What actually happens on a first dispensary visit

You get ID'd at the door, every time

Not at the register — at the entrance, before you are in the room. California requires licensed retailers to verify age before admitting anyone, so the check happens on the way in and it happens on every visit, regardless of how old you look or how often you come.

Bring a government-issued photo ID showing you are 21 or over: a driver's licence, a state ID card or a passport. A photo of one on your phone is not accepted. If you are 18 to 20 with a physician's recommendation or a state medical ID card, bring that as well as your ID.

The counter conversation is the point

Once inside, someone will ask what you are after. That question is doing real work, and vague answers get vague results. Useful things to say:

• Whether you have used cannabis before, and recently.
• How you want to take it — smoke, vape, eat, drink, apply.
• How long you want it to last, and whether you need to function afterwards.
• What you spent last time, if there was a last time.

Nobody behind a California counter is allowed to make health claims about a product, and a shop that does is breaking the rules it operates under. What they can do is tell you what a product is, how strong it is, and what other people report about it. That is a genuinely useful conversation if you let it be one.

Your purchase gets checked against the daily limit

California caps what one person can buy in a day, and the retailer's system applies that cap at the point of sale. If a basket goes over, it is flagged before payment. Our guide to California purchase limits has the actual figures.

Payment is the awkward part

Cannabis remains federally illegal, which keeps most of the ordinary banking rails closed to the industry. In practice that means payment options are narrower than at a normal shop and can change; debit and cash arrangements vary by store and over time. Check what your store takes before you set out rather than at the till.

Then it is sealed, and you leave

Your purchase goes into a sealed exit bag. Keep it sealed until you are home — an opened container in the passenger area of a car is an infraction in California, which our guide on driving home with what you bought covers properly.

If you would rather skip most of the above, order ahead: the basket is built before you arrive and the visit becomes an ID check and a handover. Find your nearest store to see what each one stocks.