20 Years of CHAMPS By Malcolm MacKinnon
When you get to the show or if you’re there already... Look around, folks, take it in!
A Retrospective
This is the fifty-fifth trade show mounted by CHAMPS and the fortieth staged here in Las Vegas. Hundreds of businesses are represented in a space that encompasses 245,000 square feet, the area of four and a half football fields! The marketplace is booming and CHAMPS is proud to have backed the cannabis business community for two solid decades. No trade show is older and, certainly, no event associated with the use of cannabis can equal its rate of growth. In truth, CHAMPS is the unsung success story of our industry. Of course, being “unsung” was a conscious business decision. Twenty years ago, sherlock pipes, one-hitters, bongs, hand pipes and the like were as demonized as cannabis, courtesy of a 1994 Supreme Court decision (Posters 'N' Things, Ltd. v. United States), a ruling that still stands today. The Court rendered ceramic, metal and glass pipes—even rolling papers—all “drug paraphernalia” these items, commonly found in head shops, were deemed designed for use with illegal drugs. In other words, the pipe itself has “intent,” not the user. It didn’t matter that this illegal paraphernalia could also 52
Bongs by Sphinx at Luxor - Space Glass - March ‘02
CHAMPS SHOW MAGAZINE
