How we model the numbers.
The labor-savings and payback figures on this site come from a model, not a survey. We publish the inputs and the math so you can check it against your own store instead of taking a number on faith. As real deployments report before-and-after results, we replace modeled figures with measured ones.
Five inputs, all yours.
Every figure starts from numbers a dispensary already knows. These are the same fields the calculator exposes as sliders.
- Door count
- How many locker compartments the store runs. Drives hardware configuration and software cost.
- Monthly pickup volume
- Pre-orders fulfilled through the locker each month. The single biggest driver of savings.
- Average budtender wage
- Fully-loaded hourly rate for the staff time a locker pickup would otherwise consume.
- Staff minutes per pickup
- How long a counter pickup ties up a budtender today, from greet to handoff.
- POS / integration type
- Native or partner-routed, which sets any per-transaction handling in the model.
A locker absorbs about 85% of the pickup transaction.
A counter pickup consumes a budtender from greet to handoff. With a locker, staff involvement collapses to ID and age verification plus the occasional exception, so the model assumes the locker absorbs roughly 85% of the labor minutes that pickup would otherwise take. The remaining 15% stays with your team.
This is the one assumption we set. Everything else is your store's own numbers.
Four steps, start to payback.
- 1. Baseline pickup labor
Monthly pickups multiplied by (wage divided by 60) multiplied by minutes per pickup. The staff cost your pickups carry today.
- 2. Labor recovered
Baseline pickup labor multiplied by 85%. The portion the locker takes off your team's plate.
- 3. Net monthly savings
Labor recovered minus your configured SafeArbor monthly cost (hardware amortized over 12 months plus the per-door software fee, shown in your quote).
- 4. Hardware payback
Your hardware investment divided by net monthly savings. How many months until the lockers have paid for themselves.
One store, every number shown.
- 17 doors
- 4,000 pickups per month
- $21 per hour budtender wage
- 6 minutes of staff time per pickup
- Baseline pickup labor: 4,000 × ($21 / 60) × 6 = $8,400 / month
- Labor recovered (85%): about $7,140 / month
- Net pickup-labor-cost reduction at this volume: about 60%, rising toward the 85% ceiling as volume grows.
- Net of your configured SafeArbor cost, the lockers pay for themselves in about three months at this volume.
Reading the headline figures: we lead with the two numbers that hold up to scrutiny. "Up to 85% of the pickup transaction, automated" is the share of labor minutes the locker absorbs, the fixed assumption above. The roughly three-month payback is what this example produces at typical volume. Net pickup-labor-cost reduction is a separate, volume-dependent figure: about 60% at this example's 4,000 monthly pickups, rising toward the 85% ceiling as volume grows (around 67% near 6,000 pickups), which is why we state it as a 60 to 70 percent range rather than a single number. Run your own volume to see your store's figure.
What we will not put a number on.
Hardware and per-door software pricing is configured to your store (door count, install variant, and POS), so it lives in your quote rather than on this page. And we do not present modeled figures as measured outcomes. When a deployment shares real before-and-after numbers, those replace the model here, with attribution.
Run the model for your store.
Plug in your door count, pickup volume, and wage. The calculator applies exactly the method on this page.