responded to the complaint.

NCWM will send package inspectors to investigate complaints. Their agreements with states typically grant them authority to analyze and open pre-packaged goods to determine accuracy, which sometimes exceeds the power of local officials. The usual procedure is to determine the weight of the package, then weigh many without opening them to avoid unnecessary destruction of product. A representative number of samples is determined based on the size of the lot, and samples are selected at random.

For plant materials such as cannabis, a moisture allowance of 3% has been set for individual packages, but the total weight of all packages must be up to snuff. Since properly cured cannabis flower should have a moisture content within a narrow range of just a few percent points, this allowance can account for any changes from drying.

If any package varies from the nominal weight by more than the moisture allowance, or the total weight of them all is short, the entire lot fails the inspection. The consequences for the producers can be as significant as destruction of the lot, a powerful disincentive for consumer fraud.

Orwiler was more familiar with deli-style cannabis service than with prepackaged goods, and told me NCWM is working on standards for the scales in that marketplace right now. For the time being, states set their own criteria, and NCWM can investigate whether a scale in a dispensary has the necessary precision and accuracy.

He also noted that investigations of cannabis are, in some ways, simpler than those in other markets. Because of the restrictions on interstate commerce, “We know it was packaged in that state.” 

I was relieved to learn of authorities that investigate light-weight cannabis packages, even if we don’t yet enjoy the same protection for failures of product quality. According to NCWM, an underweight package of weed “should be handled the same way as a short-weight box of corn flakes. File a complaint with the state Weights and Measures authority to do some package inspections.”

You can learn more about NCWM and find your state director by visiting www.ncwm.com