A longstanding Denver dispensary has been awarded the right to buy the building in which it operates after a nearly three-year court battle with the property's current owner.
Owned by Amy and John Andrle, L'Eagle has been based at 380 Quivas Street for over a dozen years. But the dispensary's future there has been in question since 2020, when the Andrles and North Mountain Group LLC, the property owner, began trading lawsuits.
The dispute stemmed from a clause in L'Eagle's lease, which the Andrles claim gave them the right to buy the property after agreeing to an increase in monthly rent with NMG. After more than thirty months of litigation, the Andrles were vindicated by the Colorado Court of Appeals, which issued a ruling on February 16 saying that L'Eagle can purchase the Quivas property and that NMG is responsible for the dispensary's legal fees.
According to Amy Andrle, the court hasn't yet provided a timeline for the building's purchase, but she and her husband are "ready to go" once given the green light.
"We've had the money to buy the building sitting in an escrow account for a while now, and have already done the environmental and separating law studies," she says. "For us, as a cannabis business, this is a very big deal. We would essentially become our own landlord, which allows us to be much more nimble."
In 2011, L'Eagle opened a medical marijuana dispensary and cultivation operation at 380 Quivas under a different landlord; NMG purchased the building in 2016. The two parties agreed on a new lease with the purchasing clause in 2016, according to L'Eagle's lawsuit, which argued that NMG never intended to honor the agreement. By 2018, NMG began making what the Andrles believe were questionable repair demands, including updates to the facility's roof and parking lot as well as fixing a broken water line connected to the property.
"Let's just say we put around a half-million dollars into it," Amy says of those repairs. Meanwhile, they were holding on to another $400,000 in hopes of putting it toward the purchase of the building.
As the case dragged on, she adds, the Andrles lost the motivation to put money into the dispensary or cultivation out of fear that they might eventually be evicted. Any renovations also had to be approved by their landlord.
"We didn't want to do much anymore because we stood to lose the store," she says. "Doing upgrades to the store or even changing little things about the facility — whether it's putting more money into advertising and promotions — it has been really hard times."
In 2022 a district court judge ruled in favor of L'Eagle's argument that it had the right to buy the building, but said that each party had to pay their own court fees. NMG and its owner, Douglas Norberg, then appealed the ruling — but not only did the Colorado Court of Appeals reaffirm the ruling on the purchasing provision, the judges also determined that NMG must pay for L'Eagle's attorney and court fees.
"We were just going to sit with the original ruling and eat the fees, because at least the purchase was in place," Amy says. "He was grasping at anything he could do to make sure this purchase couldn't go through — a purchase option that he wrote, by the way."
Norberg and NMG declined to talk about the original lawsuit in 2020, and didn't respond to a request for comment on the Court of Appeals ruling.
According to Amy Andrle, there's a fee hearing scheduled this month to determine the payment process. And under the court ruling, the purchase price for the property will go down with time if NMG waits to sell.
Now that L'Eagle's future is more secure on Quivas Street, the Andrles are excited to make the building a more permanent home.
"We've been in this for so long, and we've ridden other waves of uncertainty, whether that's from a legal standpoint, other states opening up to sales or changing from medical to retail. We just assumed that is part and parcel of the game," she says. "We're on this roller coaster, and John and I don't have any intention of going anywhere."