Charlie Fox, the first licensed cannabis dispensary to open in the Hamptons, wants you to feel good, both inside and out.
Perched on the northern side of County Road 39 in Southampton, in the spot that formerly housed Hampton Car Club, the dispensary is a clever blend of Old World apothecary and trendy, chic hospitality hub. At least that’s how Julia Levi, owner and founder of Charlie Fox, would put it.
“We wanted it to feel different. We wanted it to feel unlike anything else you’ve experienced in the cannabis space,” she says. “It doesn’t have to be this one type of green, ’70s, stoner aesthetic, right?”
Right. And at Charlie Fox, it isn’t.
Cannabis dispensary and lifestyle hub Charlie Fox opened in Southampton Sept. 16. (Photos by Emily Toy)
Along with her co-founder, James Mallios, the Connecticut-born, Manhattan- and London-bred Levi has brought her expertise in public relations, hospitality and brand building into the cannabis arena. And the results are pretty dope.
With an ethos deeply rooted in education as well as hospitality, Charlie Fox is equipped with sales associates that are the equivalent of what a sommelier would be for wine in a restaurant, always at the ready to guide new (or repeat) customers through their plentiful offerings. Additionally, for the more low-key peruser, an iPad that outlines the store’s inventory is readily available for swiping through.
Inside the 1,000-square-foot, budding boutique, customers are able to look through a curated selection of New York State’s finest flower (in industry-speak, that refers to the dried plant material commonly known as “weed”) along with myriad premium brands of pre-rolls, edibles, tinctures, topicals, beverages and concentrates.
Noteworthy brands include Nova, Camino, Tune, Ayrloom, Cam, Remedy Plant Lab and Reunion. Products run across both the CBD and THC spectrums, so those individuals that want to stay off the “funny stuff” can.
There’s also a plethora of smoking accessories — bongs, pipes, grinders, lighters, vapes, ashtrays — available for sale. Signature Charlie Fox products include a unique line of CBD and CBD+ gummies, reminiscent of Turkish Delight and designed around the moods Sleep, Creative, Bliss and Social.
Eventually, Levi’s plan is to work with and support as many brands or companies that are based here in the Hamptons. “If I think their product is great and sells and is on brand, you know, I want to carry that.”
In addition to all the cannabis goodies, Charlie Fox also carries unisex apparel and a handful of stylish houseware selections. (Photos by Marcus Martinez)
A member of the hospitality industry (Levi and Mallios also co-own Calissa, a Greek-inspired restaurant in the neighboring Water Mill), plus her visceral attraction to brand-building, mixed with her practically innate sense of providing good service, stepping into the cannabis space seemed a natural fit, particularly because it lent itself well to stepping into the lifestyle space as well.
“I knew the market pretty well,” Levi says about how she got into the cannabis biz. “I’m really passionate about brands and markets in the consumer space. I had spent a lot of time watching the cannabis industry grow, and I just felt like there was a huge market missing. A market for me, my people.”
So, she built her own. After visiting over 20 different dispensaries across the nation, all of which, Levi says, were marketed as luxury, she discovered they all looked exactly the same.
“It was all this sort of MedMen vibe, which I give them props for, since they were the first to make a clean, professional store,” she says of the once trailblazing, California-based cannabis company, “or I couldn’t really differentiate one from the other.”
Charlie Fox originally opened in winter of 2024 in Times Square, with the aim of providing visitors to that bustling area of Manhattan some respite. Part of the original concept was to get people to actually relax, something Levi soon realized was not a one-size-fits-all situation. It was here the heart of her company was born: to educate the Charlie Fox customer and consumer about cannabis, but to do it in a familiar yet highly curated, service-forward way.
Staffers are on-hand to guide customers through samplings and hopefully, later on down the road, there’ll be talks and workshops with purveyors. (Photo credit: Emily Toy (left); Marcus Martinez (right).)
And that’s where Charlie the fox comes in.
“I love the idea of personifying a brand or store that is, in many ways, so versatile in what and how you can present it. Because to me, Charlie is like your friend next door that you’ve known your whole life, so there’s like some familiarity, like everyone knows of Charlie,” she says. “It was really important that it felt there was an element of mystery, but also, really, approachability. And Charlie Fox could be a man or a woman or a fox. And I think, as someone who loves branding and creating worlds, that’s a really fun place. That’s a really fun start of being able to play with something and create a world.”
The Southampton store is slated to be open from 10 a.m. to 9 p.m. daily. Fittingly, Charlie Fox, the self described “purveyors of fine living,” will provide local delivery from Westhampton all the way to Montauk, making it easy to access premium products all across the Hamptons.
Crazy? Like a fox.
Charlie Fox is located at 471 County Road 39 in Southampton. For more information, call 631-296-9445.
