As marijuana for recreational use is legalized in more states, the cannabis industry will try to shed the stoner image that pot has developed over the years and try to appeal to a wider range of potential customers. The best strategy is probably to go where the money is.

That’s the strategy of an Aspen, Colorado-based company that makes and sells a package of 10 professionally made marijuana cigarettes for $85. The company is called Toast and its new cigarettes are called Slice.

More than 90% of marijuana’s psychoactive ingredient THC is removed from the cigarettes and the company hopes that older and wiser (and richer) users will choose a slight buzz over a stoned haze.

Toast co-founder and CEO Punit Seth told the New York Post:

You don’t get couch lock with our product. Each puff is like having a sip of champagne, and a complete cigarette is like having a generous glass of wine.

Toast isn’t the only company that is going after older, more affluent customers. The Post notes a Colorado edibles firm named Beboe that sells pot-infused gummi candies for $1 apiece and $60 vaporizers and another firm, AuBox, that sells a $150 mail-order box of cannabis-related items. AuBox even offers a box-of-the-month subscription.

We wrote earlier this year about a beer company that strips all the THC out of cannabis and includes the cannabidiol in its product. The beer has been approved for national distribution by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

Well-heeled cannabis consumers are an obvious target for marketing and sales. Once pot is available legally — and provided it is not way over-priced compared with black market pot — the affluent pot buyer is more likely to buy from a legal outlet and be willing to pay for the convenience. It’s a brave new world out there.

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