GREENFIELD — The Board of Health has revoked Green Mart Convenience’s tobacco license following a hearing over its fourth violation of tobacco sales regulations.
Public Health Nurse Megan Tudryn said the convenience store will have 30 days to sell its existing stock of tobacco products, after which point it will not be permitted to sell any tobacco-related products.
Tudryn explained to Board of Health members on Wednesday that she, accompanied by a Greenfield police officer, was conducting inspections of the city’s tobacco retailers in early September to ensure compliance with the city’s new ban on kratom sales. At Green Mart Convenience, Tudryn said she observed a plastic bag filled with flavored hemp wraps behind the counter by an employee’s feet.
Under Massachusetts General Laws, Chapter 270, Section 28, flavored tobacco products and tobacco product flavor enhancers have been banned since 2020.
Sameer Khan, owner of Green Mart Convenience, told the board that the cashier was not selling them. He argued that the flavored hemp wraps were only banned recently and that the store had just not gotten rid of them yet. He also suggested that it was a city ban because his vendor would not have sold the store the product if it was a statewide ban.
“There was an honest mistake,” Khan told the Board of Health. “There was no intention, we were not selling them.”
The state law defines tobacco product flavor enhancers as any product that is designed, manufactured, produced, marketed or sold to produce a characterizing flavor when added to any tobacco product. Board members agreed that the mango-flavored hemp wraps in the bag did classify as flavor enhancers.
“It’s a state ban,” Board of Health Chair Darius Greenbacher said. “It’s not up for discussion.”
Tudryn informed the board this was the store’s fourth violation of tobacco sales regulations in recent years. In January and June of 2025, as well as June 2024, the store was caught selling to a minor. She added that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration issued another warning for the sale of cigarettes to a minor.
The Board of Health voted unanimously to revoke the convenience store’s tobacco license and institute a $5,000 fine.
“The license is a privilege to have,” Greenfield Health Director Michael Theroux said to Khan. “And you violated it for three times selling to minors and now a fourth time with a flavored product. … I don’t take lightly taking anybody’s license, but unfortunately when you get that many violations…”
