Cannabis SMS Marketing Rules in Canada

SMS is direct, immediate, and gets read, which makes it valuable for cannabis retailers who cannot run paid ads. It is also double-regulated: Canada's Anti-Spam Legislation (CASL) governs how you send, and the Cannabis Act governs what you say. Get either wrong and a quick text becomes a compliance problem.

This article is general information, not legal advice. Confirm your program with a qualified specialist.

CASL: how you are allowed to send

SMS marketing messages are commercial electronic messages under CASL, so the same core requirements apply:

• Express consent. Recipients must clearly opt in to receive texts from you. Keep a record of when and how they consented. Pre-checked boxes and assumed consent do not count.
• Identify yourself. Each message must make clear who it is from and include valid contact information.
• Easy unsubscribe. Provide a simple opt-out, typically replying STOP, and honour it promptly.

Age verification comes first

Cannabis promotion is only permitted to people of legal age. Build your SMS list only from customers you have age-verified, such as at point of sale or through an age-gated web form. An opted-in number is not enough on its own; it has to be an age-verified, opted-in number.

The Cannabis Act: what you are allowed to say

Once you are sending compliantly, the message content still has to follow cannabis promotion rules:

• No health or therapeutic claims.
• No testimonials or endorsements.
• Nothing appealing to young people.
• No glamorization or lifestyle framing.
• Caution with discounts and other inducements, which vary by province.

SMS makes this harder, not easier. Messages are short and punchy by nature, which is exactly where claims and lifestyle hooks slip in. "Feel better tonight, 20% off" packs a health implication and an inducement into six words.

Provincial considerations

As with every cannabis channel, provincial rules sit on top of the federal baseline, especially around discounts and promotions. Check your provincial regulator before sending anything that mentions price. See our complete guide to cannabis marketing compliance in Canada for how the layers fit together.

A compliant SMS checklist

1. Is every recipient age-verified and opted in with recorded consent?
2. Does the message identify your business?
3. Is there a working STOP-to-unsubscribe, honoured promptly?
4. Is the copy free of health claims and lifestyle hooks?
5. Are any promotions allowed in the recipient's province?

Keep both regimes satisfied

The fastest way to stay on the right side of CASL and the Cannabis Act is to generate SMS copy that follows the rules from the first draft, then scan it before it sends. Kannlicit does both, alongside consent-aware sending. See how cannabis content creation and the compliance checker work together, and read about the closely related email rules.