BATON ROUGE — Traffic was backed up Friday morning on both O'Neal Lane and Interstate 12 Exit 7 going westbound as a line of hundreds of cars formed in anticipation of the opening of a new medical marijuana dispensary.

Lines formed around the corner and around 2,000 people gathered in the neighboring AMC Baton Rouge 16 movie theater's parking lot for legal marijuana or discounted medical cards at the new dispensary, Cookies located at 1940 O’Neal Lane. 

The store opened Friday in partnership with Capitol Wellness Solutions, Baton Rouge's sole distributor of legal marijuana. Cookies is an internationally recognized brand in medical cannabis sales. With the Baton Rouge store, Cookies reaches 77 worldwide locations.

The company was founded in 2010 by Billboard-charting rapper and entrepreneur Berner, who was at the opening of the O'Neal Lane store with a DJ and retail tents.

“Anywhere the markets open up, we want to be there,” Berner, whose real name is Gilbert Milam Jr., said. “It made complete sense to move forward with this.”

The grand opening event, which started at 10 a.m., also saw doctors on hand to issue medical cards to people with conditions such as anxiety, depression, chronic pain and insomnia at a discounted fee of $25, Capitol Wellness said. According to Capitol Wellness CEO Randy Mire, the average price for a medical card is $49. 

Mire, who founded Capitol Wellness as the first dispensary in the state in 2019, said that medical marijuana can be a safe alternative to pain and sleeping pills, adding that smoking isn't the only way to feel the effects.

"Many people that want to smoke, it's because of the onset of action. It helps them relieve their anxiety so quickly, it helps them get a good night's sleep if they use a vape device. But we have some patients who say we don't want to do that, we just want to take a gummy before bedtime," Mire said.

As of August 2020, any Louisiana licensed medical doctor in good standing with the state Board of Medical Examiners may recommend medical marijuana to their patients. Mire said it's easy to sign up for a card even after the event, pointing potential customers to their website.

“I love how he wants to continually bring awareness to the medical marijuana program, and that was a big thing for Louisiana to be able to educate patients and for them to see a brand that they recognize to join the program,” Mire said.

All of the products at the store will feature marijuana grown at Good Day Farms, which has operations in Ruston and Baton Rouge. A recently signed law reallocated the state's two medical marijuana growing licenses to be given to two private growers, including Good Day.

For most of the industry's history, Louisiana's medical marijuana was grown exclusively at LSU and Southern University through partnerships with these private companies.

Capital Wellness' partnership with the brand expands Baton Rouge's medical marijuana distribution to a second location, with Capital Wellness operating another dispensary on Picardy Avenue. A third Capitol Wellness location is set to open in Gonzales on Airline Highway.