How the largest cannabis greenhouse in Arizona helped revamp Snowflake’s rural economy

SNOWFLAKE — As the sun rises across the White Mountains, many in northern Arizona are still trying to catch a few more hours of sleep.

But at Copperstate Farms, nearly 200 employees are already hard at work throughout the 40-acre cannabis greenhouse on the northwest side of Snowflake.

Workers dressed head to toe in personal protective equipment to safeguard their highly sensitive crop are busy at work monitoring the thousands of plants in the latest harvest and trimming the top-tier flower by hand to get it ready for sale.

Now eight years into operation, the greenhouse is the largest in the state and home to every aspect of growing and harvesting cannabis. With a process fine-tuned over the years, it now takes just about 140 days from when a seed is planted to when it reaches a consumer at an Arizona dispensary.

And the economic impact is clear, Snowflake town manager Brian Richards said.

“Over the last eight years our revenues have increased, our populations increased, our building has increased and Copperstate has been a part of that,” Richards told The Arizona Republic.

According to annual financial reports, local sales tax revenue for Snowflake increased just under 287% between 2016 and 2023. [Read More @ AZCentral.]