Clear Chronic is another cart brand that we see making the rounds in THC vaping culture. It appears to be a bogus brand that’s nothing but packaging. There doesn’t seem to be any regulated, licensed company behind it. Yet it’s as prolific as any other black market brand we’ve found.

Clear Chronic cartridges flood the market

Questions about them come up all the time:

• Reddit oilpen, one year ago
• Reddit oilpen, two years ago
• Reddit weed, 10 months ago
• Reddit oilpen, 8 months ago
• Reddit oilpen, one year ago
• Reddit fake cartridges, 7 months ago
• Reddit oilpen, one year ago

That last post contains a comment linking to a lab test result. If you scan in that QR code, however, SCLabs will say that “the owner has marked the results as private” and only say that the test was performed on 10/24/2017. Remind me to complain about this later.

Clear Chronic is being advertised online

Here is one person in Lynchburg, VA, on LeafedIn, which is becoming a mighty questionable site in general. Here is another site with Clear Chronic, this one claiming it’s by “Full Spectrum Concentrate Labs.” That sounds like it should be a legit company, and yet a quick Google reveals this very page as the sole source of the full quoted phrase. And this online seller includes Clear Chronic in its products.

One thing we can’t find is a licensed, registered, above-the-counter dispensary selling Clear Chronic carts.

Clear Chronic packaging notes

Some carts appear to have alternative packaging. One online seller identifies a product as “Clear Chronic – Banana Train Wreck” while showing this packaging shot that looks familiar:

That’s because it resembles the Coco Chanel logo, which is also used by another black market brand we’ve covered before: California Confidential. But note the packaging is the long, thin box design which Clear Chronic has kept, while California Confidential typically comes in short, squat packaging. On the other hand, the name “Clear Chronic”

Note the final “C” in the name is reversed, signaling a connection to the former (?) Coco-Chanel logo. This could all be a coincidence, or it could be a clue that there’s a connection between these two brands. When we speak of brands being “related,” we mean they could have been both invented by the same packaging printer in China.

Black market cart brands that are packaging-only show this inbred tendency to half-copy each other, knock-offs of knock-offs. Witness the infamous and chaotic Runtz “brand,” which cross-breeds with other street brands including Chronic Carts, which could also be related to Clear Chronic.

There are dozens of social media accounts all claiming to be the Clear Chronic brand

Who is Clear Chronic?

• This Facebook account whose “about” section is blank?
• This Instagram account which posts the same bogus lab result mentioned previously?
• Or this ClearChronic420 Instagram account?
• What about the “official” Instagram Clear Chronic?
• Of course “official” Instagram accounts always come in twos!

There’s all that and much more lurking behind the #clearchronic tag on Instagram. In fact, Chronic Carts are synonymous enough with black market brands that the same tag also fetches images for Dank, TKO, Boom, Mario Carts, and other street makes of cartridge.

Complaining later: I’m sick and tired of seeing “private” lab tests!

Getting back to what I wanted to complain about later, this practice of misleading lab results is the most vexing part of the unregulated cartridge epidemic. Why do testing labs even allow this? What is the point?

Cannabis safety testing labs need to require testing agents to declare – AHEAD OF TIME – whether they want the results private or not. Then mark that ON THE PAGE, so we don’t have to run and fetch a QR code and go to a website and then find a door slammed in our face.

As it stands, lab result sheets get pasted on Instagram, the average phone user sees a screenshot and concludes “yup, all good!” That’s the purpose that black market brands have for posting a lab test sheet with the testing party’s information removed, and with the results marked “private.” Most of the time the page is even clearly edited. That’s what the QR code is FOR, is to verify that the page has not been altered.

This is a matter of public safety and health, which is the whole reason we have cannabis product testing facilities to begin with. When you release a page with a QR code and then don’t let people see the results behind the QR code, you just helped spread a lie.

Unlicensed, unregulated brands like Clear Chronic may contain anything

There is a deadly epidemic of lung illness tied to black market cart usage. Vaping-associated pulmonary injury has so far claimed 42 lives and hospitalized more than 2000 users. Unregulated vape carts could contain heavy metals like lead, pesticides, cut such as Honey Cut, or simply bunk. Or they could be fire if you’re lucky. But a lot of people in the hospital right now weren’t lucky.

If anybody has more information on where these are circulating, please feel free to help us protect public safety by sharing it with the community here in the comments or in our forum.