Denver airport bans pot-themed souvenir sales

DENVER -- Visitors to the Mile High City will have to leave Denver International Airport before picking up marijuana-themed souvenirs.

Airport officials earlier this month banned the sale of pot-themed merchandise at DIA's shops after merchants began offering T-shirts and other items that officials felt were crossing the line from clever to overt.

Well before the state legalized recreational marijuana sales a year ago, Colorado vendors sold T-shirts making oblique jokes about "the entire town being high."

Those kinds of shirts will remain on sale, said airport spokesman Heath Montgomery. The ban covers explicitly marijuana-themed items.

"DIA is certainly a gateway to Denver and Colorado and the Rocky Mountain West, and we don't want marijuana to be the first thing people experience when they arrive," Montgomery said. "There's a lot more to our state than marijuana."

The DIA ban extends to items such as shirts and hats bearing cannabis leaves, or the actual word "marijuana." It exempts newspapers and newsmagazines, Montgomery said.

"A picture of a pot leaf on a T-shirt would not be allowed, but people are creative ... and they will find ways to express that innuendo," he said. "People will be creative, and people will skirt the rules."

The airport already offers informational brochures explaining the laws surrounding recreational marijuana sales -- tourists cannot buy as much as residents, and public consumption is prohibited -- and also bins where departing fliers can throw away unwanted marijuana when leaving.

The ban on marijuana-themed souvenirs is the latest twist in Colorado's ongoing legalization process. DIA is home to multiple bars and celebrates the state's craft-brewing culture. But even though state voters legalized the use and possession of marijuana for adults, it remains banned at DIA because it must follow federal law, which still outlaws pot use.

Colorado tourism officials have been reluctant to discuss the impact legalization has had on the state's visitation. One one hand, officials say, families could be scared away by the state's permissive attitude toward marijuana. On the other hand, they acknowledge that tourists are the biggest buyers of recreational marijuana in the state's ski towns.

Colorado and Washington are the only two states with operating recreational marijuana systems. Alaska, Oregon and Washington, D.C., have approved similar systems but haven't yet got them running.

In Seattle, the issue of marijuana-themed merchandise at the airport hasn't yet come up, said Sea-Tac International Airport spokesman Perry Cooper. He said Sea-Tac, like most airport operators, retains the right to approve all items offered for sale on its property. The airport, however, does not have a specific ban in place.

"We have not run across that issue," Cooper said. "Our major tenant has not brought that up."