Search Results for "vermont"

New York Bans Delta-8 & Delta-10 In New Hemp Regulations

5/24/2021

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New York has joined the growing number of states to ban Delta-8 and Delta-10 THC after the Department of Health (DOH) issued hemp regulations last week clarifying that hemp-derived cannabinoid products may “not contain synthetic cannabinoids, or cannabinoids created through isomerization.”

The regulations also keep intact a proposed ban on smokable hemp – which was initially released last year – but the sale of hemp flower would be permitted as long as it is not marketed or branded as a smokable product.

“It is the mission of the (DOH) to protect, improve and promote the health, productivity and wellbeing of all New Yorkers, and the commitment to a smoke–free society is consistent with that mission,” the agency said in response to concerns about the smokable product ban raised in public comments on the regulations.

The new industry rules also set $1,000 application fees for hemp producers who seek to process cannabinoids and $500 application fees for those seeking to manufacture – rather than extract – hemp cannabinoids. Retailers will have to pay a $300 license fee per location.

The guidelines also require all hemp manufacturers to show evidence of a Good Manufacturing Practices audit under the new rules.

The DOH rules also require out-of-state manufacturers and distributors of cannabinoid hemp products to “adhere to the requirements of the program, to the extent they intend to sell products” in the state.

Regulators in Colorado, Vermont, and Alaska have also banned the hemp-derived cannabinoids, while Washington state has implemented a temporary ban on the products.

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Michigan Bill Would Restrict Delta-8 THC Sales to Licensed Dispensaries

5/21/2021

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A bill to ban the sale of psychoactive cannabinoids synthesized from hemp – such as Delta-8 THC – at shops not licensed as cannabis retailers in Michigan is headed to the House after passing the Committee on Regulatory Reform, MLive reports.

The bill expands the definition of cannabis to include THC “regardless of whether it is artificially or naturally derived” and put regulation of the cannabinoids under the state’s Marijuana Regulatory Agency.

Currently, the products can be found at some traditional retailers in the state, such as convenience stores.

Republican state Rep. Pat Outman said the unregulated cannabinoids remind him of other “sketchy substances that are working their way into gas stations and other retail places” and that there are “no consumer protections or any sort of regulatory structure” for the products.

Dave Crabill, a spokesman for trade group iHemp Michigan, said hemp that can be used for Delta-8 has “the highest value right now” for producers.

“Everyone that is in the market is going in understanding that it’s a short-lived game that makes some profits in the meantime.” – Crabill to MLive

Under the proposal, hemp-derived THC products will still be allowed to be produced and sold in the state, but only by individuals and shops licensed by state cannabis regulators.

Last week, Colorado regulators banned the compounds from state-licensed cannabis dispensaries, dietary supplements, and cosmetics. Other states with legalized cannabis, such as Alaska and Vermont, have banned the cannabinoids, while lawmakers in Illinois and Oregon are considering their own prohibition on the products. Washington state has implemented a temporary ban on both Delta-8 and Delta-10.

If the Michigan House approves the measure, it would still require approval from the Senate and Gov. Gretchen Whitmer (D) to become law.

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Cannabis in the South: Past, Present, & College/University Involvement

5/20/2021

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The United States’ South includes Alabama, Arkansas, Delaware, the District of Columbia, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, Mississippi, North Carolina, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Virginia, and West Virginia, according to the federal government.

Most of America has experienced ugly history, but this region’s history has been one of the harshest. The South has experienced slavery, segregation, Jim Crow, civil rights demonstrations, and black codes, which even further delayed society’s push for equality. For these reasons and others, the advancement of cannabis legalization and research in the South deserves recognition, especially when led by Black people.

Louisiana State University and Alabama State University are showing that a change is coming. Louisiana State University launched their Therapeutic Cannabis Program, and Alabama State University also recently started to allow medicinal cannabis research. Though neither offer degree or certification programs, allowing for research is a sign of good faith. Wellcana Group in Louisiana and Cannabis Group South LLC are leading the change in partnership with the universities.

The Past – Cannabis and Slave History in the South

In most U.S. history lessons, students are taught that slaves were forced to grow and harvest crops like cotton, tobacco, and sugar. But a lot of American history leaves out the early role of hemp and cannabis cultivation and how it relates to enslaved African Americans. Much of American history is whitewashed, so it’s easy to forget how hemp crops saved early settlements in Virginia, Massachusetts Bay, and throughout the South. Additionally, the country’s early cultivation power was concentrated in the South, where large numbers of enslaved African Americans were forced to plant, grow, harvest, and process hemp.

James F. Hopkins confirmed in his 1951 book, A History of the Hemp Industry in Kentucky, “on the hemp farm and in the hemp factories the need for laborers was filled to a large extent by the use of … slaves.”

The Present – Cannabis Legalization in the South

Though the South was an early adopter of cannabis/hemp cultivation, it has largely been the last to legalize/decriminalize. As of May 2021, just two jurisdictions in the South have legalized cannabis for adult consumption: Washington D.C. and Virginia, but legalization there still carries restrictions.

In Virginia, dispensaries are not anticipated until 2024 but residents who are 21 or older can grow up to four plants (two mature, two immature). In D.C, medical and adult consumption are legal, but adult-use sales are still outlawed. Adults can only legally purchase cannabis if they have a medical card (although the rise of  cannabis “gifting” services in the District has somewhat addressed those concerns).

But as for the remaining southern states and their cannabis priorities:

  • Alabama – illegal
  • South Carolina – illegal
  • Arkansas – medicinally legal
  • Delaware – medicinally legal
  • Florida – medicinally legal
  • Georgia – only CBD oil is legal
  • Kentucky – only CBD oil is legal
  • Louisiana – medicinally legal
  • Maryland – medicinally legal
  • Mississippi – medicinally legal
  • North Carolina – illegal
  • Oklahoma – medicinally legal
  • Tennessee – illegal
  • Texas – only CBD oil is legal
  • West Virginia – medicinally legal

Involvement of Higher Education

Though the South has been very slow in its cannabis legalization efforts, as highlighted above, two states — Louisiana and Alabama — are allowing cultivators to partner with colleges/universities. In Louisiana, Wellcana Group, a fully integrated and diverse Louisiana biopharmaceutical company, is contracted with Louisiana State University (LSU) to cultivate and process hemp.

“In the state of Louisiana, LSU is one of two licensed by the state to cultivate and manufacture cannabis,” said Ra’mon Richardson, Lead Cannabis Cultivator with Wellcana Group, adding that, “I may be the first African American to cultivate and process medical cannabis [in the South].” A powerful statement made by a Black man, in the South, on the same soil where Black people were oppressed and enslaved through black codes and the 13th Amendment.

In Alabama, Cannabis South Group LLC (founded by Matthew Ibidapo), one of the first Black-owned industrial hemp companies, was awarded a license to cultivate hemp as a partner of Alabama State University, which is an HBCU (historically black college or university). Together, Cannabis South Group and Alabama State will work to establish the infrastructure needed for future farmers, entrepreneurs, and retailers.

These strides are important efforts that will shape our future through research that will lead to the further removal of Reefer Madness-era stigmas. These partnerships are also important because as shown above, the South’s reform efforts frequently carry restrictions like banning smokable consumption options — but rules that would ban smokable cannabis while allowing the smoking of tobacco are oppressive and overly restrictive.

The Work Continues

Wellcana Group has a Black lead cultivator, and Cannabis South Group is owned by a Black man — and these are two of the only companies that have been awarded cultivation licenses in the Deep South. Cannabis is certainly not legal in Alabama or in Louisiana, just as a restrictive medicine, but through LSU, Alabama State, and their partnerships with these two cultivation companies, a change is coming — and the South needs it. The South needs a massive change of pace with regard to freedoms, liberties, and reparations.

These licenses, partnerships, and efforts serve as powerful destigmatization tools that will lead to legalization and hopefully, a more balanced field for business opportunities in the cannabis industry. Education is key, and in a region where enslaved African Americans were beaten and worse for reading and trying to learn, thrown in jail through black codes, and robbed of their human and civil rights, historical efforts like these showcase accomplishments that enslaved ancestors could have only dreamt of.

Representation is also an important piece of this puzzle: Black students attending these colleges and seeing these Black men grow cannabis is important because for many, any Black man or Black person touching cannabis — that leads to jail. Many of their family members are in jail because they touched cannabis and many want to have careers in cannabis but are in a region that doesn’t support it.

Like with every other civil and human rights issue, the South needs to join the rest of the country and do what’s right: free the people by freeing the plant.

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Colorado Regulators Ban Delta-8 and Delta-10 In Dispensaries

5/17/2021

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The Colorado Marijuana Enforcement Division (MED) has banned hemp-derived and synthetic forms of THC – including Delta-8 and Delta-10 – from licensed dispensaries in the state, Westword reports. In a letter to industry operators, regulators cited safety concerns while also banning the compound from food, dietary supplements, and cosmetics.

“Additionally, a complete profile of reactionary byproducts has not been established in association with the conversion or creation of delta-9, delta-8, delta-10-THC; therefore, insufficient evidence exists to determine whether or not any toxic or otherwise harmful substances are produced during these reactions and may remain in the regulated industrial hemp products ingested or applied/used by consumers.” – MED in the letter, May 14, 2021

The letter further clarified that the only solvents allowed in the cannabis extraction process are butane, propane, CO2, ethanol, isopropanol, acetone, heptane, ethyl acetate, and pentane; and using “acids, bases, catalysts, or other unapproved reagents to extract, isolate or convert cannabidiols, tetrahydrocannabinols, or other cannabinoids is not permitted.”

Neither Delta-8 THC nor Delta-10 THC is specifically outlawed by the federal Controlled Substances Act and the cannabinoids are essentially created by converting CBD into THC with acetic acid, according to Westword.

Several states, including those with legalized cannabis such as Alaska and Vermont, have banned Delta-8 and Delta-10. Washington state has implemented a temporary prohibition on the compound. Lawmakers in Illinois and Oregon are also considering their own bans.

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Washington Clarifies Delta-8 THC Not Legal Under Current Regulations

4/30/2021

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The Washington State Liquor and Cannabis Board (WSLCB) issued a policy statement this week to clarify that neither Delta-8 THC products nor the conversion of CBD, hemp products, or Delta-9 THC to Delta-8 THC, or any other cannabinoid, are currently allowed under Washington law.

In their statement, the LCB said it is aware of edibles and concentrates in Washington’s cannabis market that contain Delta-8 THC and has confirmed the presence of Delta-8 THC products in markets outside of their jurisdiction. According to the statement, the controlled substances section of the Revised Code of Washington (RCW) indeed regulates “cis – or trans tetrahydrocannabinol” and their optical isomers.

Regulators additionally cited the RCW covering unfair business practices and said, “It is an unfair or deceptive practice … for any person or entity to distribute … or sell to a purchaser any product that contains any amount of any synthetic cannabinoid.”

“For these reasons, delta-8 THC, as well as derivatives, extracts, cannabinoids, isomers, and CBD isolate from hemp or other sources that are genetically or chemically altered into compounds may not be produced or processed in LCB licensed facilities, and may not be sold in licensed marijuana retail stores.” — WSLCB policy statement excerpt

In the statement, the WSLCB raises other concerns about unnatural chemicals produced during Delta-8 THC synthesis, lacking concentration and potency thresholds, and a shortage of labs capable of testing for the cannabinoid. Despite their ban on “genetically or chemically” derived Delta-8, however, regulators said they will allow “cultivated” Delta-8 THC, seeming to carve out an exception for the cannabinoid if produced naturally by the cannabis plant.

Washington joins a growing list of states that have enacted or clarified cannabis industry rules related to the manufacturing and sale of Delta-8 THC products.

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CBD Brand Sues FedEx Over Confiscated Hemp Shipment

4/22/2021

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New York City-based Green Angel CBD is suing the city and FedEx after police intercepted a hemp shipment destined for the company in 2019, LLNow reports. In addition to the City of New York and the shipping company, the lawsuit names one of FedEx’s drivers and two NYPD officers, claiming that they are all responsible for the missing shipment which was valued at $17,000.

Oren Levy, the owner of Green Angel, had ordered 106 pounds of hemp products from Vermont-based Fox Holler Farms. In the lawsuit, Oren, along with his brother Ronen, said they expected to make a $60,000 to $100,000 profit through sales derived from the shipment.

Oren Levy had redirected the FedEx shipment redirected to his brother’s residence in Brooklyn because he was hospitalized when it was due to arrive at Green Angel. However, Oren received a notification that the shipment was seized by the Vermont Police Department after FedEx and its truck driver notified authorities of packages containing an illegal substance. Vermont police subsequently cleared the shipment, deeming the paperwork lawful and apologizing for the inconvenience, according to the lawsuit outlined by LLNow.

Ronen was arrested and held for 24 hours. In December 2019, the Brooklyn District Attorney’s Office dropped all of the charges against Ronen.

Green Angel is suing FedEx for negligence in making a false claim and giving up the packages to the police. It is also claiming negligence on the part of the city for “creating a media spectacle of the confiscation” and publicizing “the incident on a variety of public platforms including but not limited to Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram,” the lawsuit states. Additionally, the lawsuit claims that the city was negligent in the hiring, training, and retaining of the officers involved in the bust, describing the city’s hiring practices as one that leads to officers “lacking the intellectual capacity and moral fortitude to discharge their duties.” The lawsuit said the officer’s conduct in the seizure was “inappropriate, unlawful and improper.”

The city and FedEx have both denied wrongdoing.

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Virginia Becomes First Southern State to Approve Cannabis Legalization

3/01/2021

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Virginia lawmakers on Saturday passed cannabis legalization legislation becoming the first Southern state to approve the reforms, which under the law will take effect in 2024. The measure moves next to Gov. Ralph Northam (D) for his signature, which is expected.

NORML Development Director Jenn Michelle Pedini, who also serves as the executive director of Virginia NORML, called the approval “another historic step for cannabis justice in Virginia.”

“Stakeholders, the administration, and the legislature have dedicated hundreds of hours to craft legislation that is just and equitable, and that will replace the failed policy of cannabis prohibition with one that promotes Virginia’s economy as well as Virginians’ public health and safety.” – Pedini, in a statement

The bill does not legalize simple possession immediately – which was included in the Senate-approved version – rather when sales commence in three years. Last year, the state approved a cannabis possession decriminalization measure which reduces the penalties for possession of up to a half-ounce to $25. Previously, possession charges could lead to a $500 fine and 30 days in jail.

The measure passed both chambers across party lines, 20-19 in the Senate and 48-43 in the House. Virginia is the third state to approve adult-use cannabis legalization via the legislative process, following Illinois and Vermont.

In a statement, the American Civil Liberties Union criticized the measure as not going far enough to “break the chains of marijuana prohibition” because it failed to legalize cannabis possession immediately.

“The Virginia General Assembly failed to legalize marijuana for racial justice,” the statement says. “Lawmakers paid lip service to the communities that have suffered decades of harm caused by the racist War on Drugs with legislation that falls short of equitable reform and delays justice.”

A recent report found Black people were 3.4 times more likely to get arrested for cannabis possession than white people in Virginia. The measure includes social equity provisions, such as prioritizing business licenses for individuals most impacted by the war on drugs.

In addition to allowing sales and possession, Virginians will be allowed to cultivate up to four plants per household.

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New Jersey Gov. Signs Bill to Legalize Cannabis

2/22/2021

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After over three months since voters approved the state’s cannabis legalization ballot question, New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy (D) today signed into law a series of bills that ultimately legalize the adult use of cannabis.

The New Jersey Cannabis Regulatory, Enforcement Assistance, and Marketplace Modernization Act was only signed after lawmakers, at the governor’s behest, advanced accompanying legislation aimed at clarifying penalties for underage possession.

The legislation will remove criminal penalties for cannabis possession and legalize its use and possession by adults aged 21 and older. The laws also establish a five-member Cannabis Regulatory Commission (CRC) tasked with creating regulations and overseeing the industry’s launch. The application period for cannabis business licenses will open 30 days after the CRC releases its regulations, which are expected this summer.

“Our current marijuana prohibition laws have failed every test of social justice, which is why for years I’ve strongly supported the legalization of adult-use cannabis. Maintaining a status quo that allows tens of thousands, disproportionately people of color, to be arrested in New Jersey each year for low-level drug offenses is unjust and indefensible. This November, New Jerseyans voted overwhelmingly in support of creating a well-regulated adult-use cannabis market. Although this process has taken longer than anticipated, I believe it is ending in the right place and will ultimately serve as a national model.” — Gov. Phil Murphy, in an announcement

New Jersey is the 13th U.S. state to legalize cannabis and the fourth on the East Coast, having followed in the footsteps of Maine, Vermont, and Massachusetts. Neighboring New York, meanwhile, is expected to legalize later this year.

To the dismay of advocates, New Jersey is the second state after Washington to legalize cannabis but not allow residents to grow cannabis plants in their own homes.

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Virginia Advances Dueling Cannabis Legalization Bills

2/12/2021

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Virginia’s House and Senate have each passed broad cannabis legalization bills that are headed for a conference committee to come to an agreement on final language – which would have to pass both chambers again – before moving to Gov. Ralph Northam (D) for his signature, the Washington Post reports.

While both bills would legalize sales beginning in 2024, they differ on several details, including when adults would be allowed to possess cannabis legally and whether industry operations will be under municipal control. The Senate bill would allow cities and town to-opt out of retail sales and allow possession as early as July 1, while the House bill would not allow possession until sales commence and does not include opt-out provisions, but retail sales would still be required to comply with zoning rules, according to a Center Square report.

The House bill also caps the number of industry licenses available while the Senate bill has no restrictions.

Democratic House Speaker Eileen Filler-Corn described the bill’s passage – along with one to end the state’s death penalty passed the same day – “historic” and “transformational.”

“Virginia is changing, and some of these historic pieces of legislation – it’s what the public wants.” – Filler-Corn to the Post

Since neither bill passed both chambers the differences will be ironed out in a compromise bill by a conference committee and then voted on again by both chambers. If approved, Virginia would become the first Southern state to legalize cannabis for adults and just the third to pass the reforms via the Legislature, behind Illinois and Vermont.

Jenn Michelle Pedini, the executive director of Virginia NORML, told WSLS that “the chambers certainly have their work cut out for them.”

“They worked remarkably well to advance the bills this far,” they said in the interview. “And we really are confident that they’ll be able to reconcile their differences and put forth a bill that they can all agree upon.”

A Legislature-required report released last year found legalization could generate up to $1.2 billion in economic activity for the state along with $274 million in revenues, but it could take up to five years to reach those levels. The study also suggested Virginia could see as much as $300 million annually from cannabis-derived taxes and fees.

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Cannabis Training Curriculum for Doctors Announced By Healthcare Education Group

2/02/2021

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The Society of Cannabis Clinicians (SCC) — a 501(c)(3) non-profit made up of expert clinicians and researchers — is releasing a new clinical medical cannabis training curriculum for medical professionals. Twelve of the twenty two training courses will be available remotely starting February 8, 2021. SCC members will receive 20% off of all educational offerings.

A recent study conducted by the SCC showed that 56% of clinicians felt that there was adequate information available to ethically practice cannabis medicine; however, according to a study conducted with medical patients in Vermont, only 18% of patients reported that their provider was a good source of information on medical cannabis. This divide is an issue that the SCC has been working to reconcile since its founding in 1999. The SCC’s latest offering will provide clinicians with a multi-pronged approach to understanding cannabis medicine and clinicians will leave with tools for better serving medical cannabis patients.

In the new educational modules, clinicians and researchers will learn how to build medical cannabis treatment regimens personalized to patient needs. They will also get access to an in-depth look at the endocannabinoid system and how it relates to cannabis as an application for a wide variety of conditions.

“The endocannabinoid system is an integral component to many bodily functions, and we still have much to uncover about its impact on human health. The fact that medical professionals are not taught about this vital signaling system in their training is detrimental to our ability to accurately understand disease pathology and is a disservice to public health. The SCC’s commitment to teaching cannabinoid science is guided by a responsibility to provide the best evidence-based patient care.” — SCC Program Director Christine Milentis

Researchers and clinicians who are looking to engage with this new educational offering can access individual modules or full course packages on the Society of Cannabis Clinicians website. Each module is optimized for desktop and mobile, so it can be accessed from anywhere. People who sign up for SCC membership will receive a discount on courses and gain full access to the resources made available after joining.

The SCC is currently raising funds to support the development of this educational endeavor. Each module offers critical education that is missing from most health professional training schools and continuing clinical education programs. Membership and individual donations financially support the non-profit’s mission. The group is currently working to meet a new donation goal to continue bridging the gap between cannabis medicine and medical practitioners.

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Bob Eschino & Derek Cumings: Building a Cannabis Edibles Empire

1/21/2021

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In the notoriously turbulent cannabis industry, 10 years of continuous operation can feel like a lifetime. For the team behind Colorado’s Medically Correct, it’s the ultimate testament of their company’s success and longevity.

In this episode of the Ganjapreneur.com Podcast, Medically Correct co-founders Bob Eschino (who is also the company’s president) and Derek Cumings join our host TG Branfalt to discuss their various cannabis edibles brands, the early years of Colorado’s cannabis industry, and how they helped shape cannabis regulations in Colorado and (as other states came online) beyond. Tune in to hear about the trials and difficulties that led to the company’s founding; how a strong work ethic, an ever-present emphasis on compliance, and a continued focus on cannabis as medicine has driven their success; and more!

You can listen to the interview through the media player below or via your preferred podcast listening platform. Scroll down to read along with a full transcript.

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TG Branfalt: Hey there. I’m your host, TG Branfalt, and thank you for listening to the Ganjapreneur.com podcast, where we try to bring you actionable information and normalize cannabis through the stories of ganjapreneurs, activists, and industry stakeholders. Today I’m joined by Bob Eschino, who is the co-founder and president, and Derek Cumings, co-founder of Medically Correct, a Colorado-based firm founded in 2010, whose brands include incredibles, Quiq, TruPura CBD, Clear Creek Extracts, and Nove, which is coming this winter. How you doing this afternoon guys?

Derek Cumings: Good, man.

Bob Eschino: Great, TG. Thanks for having us.

TG Branfalt: I’m really excited. You guys have so much experience to talk about. But before we get into that, man, tell me about your backgrounds and how you guys ended up in the cannabis space.

Bob Eschino: Go ahead, Derek. You start.

Derek Cumings: Me, personally, I was a patient, and to make a really long story short, I fell 45 or 50 feet, I broke both my legs, and then the pharmaceutical companies in combination with the doctors went for the all-time poisoning, so they had me up to about 20 pills a day and a dozen different prescriptions in my mid 20s. And I started using cannabis again in my life and basically, through escalated cannabis use, I was able to chip down every one of those prescriptions over about a two or three-year period.

And after I had the revelation of how much cannabis had helped me, and it was just because I had access, my mission sort of changed into giving other people access and putting that knowledge out there because there was nothing. I mean, you couldn’t find out information at the time. I sort of tiptoed into it myself and then was fully immersed, and then because of that I sort of wanted to help other people and get that knowledge out there because of the information blackout really at the time.

TG Branfalt: It’s unfortunate that we can’t hear that full long story, man, because, I mean it sounds like you’ve really been, hate to make the pun, but in the weeds with this on both sides.

Derek Cumings: Yeah. It was a trip to… I had like 300 or 400 doctor appointments and at some point in there I started telling them I didn’t want pills. I went from, “Hey. I’m going to take this tincture. I don’t want this anti-nausea pill anymore,” all the way up to, like graduated use, start smoking, and then all the way to start smoking hash, and then start smoking hash first thing in the morning instead of taking a morphine pill.

My doctor kept notes of the whole thing so when they tried to kick me out as a patient, the State of Colorado stepped in and said, “Hey. What happened here? You don’t have a lawyer.” It was all under a workers’ compensation case so they tried to kick me out for using cannabis after basically they had the notes that proved I was better off with it. So the State of Colorado stepped in and we worked out a settlement with the insurance company that would allow me to basically be in charge of my own healthcare through cannabis use. And like I said, once my parents knew, there wasn’t really any reason to hide from anybody else so that’s… As soon as my parents were cool with what was going on, I started going to town meetings and shit.

TG Branfalt: Wow. That’s fascinating, man. Bob, how about you, man? What’s your story?

Bob Eschino: I got into the cannabis industry through my grandmother. Back in 2009, my brother started making edibles for my grandmother, who was towards the end of her life. I watched it help her with sleep, pain, appetite. And as I was watching this unfold before my eyes, the light bulb went off. Same thing with Derek, I was like, “Holy shit. It’s medicine.” I had been a cannabis consumer most of my life but I never put the two together that it was medicinal. And even when I was using it, there was medicinal properties that I was getting. But watching it work for my grandmother, someone who would never touched cannabis and the topicals for her pain and… She’d eat a cookie and all of a sudden she had an appetite and her pain levels were dropping and she could sleep. Same sort of thing.

I sold packaging, and my partner, Rick, he ran one of the largest bakeries here in the State of Colorado. So everything we had talked about for little side businesses revolved around food and as I watched edibles working for my grandmother, I approached him and said, “Hey. Could we make an edible here in your kitchen?” At first he was reluctant, thought I was crazy, and then he came and he met my grandmother and he saw the healing properties of cannabis as well.

Right about that time, 12-84 came out, which was really the first framework here in Colorado that gave us a roadmap, some rules to follow, and as business people we looked at that and went, “Okay. They’re giving us rules. They are telling us if you do these things, you’re not going to get in trouble in the State of Colorado,” which brought us to a comfort level that we were both satisfied with. And we walked our happy little asses down and filled out an application and we were one of the first people in the country to have a license to make and sell legal cannabis in the US, which is pretty damn cool.

TG Branfalt: And you guys both come from that sort of compassionate background, right?

Bob Eschino: Yeah.

TG Branfalt: And we could sit here and talk all day about… I mean, I’m one of those people who use cannabis for years and years and years and then I start realizing, holy shit. I’m actually kind of using this more medically than I am recreationally. I still have a medical card in New York and that sort of thing, but I sort of digress. Tell me about these early days in Colorado and how you ended up leveraging that early experience to remain in business for this long. I mean, 10 years is a lifetime in this industry.

Derek Cumings: The truth is, I didn’t remain in business that long. My early days in Colorado stretch all the way back to George Bush presidency. Like I said, figuring it out for myself, understanding there was a small business aspect to it, so I started thinking, “Hey. I’m going to move back to my hometown. I’m going to make a small business out of this. This is really a states right thing.” I really got things going.

When my store opened up, there was only like five or six shops open at the time in Colorado. And we opened up in Harmony Wellness right on I-25. 10, 11 years ago, I had a billboard on I-25 that basically said, “$9 grams. Exit here,” and people’s minds were blown. But that was before that regulation that Bob was talking about. And when I opened up, I opened up as a good person and with a good business model and a vision to normalize cannabis back then. And what I didn’t foresee… When I opened, I thought of the eight or nine shops that were open, I thought four or five of them were going to have to close because of me. And when I opened up, everything was going according to plan. We did like almost $100,000 in business our first month in this tiny little shop. For instance, my town had a budget of like 1.1 million and that year I think we gave him like a $100,000, unsolicited tax money, from our shop that year.

Derek Cumings: When I opened, like I said, I thought all these people were going to close. And then Barack Obama became president, and all of a sudden it was like the flood gates opened, and instead of me closing a bunch of shops, people went into my shop openly with notebooks asking questions and shops literally started springing up all over. So we were in business about two years and that law shut down or it basically gave everybody the opportunity to opt out. And my town, of which I had government officials that were my patients and actually providing cannabis to my other patients for me, they just were sort of overwhelmed by a couple of the town board members and they were inundated with license applications in one week, so they shut it all down and they ended up closing me.

They kept saying, “Hey, it’s not you, but it’s all these other people,” and I’m like, “Yeah. I told you guys. We should’ve had rules.” Without that regulation, people just… It would’ve taken a while for the Wild Wild West to calm down. They were just tiptoeing into the legality of weed. The public didn’t have a stomach to let natural attrition happen from entrepreneurs making it and then it’s failing and so all those businesses got forced into the system.

And at the time I’d been making my own edibles, and my business partner was going to go do a doctor referral thing and I remember very specifically she said, she’s like, “You’re going to do your little edible thing?” And I was like, “Wow.” I just built all this up and you minimized everything. So I had that in my back pocket and was basically working as a consultant and taking meetings with different people for different reasons over gardening with one of my good buddies, Adam Dunn.

We happened to have a meeting with Rick and Bob, and they were making edibles, baked goods, out of this little kitchen. It piqued my interest that they had a kitchen and had the legit… they already had their license. All the shit that I had went through, they had got through all of that and they didn’t have a product. They were making popcorn and brownies, and albeit the best weed brownie I’d ever tasted. I already knew from having a shop that that was only going to last a couple of days. And for me to sell fresh baked goods at my shop was really hard, and it was my shop, so to try to add in their distribution and time for it to sit on another shelf, I knew right away that they had the mindset and the infrastructure to succeed but they had the wrong product line.

So I suggested that, “Hey. I made these candy bars for the last year of my dispensary.” I remember I set another meeting with them a couple days later and I went to my storage unit and I got candy bars that I had made about 9, 10 months earlier, and I brought them back to that meeting and was like, “Hey. The shelf life on your brownie, it’s already getting hard, but check out these chocolate bars.” And they’re like, “Oh, nice. When’d you make these?” I was like, “Last winter.” And I think the light bulb went off and I said, “What you should do is, ditch this idea of baked goods, make these candy bars. Switch over to BHO, an oil that’s easier to regulate or easier to dose into your products and let’s work something out.”

That was me meeting Rick and Bob and having that… I just dropped the mic. I said, “Hey. You guys should fuck this business, switch to edibles or switch to candy bars. I’m out. Figure it out.” And they wanted to buy my recipes and this and that and I was like, “No. It’s a bigger deal than that. Make me part of the thing and let’s figure it out.” And that led to about a eight-year handshake deal that we had before it was all finalized in the end, but that’s how we all came together and started the original chocolate line.

Bob Eschino: That’s right. Right about the time we met him, we were coming to the same realization that… Rick came from a bakery background. So as you’re making cookies, and brownies, and apricot bars, and carrot cake, and all of those things that we were going to do when we were making, you build in that waste. You build in throwing away 30% to 40% of your product because it’s going to go bad sitting on someone’s shelf. But once we came to the realization that we’re not throwing away around a brownie, we’re throwing away THC. We are throwing away medicine. That was right about the time the universe brought Derek into our door and went, “We’re turning it into an oil. It’s going to be more stable. We’re going to put it in more shelf-stable products,” and everything came together and off we went.

TG Branfalt: It’s a really unbelievable story.

Bob Eschino: It is.

TG Branfalt: In 2011, from what I’ve read, you guys were the first company to test all oil and batch products, in 2012, you were the first to add nutritional information, and in 2013 you added milligrams per dose to edible packaging, which none of this yet was a requirement. None of this was a state mandate. What led you guys to enact those policies without these government mandates?

Derek Cumings: One of the biggest drivers was, really just wanting to be truthful. It was at a time where I had started using oil because it was easier for me to understand… If somebody used a gram of the dirtiest hash oil in the world, their math started with a thousand milligrams. And I had a very good realization that this is not pure THC. So when we were doing calculations before testing, I was basing it on very unscientific thoughts, based on clarity, and taste, and this and that, but I could tell how good the oil was. I would put it between somewhere between 60%, 70%, 75%. The highest we ever went with anything would be like 80%.

And at the time, everybody else is just absolute bullshit. They’re selling, hey, this was weed butter that was made with a hundred milligrams of THC oil. And it was weed butter that they made a pound of butter with one gram of shitty hash, so the pound of butter, total only had like maybe 400, maybe 300 milligrams of THC and then they break that up into a thousand cookies and then they’re telling people that… It didn’t add up. Meanwhile, we’re making products based on the knowledge that, hey, this is only this much oil and we’re dosing it appropriately. So when that testing came out everyone was like, “The gig is up.” And with us, people had for years told us, “Your products are too strong,” and we were just saying, “No. We’re just truthful.”

And there was like a great awakening. When everybody else had this, come to Jesus with testing, it was more like, we got a better scope, and we were able to dial it in better. But we were already in the range to put it where people are like, “Wow. All products… All hundred milligrams are supposed to hit like this.” And that’s the truth. Instead of it being such a discrepancy, it was the equaling of the playing field when it came to other products.

There was product after product, after product, after product that tested. A 50 milligram gummy, 2.5 milligrams. Like there’s a 100 milligram brownie, it test as 11 milligrams. And in all of those testing, like I remember the big one that was done by the local news station, the big revelation with us was, “Oh, they’re too strong. Look. Their hundred milligram product is 112 milligrams.” And we’re like, “Yes.” Everyone else is being exposed and you’re doing a news story that’s basically telling everybody, yep, these guys are actually putting more. I’m like, “That’s a good one for us. That’s a free… Let’s use that as a commercial.”

Bob Eschino: Rick and Josh, who our other partners, they came from the bakery world. When we first started exploring this, when I did and Rick, when we started asking people about edibles, what we found is, most people were afraid of edibles. In Colorado, back in 2010, on the label it was one times, two times, three times strength. What the fuck does that mean? That’s how scientific it was. It meant nothing. Someone said, “Hey. This is extra strong. This is three times strength.” Well, what is strength? What does that mean? So when we started asking around and finding out that people weren’t testing and didn’t know how much of their most important ingredient they were putting in their products, that’s when a light bulb went off for us as well, which is, we’re selling THC. I’m not selling a chocolate bar, we’re not selling a brownie. We’re selling medicine, so we need to find out how much medicine we are putting in all of our products and that’s really where it all… It all started there.

Things like nutritionals. That’s just what they did. Rick and Josh put nutritionals in all of their products. Always. So we set up a bakery planning to be inspected. Planning for the health department to come in. Planning for the FDA to one day look at our packaging, and look at our nutritionals, and look at the process and be inspected. We just always waited. And I think it was three years before a health department official walked through our doors at the kitchen. Three years. And they came in and went, “Oh, shit. You have a HACCP plan?” “Yes, we have a HACCP plan. We’ve had a HACCP plan since we opened the doors three years ago. We’ve just been waiting for you to get here.”

So for us it was just normal. It was normal business. It was, we’re going to make a quality product. We’re going to tell people what we’re selling them, which was THC. And Derek and Josh became the experts on extraction and dosing and zeroing those things in to make sure that we were making accurate and consistent products. And once people realized that, hey, a square of this chocolate bar is going to do the same thing to me every time I take it, and I don’t have to be afraid of it because it’s going to be consistent, that’s when things… Our growth was exponential. Once people in our market realized what we were doing and how we were doing it and that we were putting out a consistent product that they could trust, the light bulb went on.

TG Branfalt: I want to ask each of you this sort of individually, but how challenging was that R&D period for you guys?

Derek Cumings: Well, for me specifically, it was a crazy time because I went from basically being a garbage man where I could get a free ounce of weed from one of my caregiver buddies if I dealt with taking their shit. Their stems and their trim, because that was just more hustle. If they didn’t have to go to the dump, better for them. So they would give me a little VIG in order to take care of that for them. And then I started doing my R&D and making my own little products. And then all of a sudden, the guys were like, “Hey. Why don’t we work something out on that?” And then it went to, “Hey. Why don’t you just buy this trim from me?” And I’m like, “Man, you used to pay me to take this.” Then it was free, now I have to pay you.

And then as we got into that relationship with Rick and Bob and other dispensaries, the price of R&D… I’ll be honest. I learned R&D on such a small scale because I had like one or two grams of oil and I’d be trying to make a new product. I remember… I don’t want to say anyone’s name, but one of their really experienced guys that had come from this kitchen world is in on the R&D now. And we’re having this meeting and he tells me that he needs some oil for R&D, I’m like, “Okay.” And I’m thinking about how I’ve done R&D in my life. I asked him how much he needed and he said, “I don’t know. A few quarts.” And I was like, “Dude. I don’t think you understand what the oil is, dude. We don’t have a few quartz in-house. I don’t know what you’re talking about.” So the ability to sort of scale up and do more R&D with more access to larger batches, it became fun.

And then also, all the things that Bob was talking about, those are the things that I saw right away. In our first meeting, Rick is telling me how Udi’s, they would make muffins for the Boulder County school district. He’d make something like [crosstalk 00:23:21]-

Bob Eschino: 40,000 a day.

Derek Cumings: 40,000 a day or something. And they all adhered to Michelle Obama’s recent nutritional guidelines. And in my head I’m like, “Man, these guys are going to have a better time sourcing ingredients, batching up the recipes.” Like specifically with the… I remember I had found the perfect strawberry to add. And it wasn’t a dried strawberry, it was a freeze-dried strawberry. It stayed crunchy in the chocolate. So I was all excited because I found this company that made these freeze-dried strawberries and they were the ones we had to go with. So when I’m introducing them to the strawberry crunch bar, we’re making it. I’m like, “Really, it’s got to be these strawberries.”

And I come back in a couple of weeks and they’ve not only found the distributor of the strawberries, they went to that distributor of the strawberries and they got the strawberries. And then the next update was, “Hey, guess what? We now got the strawberries from the strawberries strawberry guy and we cut a deal with them because we’re taking the bits and pieces instead of the full cut strawberries that go into the packaging, which saves us because then we don’t have to chop them up.” And I was like, “Man. These guys are not only using my strawberries, they’re using… They cut to the main source of the strawberries plus they’re getting a deal on it.” So all of those things got scaled up so big that R&D these days are a lot different. But I still like to think of things very individually. And if I’m thinking of a new product, I got to figure out how to make one before you make a thousand of them.

And a lot of times there’s hiccups in between there, where you have a product that might do great but it’s for a small scale operator because if you have huge distribution, you’re going to reach a maximum input point where you can’t jump to the next level. So there’s a bunch of great businesses that are set for small companies, but there’s products that large companies, if you have that distribution ring, you need to be able to churn out a million of them, not just a thousand of them. But if you’re trying to fill one store, a thousand of them is perfect. So if you know your height and where you’re trying to be, that’s the best way to judge. Even in R&D, that’s the best way to judge where you’re going, is try and aim for somewhere and start small.

Bob Eschino: But you have to be able to scale. We’ve got so many products that we don’t sell anymore because we can’t scale them. We couldn’t make them efficiently enough. What we’ve realized here in Colorado over the last decade, especially now more than ever, people are buying THC. They don’t care what you wrap it in. People don’t want to pay more than $15 for a hundred milligrams of THC. So I don’t care what you put. I don’t care if it’s in a brownie, a cookie, a chocolate bar wrapped in gold, I’m paying you 15 bucks. So you have to be able to make products that really hit the market and that the people will buy. Because I can make a $40, 100-milligram product, people aren’t going to buy it.

TG Branfalt: It’s probably delicious.

Bob Eschino: Oh, no, they’re great. Yeah. We have this sprouted seed, date-based nutritional bar that we used to make called …. People loved that thing. But we couldn’t make it efficiently enough. And then the new stamping rules and regulations came out and then we couldn’t make it. We couldn’t make it compliant with the state. So that’s one of those products that we would have loved to bring back out because people loved that thing but with the rules and regulations, and then the cost of materials going into it, it’s a product that… If we could bring it back out, we’ll probably only sell minimal amounts here in the state anymore.

TG Branfalt: You guys, your company had a role at the table when they were devising government regulations. And not a lot of people know what that experience is like, so the first thing I want to ask is, what was that experience like coming from the background that you came from and now sitting at the table… And you’ve already been sort of forward-thinking with nutritional information and milligrams per dose. Describe that early experience.

Derek Cumings: Before Bob talks about what it is and now and what it’s grown into, I would like to just highlight this one golden era of time, where people were actually genuinely, innocently ignorant and dying for the information. Because if you go back far enough… Like my first meetings, I had meetings with the City of Denver, with the fire department, the city planners, engineers. I’m explaining literally to a room of 30 people who are absolutely silent, just listening on how to use a closed loop extractor.

And that timeframe, from helping the fire department to the… I’ve worked hand-in-hand with the mayors of these towns, the town boards. Working with them when they all wanted to know, before everybody thought they fucking knew everything, was such a genuinely beautiful time, that I’m glad I participated then. Because now it got to be such an art just to be able to get in, get past everybody else that’s peddling bullshit to get your five minutes to be able to speak the truth to someone, or they would already have their own experts. It changed so fast and so rapidly that there was that one genuinely golden time where we got to go explain to the captive audience at the state house how a closed loop worked. And I swear to God, within 12 months, the government is selling their services as consultants to other states all around as experts and I’m like, “Wait minute. Where’s my cut?” Basically Bob made it so… I mean, all of those opportunities made it so I was going to pull my hair out and Bob made it so everybody would still listen. There you go.

Bob Eschino: That’s why I have no hair. Correct. And we learned very early on that if we weren’t sitting at the table, people were going to make rules and regulations for us. As that started to happen, we very quickly started to become more involved because you had to. Like Derek said, it was great for a lot of years, being able to help and being there as… You said it earlier, that Derek and I came from kind of the same place of wanting to help people.

10 years ago in Colorado, almost everybody with a license came from that place. There weren’t very many people who thought it was going to be a moneymaker, who thought they were going to get rich. It was people who had a personal story with the plant who went and got a license. And working with those people early on… I’m still friends with a lot of them today. We all just had our 10-year anniversary because we were all in that line together 10 years ago when we got our licenses. And to watch all of those companies grow and be successful and do what they wanted to do has been great for me and really cool for me to watch.

But sitting in the rooms with those types of people and talking with regulators, and government officials, and fire departments, and health departments, and really trying to do the right thing and trying to put regulations in place that not only protected the patients, but allowed us as businesses to be successful and then allowed the state to be successful, to regulate us. Because we were used to regulation coming from the bakery world. We wanted regulations for the industry so everybody was responsible. So everybody had to be professional. So the patients could get the products that they wanted.

Just like Derek said, there was a lot of people who were peddling bullshit. Who were selling 250 milligram products that had two milligrams of THC in it. And then you wonder why it’s not working for a patient, you wonder why a patient’s not getting healthy and they’re not getting some sort of relief. So, us being in a position to put the things in place that we put in place and do nutritionals and marking and stamping products and testing everything, those became the basic framework for what the MED did. Because they would see what we did, and went, “I want everybody to do that.” Everybody in the state should be doing that. They should be following those SOPs.

So the things that used to set us apart are now entry level in Colorado. If you’re not triple testing your products, you can’t get a license. If you’re not putting nutritionals, you can’t get a license. If you’re not marking and stamping, if you’re not a compliance company first in Colorado, you can’t get a license. So those are all the things that we started out doing and now, not only is Colorado kind of the pinnacle of that, it’s been the framework, unfortunately not well enough, but for the rest of the country.

So I traveled across the country for years trying to teach regulators what we had taught the regulators in Colorado is, here’s a good framework. Start with where Colorado is. It’s not perfect but it’s pretty damn good. And the frustrating part for me was, everybody thought they could do it better. And every state, nah, I’m not going to… We’re going to set our own rules and regulations because we’re going to do it better. And right now, Colorado in my mind is still the best for rules and regulations that not only protects the patients, it allows us to have a successful company and it allows the state rules to regulate us by. So they can come in and go, “Hey, you need to do this, this and this.” And if we do this, this, and this, we’re putting out products that are good for the patients.

TG Branfalt: Do you think that your experience, not only in the early days of Colorado but also in the state that sort of advises other states on legalization, do you think that that’s helped you adapt to different states as you’ve entered their markets?

Bob Eschino: Definitely. The reality is, is we’re a compliance company first. So when a new state opens, I don’t care what their rules are, I just want to be able to read them and understand them. And we have. We have walked into other states and said, “Here’s your rules. We’re going to follow these,” but we immediately get involved with trying to change those rules to make them smarter. To make the system better for the people in that state. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t. But it doesn’t matter to us. You tell us what the rules are and we’re going to follow them, because we don’t want to lose the license. We want to partner up with people in other states who see the same vision we do which is, you got to be compliant. If you’re not a compliance company first, you’re not going to have a license too long. So, as long as you’re working within the rules and frameworks of your state, we can make products. We can make products that patients will learn to love and trust. Just tell me what those rules are.

TG Branfalt: For you guys, which emerging market is most exciting? I mean, New Jersey, it’s going to vote next month, along with a couple other states that are Florida. No, not Florida. Maybe …

Bob Eschino: Florida just approved edibles so that’s going to be an exciting state for us. California is still going to be the Mecca as soon as they figure it out. Even with a terrible system, California right now is the 800 pound gorilla. They outsell every state and they haven’t figured it out yet. But I’m excited to see what happens with the East Coast, because I spent a lot of years up and down the East Coast where they were banning hydrocarbon extractions and banning edibles. Those are the things that we do. That’s what we do for a living, and everywhere up and down the East Coast, those things were getting banned. So I spent a lot of time and a lot of years out there trying to talk to regulators to make them understand that hydrocarbon extractions need to be done by licensed manufacturers. People who understand it.

They hear the horror stories about people open blasting in their basements and blowing up their mom’s house, and we go, “You’re right. That’s the scary part.” But if you don’t make it legal for me to do it or another manufacturer to do it in your state, every kid with a PVC pipe and a coffee filter is going to open blast in their mom’s basement. So the products don’t go away, you just need to put them into the hands of people who have something to lose and who want to do the right thing. So you need to be able to do extracts, you need to be able to do edibles, because if you don’t, people are making edibles at home. They’re not tested. They’re not dosed properly. They’re not packaged in child resistant opaque packages. They’re not marked and stamped for when they’re out of the packages.

So all of you states who are afraid of these things happening, if you don’t put rules and regulations in place to allow a manufacturer to do that, you’re creating your own problem, because now they have to be made at home by people who don’t have the expertise to do it and who aren’t following these rules and regulations, and then they’re selling them on Craigslist. They’re not checking IDs.

Our competition, which I have said for a decade now, is not other licensed manufacturers, it’s the black market, and the gray market. That’s our competition. You need to figure out a way to build a robust system in your state that entices people to come into regulated shops and buy things competitively priced against the black market. Not against other licensed dispensaries. Because everybody buying cannabis in an unlicensed state has an illegal guy in their phone. That’s who they’re using. So that’s my competition. And if I don’t give you a better product at a better price, that’s tested and clean in a safer environment to buy it in, they’re just going to keep calling the guy they’ve called for the last 10 years.

And regulators, it’s hard for them to hear that and it’s hard for them to understand that. We’re not creating a cannabis market, the cannabis market’s already in your state. Do you want to regulate it? Do you want to make it safer? Do you want to create jobs? Do you want to create tax revenue for your state? We can help you do that. That’s the ultimate goal, is to make those things happen. But you’re taking the business from people who already have the business. So if you make it so impossible…

I forget where I was, I think it might’ve been Maryland. I was looking at the licensing fees and all of the things that you needed to do to start a business. But do you understand that with your current patient count, just to open the door, just to pay for your licensing fees, I need to make $500 off of every patient before I even sell them a product.

TG Branfalt: Wow.

Bob Eschino: Then you’re already killing your market. You need to be able to make these things affordable for patients and to make these things affordable for the adult use market. The reason you don’t make liquor in your bathtub anymore is because you can walk to any store, get any flavor, any color, any potency, so inexpensively. It doesn’t make sense for you to try to make those things at home or to risk your freedom for what amounts to be a $15 an hour job. The allure is there’s still big money to be made in illegal states and until that changes, until there’s federal regulations or all the states become legal, it’s hard to have a real industry.

TG Branfalt: Derek, what’s your reaction when you hear or you see a news story about somebody who blows themselves up doing these home extractions and then you hear government regulators or politicians come out and demean or sort of demonize the process? What’s your reaction when you see that cycle?

Derek Cumings: There’s two reactions. One of them is, I want ignorant people to become educated people. I’m happy to dedicate my time to helping those people. Then there’s another reaction to the people that have been educated and they’re just assholes taking advantage of propaganda. Because the truth is, you never hear anything about Pfizer running into problems because somebody blew up a trailer park making meth. No one’s going after any of the pharmaceutical companies that produce Adderall or any of those other amphetamine-based products based on what happens with the meth houses on the corner. So because in people’s brains it’s still a short skip from weed to drug dealer, they just take it.

I mean, there’s a bunch of things in our industry that that’s the same thing, like regulatory takings, for example. When they just closed my business, they just said, “Peace out.” They didn’t give a shit that I owed people money, nothing. And in the real world if they did that, they would have to pay me to at least fair market value of what they closed. But because weed is still sort of just allowed, those things aren’t taken… it’s treated differently and unfairly, but that’s the truth. And there’s a normalization that’s happening across the board and eventually it’ll all shake out, but certainly the difference in the amount of time has been hard to live through.

Like there was a time when there was absolutely one video on YouTube about making hash oil. It was a Rick Simpson video where he basically poured naphtha out of a can that had a skull and crossbones onto it into a orange Home Depot bucket and stirred that shit up with a fucking dirty broom handle. At the time, I was part of a early marijuana podcast called John Doe Radio. We had these people saying, “You should make a video, Derek,” and I was like, “Fuck no, dude.” I knew this was a dangerous thing I was doing. I was scared every time because I was open blasting. And I’m like, “I’m not making a fucking video about this.” And I would go and search, and search, and then another video pops up. And it’s a classic, where these kids put a pan of alcohol-based hash oil on the fucking burner in their oven. The pan splits, the alcohol floods the burner, and the dude’s screaming, “My house is on fire. My house is on fire.” It was hilarious.

In a legal market, where regulation was encouraged, I came up with some ideas. I bought five or six closed loop systems. None of those companies wanted to listen to me as a maker so I end up making my own system. And the system that we made is still in use today. It’s used by five or six of the biggest hash companies in Colorado. It’s a passive unit that has no pumps or ancillary bullshit to go wrong with it. We just based it on simplicity and being able to keep running because we needed so much oil. And that’s why I said in the beginning I went and talked to the fire department. I was happy to help them.

And once somebody knows, they’re like, “Oh, my God. You think he was open blasting?” I still have people anytime there’s a fire or explosion they’re like, “Hey. Do you think this is open blasting?” And they’ll send me the news article and you can usually tell right away. Oftentimes in the newspaper picture, you’ll be able to see a telltale clue like, oh, this is going to be a BHO case. The kickback from it, it’s just unfair.

And like I said, if it’s somebody that’s just ignorant, when they learn they’re like, “Oh. It definitely should be regulated.” And if it’s somebody like Smart Moms, they already know and they’re just trying to use that story as propaganda to eliminate… There’s no putting toothpaste back in the tube. Just doesn’t go away. Like Bob was saying, it’s not going to… Just because you banned the… If you ban guns, only the fucking bad guys have guns. It’s not like anybody’s going to have a line for criminals to turn their shit in where they’re happy to say, “I heard these are no good anymore.” You’re just creating that opportunity. And sadly, you have a lot of…

Now, it’s even more dangerous because there’s a lot of illicit labs that are using closed loop systems that aren’t necessarily rated for a real market. There’s a couple of companies that that’s their entire job, and their existence in the cannabis space is determining which of these units are safe and which are not safe and certifying them as safe. And we got kids, they’re still in the homemade lab but they’re upgrading their equipment, but they’re not upgrading it to certified equipment.

And I’m almost more scared for those guys because they’re putting things under more pressure and they’re using more butane. The open blasting guys are sort of limited to a smaller amount. I’ve seen some accidents. There’s a terrible video of a closed loop accident, I think it was in New Mexico, that they used on the news and I’ve seen fire departments use it as propaganda and saying, “Look. closed loop still has problems.” Sure they had a closed loop system but if you watch the video carefully, the guy is using like a Wagner heat gun directly on the butane, and then when it blows up, he tries to run out the door and the door opens inwards. Immediately in my mind, I was like, “Dude. This isn’t a regulated situation.” This should be in a, you can’t use a heat gun. You can’t be in a doorway that comes inward. That’s definitely not a booth. They’re still using propaganda wrong.

Because the truth is, America, we cut our teeth doing dangerous shit. Going back into the 40s, 50s, and 60s, once we figure out how to do something, and then they make it safe. And it used to be, people had to die. This is the first case preemptively, they stepped in and they made all these regulations. We’re in like most, if not all, places where there’s regulated extraction, you’re under a Class I, Division 1 regulation, which is the most stringent environment regulation that you can get no matter what you’re doing. So if you’re following those rules, you’re, literally, at the very upper echelon of what OSHA and what federal regulations hold people expectant to. And I don’t think we have any deaths. So if you look back-

Bob Eschino: We haven’t even had a single explosion in Colorado in a licensed facility.

TG Branfalt: Really?

Bob Eschino: There hasn’t even been a severe accident, so-

Derek Cumings: And when you look at-

Bob Eschino: … we’ve done it correctly.

Derek Cumings: Yeah. When you look at industry, it’s a terrible tragedy, but it’s one that’s accepted because we need industry to keep moving. But if you look at how many people die in industrial accidents… We’re blessed that it’s been such a safe industry to work in but you need that groundwork. And there’s been places that said, “Oh. We’re going to leave that up to the people.” Nah. You can’t leave that up to the people, you just got to say, “Hey.”

And even in the beginning, people, they were wishy-washy between which way they were going to go. I was just openly advocating for them to give us a Class I, Division 1. Hey, just give us this because then everybody can achieve this level of compliance and that’s it. As a consultant, or a hash maker, or as a company, you need those concrete guidelines to be able to move forward. And especially if you’re trying to expand in other places, if you make things that are… I love it when they make universal regulations like, “Hey. Let’s just go with this Class I, Division 1 across the board.” I wish they would do it with things like every state has their own universal symbol. So there’s still some sort of… At some point, someone’s going to introduce federal regulation for universal cannabis guidelines but we have to get enough states on board and people behind that because you don’t want a whole mishmash of different regulations and I think we’re still trudging through those waters right now.

TG Branfalt: Well, I mean, it’s something they’re looking at. On the East Coast, the governors of Connecticut, and New Jersey, and Pennsylvania, and New York, have all gotten together and they sort of want to legalize all at once and end this whole thing. Anyway, we had to skip over a lot of stuff on this list. I definitely want to revisit this maybe with you guys individually at some point and get a little bit deeper into your stories because they’re so sort of unique and you guys have so much insight. But before we go, just briefly tell me what advice you guys would have for entrepreneurs.

Bob Eschino: I tell people whenever I speak, do the right thing. You’re a compliance company. If you’re not coming in to the cannabis space to follow the rules and do the right thing, don’t come. Because you’re not building a business, you’re building an industry. And I realized that eight, nine years ago, that people have literally given their lives and their freedom to get the ball into my hands. And my job is to not screw that up moving forward. My job is to make sure that the industry grows. That the industry moves forward in a responsible and respectful manner, because if it doesn’t, we’re not going to have cannabis be available across the country to patients.

Just like Derek was talking, you’ve got to do the right thing because every at-home explosion is a black eye for the industry. So we’ve got to pull those things out of the conversation. And we have to make sure that as an industry and as companies coming into this industry, that we’re doing the right thing so the next state can become legal. And so the country can become legal. So we can grow the industry to a point where patients can get their medication.

TG Branfalt: What about you, Derek? What do you say to entrepreneurs?

Derek Cumings: I would say… It used to be… My advice was more simple because I would just tell people keep your eye on the prize and be willing to grind and there’s no weekends. All of that. But everyone should already know that. If you have a dream and you want to make something work, those are the things that everybody that… If you are a true entrepreneur, you understand that hustle and you’re getting home from your job and you’re busting your ass until, I don’t know, if you have to feed your kids, or if you don’t have kids until you have to go to bed and you’re up late and you’re always on that grind. I hate to say it but even if you have that spirit, you still need to have a couple of things go your way. I would say you need to get lucky but a lot of times luck is just opportunity presented to somebody who’s prepared.

So I would say one of my best pieces of advice is pick your partners wisely because it’s rare that if you’re the entrepreneur, if you’re the idea guy, you probably don’t have the partners lined up or the backing, you just got your one little dream and you’re holding onto it or you’re doing it yourself, or you’re trying to move forward. You got to pick your partners wisely for where you want to go and what you want to do. A decade ago, I picked these guys out because I thought, “Hey, man. I had a dream at one point that my candy bars were going to make it into 7/11,” and then I got snuffed out completely. People tell me, “Man, you have a small piece of that pie over there,” and I’m like, “Dude, I would much rather have a small piece of this giant pie than my empty pie tin.”

I lost my opportunity and was sort of on the verge of… Several times in this weed thing, I’ve looked at it like, I’ve given up. I’ve wanted to give up like, “Oh, man, I missed it. I missed it.” And then I realize, oh, man, all we’re doing is still… Everybody’s still just warming up and jogging around the block and tying their shoes, getting ready for the marathon. Nobody missed anything yet. Still today. There’s still opportunity to really get out there.

But you got to pick people that you trust and that have the same sort of like goals in the beginning because, like I said, when I met these guys I pictured it being a nationwide brand and through these guys we’ve partnered up with everybody. All of the bigger fish above us that now are in the show. And incredibles will be one of the biggest brands ever and we’re working on these other brands and it’s just a playground now. But if I didn’t make a deal where I had to have faith that these guys were going to do the right thing… It took, like I said, eight years to work it out. And I see people that work on something for two months and they think that their time’s up. You got to put in time if you want something. I went from the state telling me I should just draw disability to, in my mind starting one of the most important brands in cannabis, and I couldn’t have done it if I didn’t have the right partners.

TG Branfalt: I’ve asked that question probably for three years now and it’s rare that you get sort of answers that are differently the same from people who have worked together for so long. I think that throughout this conversation it’s very apparent how passionate you guys are. Not just about the industry but the relationship to your brand and your company. I really want to thank you guys for being on the show. I really do hope that we can have another conversation, be it with you guys, or the other partners, or individually because, as I said, 10 years is a lifetime in this industry. You look at Maine, Vermont, they just come online, they just passed legalization sales, respectively, and a lot of those businesses aren’t going to be around in 10 years, and we know that, so congratulations on your longevity celebrating 10 years in a-

Bob Eschino: Thank you.

TG Branfalt: … very sort of strange industry. I definitely hope to have you guys on the show again and keep an eye on everything you’re doing.

Bob Eschino: And as these states go legal, we want to help. We’re looking for licensed partners. We can bring 10 years of experience to your licensed company to help you grow and to help you do the right things. That’s what we do now. We’re already established here in Colorado and we’re ready to take Nove, which is high-end filled chocolate, and our Quiq line which is fast-acting. We want to take those products to new states and we want to help people do the right thing and get medicine into patient’s hands. You can go to medicallycorrect.com and check out the website and see what we’re doing. It’s been great. Thanks for having us.

TG Branfalt: Bob Eschino is the co-founder and president, and Derek Cumings, the co-founder of Medically Correct, a Colorado-based firm whose brands include incredibles, Quiq, trupura CBD, Clear Creek Extracts, and Nove, which sounds delicious and is coming this winter.

Bob Eschino: It’s pretty good.

TG Branfalt: You can find more episodes of the Ganjapreneur.com podcast in the podcast section of Ganjapreneur.com on Spotify and in the Apple iTunes Store. On the Ganjapreneur.com website, you will find the latest cannabis news and cannabis jobs updated daily along with transcripts of this podcast. You can also download the Ganjapreneur.com app in iTunes and Google Play. This episode was engineered by Trim Media House. I’ve been your host, TG Branfalt.

End

New York Gov. Calls for Legalization & New Cannabis Management Office

1/07/2021

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New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D) on Wednesday announced a proposal to create an Office of Cannabis Management which would oversee the state’s medical cannabis and hemp programs, along with an adult-use cannabis regime once approved by lawmakers.

The move telegraphs the governor’s plan to include legalization in his Executive Budget for the third time – in 2019 and 2020 Cuomo had included the reforms as part of his annual budget request but both times was rebuffed by lawmakers.

Cuomo said that the coronavirus pandemic had created “many challenges” for the state but “also created a number of opportunities to correct longstanding wrongs and build New York back better than ever before.”

“Not only will legalizing and regulating the adult-use cannabis market provide the opportunity to generate much-needed revenue, but it also allows us to directly support the individuals and communities that have been most harmed by decades of cannabis prohibition.” – Cuomo in a statement

According to the governor’s office, once fully implemented, cannabis legalization is expected to generate more than $300 million in tax revenues for the state. In November, Cuomo said he expected legalization to pass during the next session “because the state is desperate for funding.”

In 2019, Cuomo had included the reforms as part of his budget platform; however, the plan faced strong resistance from the New York State Sheriff’s Association, the New York State Parents Teachers Association, a statewide physicians lobby, drug treatment advocates, Smart Approaches to Marijuana, and moderate downstate Democrats. Instead, lawmakers agreed to expand the state’s cannabis decriminalization thresholds from 25 grams to 57 grams and lower the maximum penalties for possession to $200. The measure also included provisions for expungement of low-level cannabis crimes.

Last session, the reforms were pulled from budget talks amid the pandemic, as Cuomo said the state would pass a “bare-bones” budget in the face of an extraordinary budget shortfall caused, in part, by the economic shutdown in the state. Using the budget as a vehicle to legalize cannabis was not a slam dunk for Cuomo anyway prior to the pandemic as the governor and lawmakers reportedly had disagreements over how the revenues would be disbursed.

Many expected that Cuomo would again push for broad legalization in the budget after voters in New Jersey approved the reforms in November. New York is also bordered by Vermont, Massachusetts, and Canada – all of which have legalized cannabis for adults.

End

Will Read: Normalizing Cannabis Through Smart Marketing

12/02/2020

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Between strict regulations that vary from state to state and the long-lasting remnants of anti-cannabis rhetoric and stigmas, cannabis marketing is an inherently tricky job. The challenge, however, has prompted experts like Will Read — whose company CannaPlanners is dedicated to helping cannabis entrepreneurs find success despite the odds stacked against them — to prioritize simple aspects of brand building, such as a professional and inclusive brand experience.

Will recently joined our podcast host TG Branfalt to discuss cannabis marketing strategies, the prospects for an adult-use cannabis market in Vermont and other New England states, Will’s advice for what makes a strong cannabis brand, and more!

Tune in via the media player below or scroll down for a full transcript of this week’s Ganjapreneur.com Podcast episode.

Listen to the podcast:

Read the transcript:

Commercial: At Ganjapreneur, we have heard from dozens of cannabis business owners who have encountered the issue of cannabias, which is when a mainstream business, whether a landlord, bank or some other provider of vital business services refuses to do business with them simply because of their association with cannabis. We have even heard stories of businesses being unable to provide health and life insurance for their employees because the insurance providers were too afraid to work with them. We believe that this fear is totally unreasonable and that cannabis business owners deserve access to the same services and resources that other businesses are afforded, that they should be able to hire consultation to help them follow the letter of the law in their business endeavors, and that they should be able to provide employee benefits without needing to compromise on the quality of coverage they can offer.

This is why we created the Ganjapreneur.com business service directory, a resource for cannabis professionals to find and connect with service providers who are cannabis friendly and who are actively seeking cannabis industry clients. If you are considering hiring a business consultant, lawyer, accountant, web designer, or any other ancillary service for your business, go to Ganjapreneur.com/businesses to browse hundreds of agencies, firms, and organizations who support cannabis legalization, and who want to help you grow your business.

With so many options to choose from in each service category, you will be able to browse company profiles and do research on multiple companies in advance so you can find the provider who is the best fit for your particular need. Our business service directory is intended to be a useful and well-maintained resource, which is why we individually vet each listing that is submitted. If you are a business service provider who wants to work with cannabis clients, you may be a good fit for our service directory. Go to Ganjapreneur.com/businesses to create your profile and start connecting with cannabis entrepreneurs today.

TG Branfalt: Hey there, I’m your host TG Branfalt and thank you for listening to the Ganjapreneur.com podcast, where we try to bring you actionable information and normalize cannabis through the stories of ganjapreneurs, activists, and industry stakeholders. Today I’m joined by Will Read, he’s the founder and president of CannaPlanners, a Vermont-based website and marketing company specializing in the needs of the cannabis industry and this is Will’s second time on the podcast. And so I guess that makes you a friend of the show.

Will Read: It’s my third time, but who’s counting.

TG Branfalt: We’re not going to talk about the lost ‘second episode.’

Will Read: Yeah the infamous last pizza tapes.

TG Branfalt: So, before we sort of get into this episode, man, just remind people about your background and how you ended up in the space.

Will Read: Sure. It’s great question. I think like a lot of guests I’ve been a casual participant in the cannabis community for almost my entire life, so I’ve always had a passion there. I started CannaPlanners in 2015 after coming out of an agency that was dedicated to sort of supporting a specific part of a specific industry, nothing to do with cannabis, but they were experts in marketing and creating digital experiences around this one part of an industry. So in Vermont, as legalization started to percolate in the early 2010s, I started to do a little more due diligence, a little bit of entrepreneurial research into kind of where I might fit into this thing. I think a lot of people are because there’s no book on this thing and there’s very few people saying, “Hey, come on in and let me show you how to be part of this industry.”

A lot of us have to figure it out on our own. I think we all do. So it was really doing a little due diligence. I took a trip out to Colorado to see what their legal market was looking like and the first thing that hit me was at the time, lack of experience, and this is everything from conceptual branding, packaging design, and especially in-store experience. I had a short career…well, not short. I was with Apple for about six years. So that Kool-Aid, I definitely drank that Kool-Aid about the importance of experience and even the psychology behind opening a package is far more important to the consumer than what’s actually in the package.

So going out to Colorado and now of course, everything everywhere kind of looks like an Apple store, but back then there was nothing but opportunity. So I started CannaPlanners and we started as a web agency — websites are the other biggest part of what we do. And that’s where we really started from, we developed a platform that we could sell affordably to cannabis companies, lots of mom and pop startups, lots of farmers, things like that in order to get them online quickly, right? And efficiently, and then quickly as we started building websites, the thing I immediately saw the need for was the actual creative, because people were still coming to us with subjectively or objectively, depending on your point of view, bad branding. So we started doing a lot of creative work and really helping companies that way. I don’t even know if I answered your question, but there was a bit of it.

TG Branfalt: Yeah. What do you sort of define in your estimation as bad branding?

Will Read: This is a great question. So I don’t want to be flippant in kind of the way I speak about it, but what I really mean is, so our mission, our superhero goal is normalization. We want this market to succeed. We want this industry to succeed and as I’m sure you know and as I’m sure any of your guests would attest or listeners would attest to, the market is still small, it’s very, very boutique. It’s only in a handful of states and of course we’re not even really talking about CBD yet, which is obviously in a boom. So all of these aspects and really the “normalization”, I think a lot of that can be accomplished. And really what I mean is the acceptance by older generations, by younger generations, just people who’ve been “brainwashed,” I’m using air quotes on Zoom, but brainwashed through the war on drugs, through rhetoric, whatever, to have a certain opinion about cannabis.

And traditionally, a lot of businesses have towed the line and really sort of marketed towards themselves towards the stoner culture and I appreciate that. I’m part of the stoner culture. I’m a stoner, but I’m also totally keenly aware of the potential that this industry has as it’s only touching a razor-thin margin of the entire potential marketplace.

So really what I’m saying is how can we move… When I say bad brands, really what I mean is, “How do we make brands more accessible?” That’s all I’m saying. When you see certain imagery and unfortunately it’s things like the cannabis leaf, it’s been stigmatized. The bright green cross, or even that neon green, a lot of these things have, again, we’re talking about psychology here, but they have a certain psychological effect that can do really one of two things, speak to one specific person and/or turn off the rest. Right? So we want to, our goal is just to really create professional, good-looking brands that can be applied to a cannabis space. And hopefully a little bit more broader of a consumer base.

TG Branfalt: Tell me a little bit more about how branding can help normalize cannabis. I mean, I understand what you’re getting at in terms of sort of this imagery, but sort take it a step further for me because this is really, really interesting.

Will Read: Sure. Yeah. So I think going back to my life at Apple, that unboxing. I can remember when iPad came out and for two weeks before iPad came out it was at a time when the Apple employee would actually unbox the thing for you and draw back the curtain. And there’s this whole allure around consumer products. And I think that’s something that cannabis has to some extent, but it needs even more just in terms of, again, bringing it to a more interesting place, not pigeonholing it or keeping it in line with the ways of the past. We’re just trying to break out of that.

So I think a specific logo for sure is important, but it translates to the whole thing of what we do. So for our retailers. It’s like, okay, we’ve built you this cool logo, and it’s on this awesome website that we’re maybe, excuse me, helping drive traffic to, but what are the rugs in the store? What kind of displays are you getting? How is this whole thing cohesive to an experience as opposed to just being a logo? You know what I mean?

TG Branfalt: Yeah. So since our last interview two years ago, you had started the company in 2015, as you said, our first real conversation was in 2018. You’ve been in the industry for a few years. It was still it was the year that Vermont legalized. And so we had talked quite a bit about that and the CBD and hemp market wasn’t as large as it is now.

Will Read: Oh, man. Yeah.

TG Branfalt: So tell me about how your business has grown since our last interview two years ago.

Will Read: Insanely. And really we’re just busy. Okay, so CBD has fundamentally changed our company. We’re now far more stable than maybe other startups that are kind of point are, luckily people are looking to start and especially during COVID, right?

TG Branfalt: Yeah.

Will Read: We can get into that too, but COVID has actually had a pretty positive impact on CannaPlanners. People are being entrepreneurial because they’ve lost their jobs and they’re stuck at home.

TG Branfalt: Wow.

Will Read: So it’s a big… Yeah. So since the last time we chatted at NECANN or whatever, around the time, yeah. So the CBD industry specific because we’re a Vermont company. So that’s where we started a lot of our clients, a good deal of our clients are in Vermont. A good deal of them are farmers who traded in the dairy cows for hemp fields. So it was about helping them kind of a brand and for people in Vermont, there’s a certain allure to the Vermontiness of kind of how we… So we do plenty of CBD products. We’ve designed, I think in the last… So in 2019, catch me at the end of 2020, which I guess is soon, but last year we probably built around 28 brands, several hundred product designs. I think we launched something like 40 websites.

TG Branfalt: Wow.

Will Read: This year we’re definitely on track to double all of that.

TG Branfalt: Seriously?

Will Read: Oh yeah.

TG Branfalt: That’s immense growth for a small company.

Will Read: I love it. And not for the competition, there’s a competitiveness to being an entrepreneur and having been through my share of 9-5’s and failed entrepreneurial ventures, it’s awesome when something hits and there’s a huge potential market out there that we’re not talking to. So right now our goal is we’re scaling up. So for us that means really new people, new talent, we’ve hired a new designer, we have a new vice president of marketing, we have new salespeople. So we’re trying to expand. Because we’re just a digital company, we have clients all over the place, but we really want to focus on some of these really growing like crazy markets, California, Colorado, all these places.

TG Branfalt: So in the time, since our last two years, as an entrepreneur, what have you learned since our last interview as someone who’s growing business in this industry?

Will Read: Yeah. The one thing, and I don’t even know if this is a good answer to your question, but I would say the most important thing I’ve learned is how and when to step outside of my comfort zone. So for entrepreneurs it’s really, and I guess like anything in life, but for entrepreneurs it’s really easy to get complacent and maybe not be so open to trying new ideas or even doing things like four years ago you would never have caught me on a podcast. Or not four years ago, I was definitely on a podcast four years ago, but prior to CannaPlanners, you wouldn’t catch me doing this. It’s way outside of my comfort zone. It’s not who I was.

So you have to kind of evolve and stepping outside of your comfort zone, getting in front of people, being able to do all this client work and then confidently look back at it when I’m talking to new people and say, “Hey, I’ve built this thing with a team of insanely amazing people who have a incredible level of expertise. How can we help you kind of be better?”

TG Branfalt: What do you look for when building these teams?

Will Read: You’re going to think I’m so lame with this answer. The answer is, “How cool are you?” Seriously, that’s it. If I can’t vibe 20%, you know what I’m saying? If it’s weird, it’s so important, and I’ll tell you why. That is such a lame answer, but it’s true. And the reason is because while I’ve told you how we’re dedicated to normalizing the industry and how I’ve told you about how we’re doing all these cool things, what we really want to do is give good customer service. That’s it. We have these sets of services that we do, but really what we want to do is provide good customer service. Well, you, but maybe you’re not going to be surprised at this, but your listeners might, customer service in the cannabis industry I would say is generally not so great.

You have some people who are doing it right, but because of where the industry is, it’s still very nascent. It’s still very new. People don’t have the same sort of business acumen as maybe other industries you’re accustomed to. There is an opportunity just to be a group of cool people who can empathize with business owners who are trying to do something that’s never been done before. So that’s it. I want to find cool people who understand the vision of what we’re trying to do and who are happy to empathize and relate to our clients. It’s the most important thing.

TG Branfalt: How are you preparing your company’s growth as the Northeast, where you’re based, is on the verge of really blowing up, right? Sales commence in Maine here pretty shortly.

Will Read: Couple days.

TG Branfalt: New Jersey is very likely going to legalize during the election, New York’s going to follow, Connecticut‘s been talking about it, Rhode Island.

Will Read: Yep.

TG Branfalt: I mean, you name it. How are you preparing for that growth?

Will Read: Well, this is another… You’re good at this, Tim. You always have good questions. This is a really good question. I think one of the things, and I’ll answer this as an entrepreneur, one of the things that really attracts me beyond all the stuff I’ve been talking about, one of the things that really attracts me to the cannabis industry specifically is it’s infancy. So we can only scale as quick as the industry does. So I’m happy to take… Not that we are taking it slow, but I’m happy to evolve with California and Colorado and from all these states that have already passed. There’s what? I don’t know what it is now, but 27 medical States and I don’t know, 12 or 13 recs, something like that, whatever it is. There’s 50 total States.

TG Branfalt: Yeah.

Will Read: So, and then a whole world that’s going to follow suit of whatever the United States does. At some point, maybe, I don’t know, we’re maybe losing our edge here, but so yeah. That really excites me. It’s we can scale responsibly as soon as Jersey hits, well, we’ll have a stronger Jersey outreach. Same with same with any of these States. So right now we’re going to focus on New England, or we are focusing on New England. Maine has been very active for us because, like you said, we’re basically two days away. We’ll see what happens. But two days away from the first rec store to open in Maine. There’s plenty more so, yeah.

TG Branfalt: So, I mean, I know that you’re not a company that touches the plant and you don’t have a lot of the challenges that those firms do have. I mean, even hemp businesses face a lot more challenges than sort of ancillary companies, but what are the challenges for you operating a digital marketing business in sort of the gray market that is Vermont. And I don’t want to call New York a gray market, but the hemp only in medical industry here, what are some of the challenges that you face with those?

Will Read: Totally. So any… And I’m using air quotes again here on Zoom, but any kind of let’s say non-cannabis business, just any other industry business has access to, I mean, you name it when it comes to marketing, you want to put a billboard up? Great. You want to buy TV? You want to be on the supe? Whatever. You want to advertise on Facebook and Google? Great. Even CannaPlanners, and it’s because the company’s called CannaPlanners, That’s the only red flag, we don’t touch a plant, but I can’t even advertise on Facebook.

TG Branfalt: Really?

Will Read: Really. Yeah. So I’m okay with that. I’m actually okay with that. But so the answer is there’s plenty of hurdles and that’s part of the excitement of an infant industry is we get to solve a lot of these problems. I would say one that I can speak to fairly recently was the entire CBD industry, retail, consumer market goods, was affected two years ago when the only viable non-high risk payment merchant cut the cord.

TG Branfalt: Yeah.

Will Read: So we took it upon ourselves to form a relationship with Square. This is when they started and quickly canceled their pilot program. So I booked a ticket to San Francisco and went out there and really tried to explain what was going on in this industry to whoever would listen. And not only that, but how CannaPlanners had a level of responsibility before Square in the vetting process. We want to work with reputable people who are doing meaningful work, and we’re only going to work with meaningful people who are doing reputable work.

So how do we iterate that to a big humongous company like square? Luckily for us, it was something they agreed to. So the marketing side of it, it has challenges. So, again, we’re taking it slow. We’re not doing Facebook ads. We can’t. And I don’t want to nefariously circumvent algorithms even, that’s not a standard of kind of doing business that we want to follow. If we’re going to do it, we’re going to do it right. So we focus on really content, building good content for our clients on top of the beautiful websites we build them using the awesome brands that we build for them when it happens.

TG Branfalt: This question might seem a little bit strange, but a lot of people might not know that in Vermont, you’re not actually allowed to, billboards are forbidden on the —

Will Read: It’s the only state without a McDonald’s in the capital city. Did you know that?

TG Branfalt: I did know that.

Will Read: Okay.

TG Branfalt: Do you think that sort of having to deal with that restriction, that long-standing restriction, maybe put you in a sort of unique position to sort of walk this forbidden sort of marketing line?

Will Read: Hmm. I haven’t really considered that. I would say probably, maybe it had a small influence, but probably if I’m being honest, the way that we have been scaling out CannaPlanners has really been a response to our clients. Not so much the things going on outside of our bubble. Of course we’re following regulation where it needs to, we are definitely setting a bar when it comes to that, in terms of what we expect of our clients. We want them to be transparent. We want them to be transparent straight up.

So, yeah. I think all of the things that we’ve done, even creative and then marketing, and then what we’re growing into now, which will be email marketing and social media management and all these other kind of viable digital marketing tactics, we’ll grow into them, but we’re really just responding to the client needs right now. And it’s slow in some cases. The strategies I mean, the strategies are slow.

TG Branfalt: Tell me about sort of building a company in a small Northeastern state, do you think that that is a benefit or a detriment, because people may see, “Oh, this is a small firm in Vermont. Why don’t we go with the big guy in California?” What do you think? Do you think it’s a detriment or?

Will Read: No, not at all. I would say it for-sure works for us. And I think more applicable to your question then where we are in the geography of the country is where we stand in the timing of the industry. So my competition, our competition, there’s agencies doing what we do to some extent or another. There’s not many. With that said, look outside the cannabis industry, there’s a million word press agencies and design, there’s all of these things. There’s a huge creative world out there. It’s all about digital marketing, everybody and their grandmother does… You know what I’m saying?

TG Branfalt: Yeah.

Will Read: So I think it’s about timing. And in some instances we’re also building a brand. I think if I were to be completely honest, being synonymous within this industry for the things that we do would be incredibly amazing.

TG Branfalt: And so you mentioned that you personally can’t market because of your name and these sort of issues.

Will Read: Yeah.

TG Branfalt: So what do you do to get your name out there?

Will Read: Totally. Well, we work with people like you. We work with the team at Ganjapreneur, for sure. It’s an amazing resource for us. We’ve done an incredible amount of outreach just through some very passive marketing through Ganjapreneur, it’s been great. So there are a couple of hubs like this that allow us to sort of put our name out there. Of course, we’re not at NECANN this year, we’re not at BizCon this year. We’re not at CannaCon, we’re not at any of these this year.

TG Branfalt: Yeah.

Will Read: So I think a large part of what we’re going into for ourselves is kind of practicing what we preach. And we’re starting to expand our content creation. We’ll be building out more video resources just to sort of engage directly with whatever our community, but also to have a lasting resource for other entrepreneurs who are looking for these types of things.

When I first started off, I was going to the old Ganjapreneur website and doing that whole thing and you go on Reddit and you know what I’m saying? You try to network, and this goes back to stepping outside of the comfort zone. You got to go meet new people. You got to, for sure. It’s the most important thing. So right now, we’re doing advertising through you guys. Most of our marketing dollars have kind of pushed back, have been drawn back in so that we can use them for sales outreach and doing more proactive sales outreach. But, yeah.

TG Branfalt: How big of a loss — and the events that you had mentioned they’ve been canceled because of the coronavirus, how big of a loss has that been? Because when I went to NECANN, and I had met you prior to NECANN anyway. I mean, it was massive.

Will Read: Yeah. Massive.

TG Branfalt: And it was full and it was bustling. I mean, how big of a loss has that been you think?

Will Read: Well, financially, those things are expensive, but it’s important to again, get out there and meet people and try to retain business. But for us in this industry, it’s more than that. We’ve got this burgeoning community of a lot of great people who are trying to do cool stuff. And that’s kind of what I miss is I’ve got a group of friends who I only see, it’s like fish shows or dead shows or whatever. You only got the group of friends that you see at those shows or at the trade shows or whatever. So that part I miss.

TG Branfalt: So when somebody gets in touch with you, what’s the most common question that you get on that first sort of outreach?

Will Read: Well, if it’s not, “How can we start building our brand?” We’ve been getting a lot of outreach regarding social media, paid social media and yeah. It leads to a larger conversation about those rules and regulations, those terms of services, that those kinds of companies enact, but also, “What are other companies doing? What are they doing in place of this? Can I talk to you about SEO? How’s your website? Do you even have a social media account? Do you have an Instagram account?” So a lot of these things, the industry is ripe with eager business people. And a lot of them are jumping in for the first time. Right? So there’s a lot of just basic consulting work that we get hit up for. Just, “How do I start a company?” I can’t help you there, but I can help you make it look awesome.

TG Branfalt: So what’s your advice for those really early-stage entrepreneurs who reach out to you with these sort of issues?

Will Read: Can’t stop, won’t stop. You’re going to run into your haters, you’re going to fail, you’re going to have days where you’re like, “What the hell am I doing?” And it’s about pushing through those days. And my perspective is purely in the cannabis industry, man. This is what I know. We’ve been doing this for a little while. And I-

TG Branfalt: Five years is a lifetime in this industry.

Will Read: Yeah, it feels like that. For sure. But I think that you have to have that mentality as an entrepreneur, but you have to especially have that mentality as a cannabis entrepreneur, because the odds are stacked against you. I don’t know if everybody has forgotten this, but cannabis is federally illegal.

TG Branfalt: Is it?

Will Read: Right. Did you know?

TG Branfalt: I seem to forget that quite frequently.

Will Read: Oh, yeah. On the regular, but that’s a big thing. This could come crashing down at any second and it’s about, excuse me, but not giving a fuck about that. You have to get beyond that and dig into the work because it is meaningful. This is happening. So can’t stop, won’t stop.

TG Branfalt: Man, we’ve known each other for a while and then it’s not like we speak on a very regular basis.

Will Read: Yeah, sure.

TG Branfalt: But you offer this sort of very forthcoming, very solid insight, that a lot of people they try to dance around sort of their strategies and that sort of thing.

Will Read: No.

TG Branfalt: And you’re just like, “Here it is, guy.”

Will Read: Yeah.

TG Branfalt: So I really appreciate that about you.

Will Read: Well, thank you. That’s a very nice thing for you to say. And I think that there’s value to me being direct. It’s not wasting time, it’s display. I mean, you’re looking at me and we’ve had this conversation a few times at this point, I’m still passionate. I love what I do. I’m excited to end this podcast so I can go back to work. Not really, but that’s the thing is I love what I do and I have experience in it. So I want people to understand that or part of just my directness or just my enthusiasm is that there’s a bit of a fluctuating formula that can be applied to this industry. And we got a good track record. Let’s go and crush it. Let’s go get it. It’s out there. Let’s make a thing.

TG Branfalt: So I am going to let you go and let you get back to your work, but before I do, man, tell the people how they can find out more about you and give the people what they want.

Will Read: Yeah. We’re on Myspace, we’re on Friendster. You can get my Tinder. No. You can find us on Instagram. We’re @CannaPlanners, CannaPlanners.com. Those are great places to find us and we’d love to hear from you, for sure.

TG Branfalt: Cool, man. Hey man, I really appreciate your time today and hopefully we’ll have another conversation in less than two years and there’ll be a bustling industry in Vermont and we can meet on the boat and just chief out. And even though they probably won’t allow that, because we’ll still be going.

Will Read: Oh, I’ve been doing that since the nineties.

TG Branfalt: Oh, man. That’s Will Read, he’s the founder and president of CannaPlanners, a Vermont-based website and marketing company that’s specializing in the needs of the cannabis industry. Man, thank you so much for being on the show and…

Will Read: My absolute pleasure. Thank you for having me.

TG Branfalt: You can find more episodes of the Ganjapreneur.com podcast in the podcast section of Ganjapreneur.com on Spotify and in the Apple iTunes store. On the Ganjapreneur.com website, you will find the latest cannabis news and cannabis jobs updated daily, along with transcripts of this podcast. You can also download the Ganjapreneur.com app in iTunes and Google play. This episode was engineered by Trim Media House. I’ve been your host, TG Branfalt. (Silence)

End

More Americans Than Ever Support Legalizing Cannabis

11/10/2020

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68 percent of Americans support legalizing cannabis for adults, according to the latest Gallup poll. It is the highest recorded level of support for legalization since the pollster first started asking about the issue in 1969.

While cannabis legalization is particularly popular among younger generations, a majority of respondents from every age group including people 65+ supported legalization.

Additionally, an overwhelming majority of Democrats (83%) and independents (72%) prefer legalization to the status quo.

But, while support for legalizing has grown slightly overall, it was not across all demographics: support among self-described conservatives and regular (weekly) church-goers was just under 50%. Even among Republicans — who supported legalization with slim majorities from 2017-2019 — support had fallen below the majority threshold to 48%.

The latest poll was conducted from September 30 to October 15.

“In national polls and at the ballot box, the American public has spoken loudly and clearly. The overwhelming majority of Americans favor ending the failed policies of marijuana prohibition and replacing it with a policy of legalization, regulation, taxation, and public education. Elected officials — at both the state and federal level — ought to be listening.” — Erik Altieri, Executive Director of NORML, in a press release

In November, voters in New Jersey, South Dakota, Arizona, and Montana approved ballot initiatives to legalize adult-use cannabis. Ballot initiatives to legalize medical cannabis were also passed in South Dakota and Mississippi.

Before the election, the following U.S. states and jurisdictions had legalized adult-use cannabis: Alaska, Washington, Oregon, California, Nevada, Colorado, Illinois, Michigan, Maine, Massachusetts, Vermont, and Washington DC.

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New York Gov. Predicts Legalization Next Session as State ‘Desperate for Funding’

11/06/2020

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New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D) on Thursday said the upcoming legislative year is “ripe” for passing adult-use cannabis laws “because the state is desperate for funding,” according to a North Country Public Radio report.

“Even with Biden, even with the stimulus, we’re still going to need funding. I think we’re going to get there this year.” – Cuomo to NCPR

Former Vice President Joe Biden, the Democratic presidential nominee, has not formally won the presidency as of Friday morning.

Cuomo’s comments come just days after New Jersey voters approved a legalization ballot initiative and less than a month after Vermont lawmakers approved legislation to allow a taxed and regulated cannabis marketplace. Cannabis sales in neighboring Massachusetts launched in 2018 along with sales in Canada. The green wall is closing in on the state and paired with the budget shortfalls pressure is on lawmakers and Cuomo to, finally, pass the reforms.

After years of opposition, the Democratic governor changed his tune in 2018 following a Health Department report supporting the move; however, the State Senate was controlled by Republicans who would not back the reforms. Last year, Democrats took control of the chamber, giving them control of both the Senate and House, but lawmakers couldn’t come to agreements on how the funds would be earmarked and the session ended without a deal.

The Legislature appeared poised this year to approve a legalization measure – Cuomo had included it in his executive budget – but that push was derailed by the coronavirus pandemic as lawmakers refocused their efforts on other issues.

The state estimates legal cannabis tax revenues could reach $700 million annually but is projecting $59 billion in revenue shortfalls through 2022 due to the coronavirus pandemic.

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Adult-Use Cannabis Sales Launch In Maine

10/09/2020

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Adult-use cannabis sales begin today in Maine nearly four years after voters in the state approved the reforms. Recreational use customers can purchase up to 2.5 ounces of a combination of cannabis and concentrates, but no more than 5 grams of concentrates.

According to WGME, state budget experts predict adult-use sales will reach more than $250 million in Maine by 2025. The state is estimating $6 million in sales tax revenues from the space – set at 10 percent –  in the first partial year of sales along with $6.8 million in excise taxes, which only apply to growers on flower and seeds.

Currently, the state has licensed just five dispensaries for recreational sales in Bangor, Northport, Newry, and two in South Portland, the report says.

Thomas Winstanley of Theory Wellness, one of the license-holders in South Portland, said the company wants “to define what the future of cannabis can look like” and “help reverse the stigma” associated with cannabis.

While there are currently no testing requirements for the state’s medical cannabis products, adult-use products must be tested for potency and contaminants.

Kaspar Heinrici, of South Portland-based SeaWeed Co., said customers can “expect prices to be a little bit higher” due to testing costs and taxes.

Despite being legalized in 2016, the rollout of the adult-use program was delayed first by former Republican Gov. Paul LePage, who twice vetoed industry implementation bills, and then by the coronavirus pandemic.

New England now has two states with recreational cannabis sales – Maine and Massachusetts – while Vermont just legalized sales, which are not expected until 2022, after approving adult use and possession in 2018.

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Pabst Blue Ribbon Cannabis Seltzers Launch in California

10/08/2020

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A Pabst Blue Ribbon-branded cannabis-infused seltzer has launched in California by former Pabst Brewing employees, CNN Business reports. The alcohol company has no financial stake in the cannabis company – Pabst Labs – did not receive any money for the licensing, and will not receive any proceeds from the beverage sales.

Seamus Gallagher, Pabst Blue Ribbon’s senior brand manager, told CNN that the company’s community has been requesting that they do something in the cannabis space but the firm can’t produce cannabis-infused beverages in-house “until the legal landscape changes.”

The deal will allow Pabst Brewing to test a branded product in the emerging cannabis industry without much risk, Britt Bulla, senior strategy director at global branding firm Siegel+Gale, told CNN.

“This is the birth of a new category. I think this is the time when these brands are going to be forming out exactly how we’re going to be enjoying cannabis over time.” – Bulla to CNN Business

Pabst Labs was founded two years ago and initially sold seltzers in about a dozen dispensaries. The company said it planned to distribute the product to about 30 dispensaries by the end of the month.

“No other brands in the category can really claim a 175-year history,” Mark Faicol, Pabst Labs’ brand manager, told CNN Business.

While Pabst Brewing is dipping its toes into the cannabis sector with the agreement, other alcohol companies and brewers have already entered the space. Constellation Brands Inc., which distributes Svedka vodka and Corona beer, owns a 38.6 percent stake in Canadian cannabis company Canopy Growth Corp. In April, Molson Coors Brewing Company announced a partnership with Canada-based Hexo – Truss CBD USA – for CBD-infused beverages in Colorado. In 2018, Keith Villa, developer of Blue Moon Belgian Wheat, announced plans for a THC-infused non-alcoholic brew. In 2017, Vermont-based Long Trail Brewing Company announced a small-batch beer using CBD-infused honey, while California’s Lagunitas Brewing Company unveiled its Supercritical IPA which was infused with cannabis terpenes but neither THC nor CBD. Lagunitas, a Heineken subsidiary also launched its THC- and CBD-infused Hifi Hops sparking beverage in 2018.

In 2018, Anheuser-Busch InBev, the world’s largest beer company, announced a partnership with Canadian cannabis company Tilray for cannabis-infused beverage research.

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Ann Arbor, Michigan Decriminalizes Psychedelics

9/23/2020

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The Ann Arbor, Michigan City Council has passed a resolution decriminalizing all naturally occurring plants and fungi – including psychedelic mushrooms containing psilocybin – becoming the fourth city in the U.S. to approve such reforms, according to a Click on Detroit report. The measure makes enforcing psychedelic laws “the lowest law enforcement priority.”

Ann Arbor City Council member Anne Bannister said that the city’s police department had already considered psychedelics “a very low enforcement priority.”

The plants remain illegal under state law and police can file charges for possessing them if they are committing other crimes, the report says.

The resolution says such plants and fungi “can benefit psychological and physical wellness, support and enhance religious and spiritual practice and can reestablish humans’ inalienable and direct relationship to nature.”

Ann Arbor was one of the first U.S. cities to decriminalize cannabis in the 1970s and it has a far more relaxed approach to drug enforcement than most other Michigan cities.

Oakland and Santa Cruz, California have each passed similar measures. In 2019, Denver, Colorado voters approved an initiative decriminalizing psychedelic mushrooms.

The Vermont Legislature has pending legislation that would decriminalize psilocybin, ayahuasca, peyote, and kratom statewide but that measure has not made it to the floor for a vote.

Voters in Oregon will decide in November whether to legalize psilocybin for medical use. If approved, Oregon would be the first state to legally allow psychedelic use for medical or recreational purposes.

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Virginia Senate Passes Bill Preventing Vehicle Searches Based on Cannabis Odor

9/01/2020

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The Virginia Senate on Friday passed a measure that would prevent police from searching drivers and making seizures based on cannabis odor alone, WDVM reports. According to the report, the measure is intended to reduce the number of people of color searched by police during traffic stops.

A 2020 American Civil Liberties Union report found that Black people are three times more likely to be arrested for cannabis possession than a white person in Virginia.

“…No law-enforcement officer may lawfully search or seize any person, place, or thing solely on the basis of the odor of marijuana, and no evidence discovered or obtained as a result of such unlawful search or seizure shall be admissible in any trial, hearing, or other proceeding.” – Virginia Senate Bill 5029 text

Last year, courts in three states – Vermont, Maryland, and Pennsylvania – placed limits on police actions in cases involving cannabis odor. In the Pennsylvania case, it was determined that a search based on odor was illegal because the passenger was a registered medical cannabis patient. In the ruling, Judge Maria Dantos declared that “the smell of marijuana is no longer per se indicative of a crime.”

The Maryland Court of Appeals ruled that officers cannot make an arrest based on cannabis odor alone, but the court did not go so far as to prohibit searches based on odor.

Vermont’s Supreme Court ruling prevents officers from initiating a search based on burned or burning cannabis odor. The state legalized cannabis possession and use for adults in 2018.

Several law enforcement agencies in Florida also said last year that they would no longer detain people simply for cannabis odor because it smells the same as hemp, which is legal under both federal and state law.

The Virginia legislation also includes provisions downgrading some common infractions that can spark a vehicle search in the state, including a burned-out license plate, loud exhaust, and window tint.

The measure still requires approval from the House of Delegates and Democratic Gov. Ralph Northam before becoming law.

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Study: Patients Don’t Consider Doctors Good Source of Medical Cannabis Info

8/19/2020

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According to researchers at the University of Vermont, the majority of medical cannabis patients in the state do not believe their primary care doctor is a “good source of information regarding cannabis.”

In a study published in the Journal of Primary Care & Community Health surveying 1,009 Vermont primary care patients, the researchers found 45 percent of respondents used cannabinoids over the past year but just 18 percent of those patients said their primary care physician was a good resource for information on cannabis.

The median age of the respondents was 51-years-old.

The majority of patients surveyed who used cannabis said it was helpful for conditions such as anxiety, depression, arthritis, pain, sleep, and nausea. Medical cannabis has been legal in Vermont since 2004.

“Primary care providers need to be knowledgeable about cannabinoids to best support patient care. In addition, with a significant number of patients reporting cannabinoids helpful for medical conditions common in primary care, it is important that research continue to identify the potential benefits and harms of cannabis.” – “Use and Reported Helpfulness of Cannabinoids Among Primary Care Patients in Vermont,” Jan-Dec 2020, Journal of Primary Care & Community Health

The researchers said the knowledge gap among primary care physicians results in “providers having difficulty navigating conversations surrounding cannabinoid use.”

A 2017 survey of medical school curriculum deans conducted by researchers at the Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, Missouri found that 66.7 percent of respondents indicated their graduates were not prepared to recommend medical cannabis and another 25 percent said their graduates were not even prepared to answer medical cannabis questions.

Other surveys have consistently purported that medical professionals do not believe they know enough about the health and safety effects of cannabis.

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Curaleaf Completes Acquisition of Grassroots

7/24/2020

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Curaleaf Holdings, Inc. has completed its acquisition of GR Companies Inc. – better known as Grassroots – making it the largest vertically-integrated multi-state cannabis operator in the U.S. by revenue.

The deal expands Curaleaf’s presence from 18 to 23 states, 135 affiliated dispensary licenses, 88 operations dispensaries, more than 30 processing facilities, and 22 cultivation sites with 1.6 million square feet of growing capacity.

The deal was announced last July for $875 million in cash and stock. Grassroots Co-Founder and CEO Mitchell Kahn, who was named to the Curaleaf board of directors at the deal’s close, said the companies have “a combined strategic vision to create a dominant position in the industry.”

Joseph Lusardi, CEO of Curaleaf, said the deal firmly established the company’s market leadership position.

“The integration of Grassroots is expected to be immediately accretive to our financial performance, with our unprecedented scale providing significant opportunities to leverage Curaleaf’s powerful consumer brands as well as new form factor innovations across our expanded national presence.” – Lusardi in a statement

Curaleaf now operates in Pennsylvania, Arizona, Connecticut, Florida, Illinois, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Massachusetts, Maine, Nevada, New Jersey, New York, North Dakota, and Vermont.

Under the announced terms of the deal, Curaleaf paid $75 million in cash, 102.8 million subordinate shares of Curaleaf, and $40 million in Curaleaf shares priced at the 10-day volume-weighted average price prior to the transaction’s closing.

Curaleaf also this year completed their acquisition of Select brand parent company Cura Partners Inc. and last month announced that they were expanding that brand into four new state markets through next month.

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iAnthus Recapitalization Plan Could Leave Shareholders With Nothing

7/16/2020

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Multi-state cannabis industry company iAnthus Capital Holdings, Inc. announced on Monday a recapitalization transaction that will leave current shareholders with 2.75 percent of the company or zero percent.

In one scenario of the transaction, the company will enter “arrangement proceedings” under British Columbia, Canada’s Business Corporations Act. The other option is for recapitalization under the Companies Creditor Arrangement Act (CCAA), which would see the company file for creditor protection.

The company said the transaction “is expected to significantly reduce [its] outstanding indebtedness and annual interest costs, improve its capital structure and liquidity, and result in an enhanced financial foundation.”

“Assuming completion of the Recapitalization Transaction, the Company’s pro forma outstanding indebtedness will be reduced from $168.7 million (excluding fees and accrued and unpaid interest thereon) as at June 30, 2020 to $101.4 million (excluding $20 million of Preferred Equity).” – iAnthus in a July 13 press release

If the recapitalization transaction occurs through the Business Corporation Act, the firm’s secured lenders and unsecured debt holders will be issued an equal amount of common shares of iAnthus and each will own 48.625 percent of the company. This would leave current shareholders owning a total of 2.75 percent of iAnthus upon completion of the transaction.

If performed under CCAA, the secured lenders and unsecured debenture holders will each receive 50 percent of the common shares of the company and shareholders would get nothing.

Additionally, outstanding secured debentures will be cut from $97.5 million to $85 million and the interest rate will be reduced by 5 percent per annum. The original maturity date will be extended over four years, interest will no longer be “cash pay,” and the conversion feature will be removed. Another $60 million in unsecured debentures will be traded for equity.

Preferred equity of $5 million will be issued to the secured lenders, while $15 million will be issued to unsecured debenture holders, with the equity having a five-year maturity and no cash pay dividends.

Some of the company’s secured lenders have also agreed to lend iAnthus another $14 million on the same terms of the restructured debt, funded within three days of the support agreement.

All holders of secured debt owed to the company and 91 percent of iAnthus unsecured debenture holders have agreed to vote in favor of the plan of arrangement that is to be filed by the company. That plan is subject to stakeholder approval.

iAnthus operates in Arizona, California, Colorado, Florida, Maryland, Massachusetts, Nevada, New Mexico, New York, and Vermont.

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Catharine Dockery: How Cannabis Complements Traditional ‘Vice’ Industries

5/20/2020

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Catharine recently joined host TG Branfalt for our latest podcast episode to discuss the investment strategy behind Vice Ventures, how she transitioned into specifically working with businesses that other investors frequently avoid, her advice for finding and building a successful brand, and more.

Tune in to the interview via the media player below or scroll further down to read a full transcript of this week’s podcast episode.

Listen to the podcast:

Read the transcript:

Commercial: This episode of the Ganjapreneur podcast is made possible by Evergreen Gateway, a provider of cannabis-friendly financial services. As many cannabis entrepreneurs have experienced firsthand, it can be very difficult to get approval for essential financial services once your bank finds out what industry you’re in. Evergreen Gateway makes it easy for cannabis entrepreneurs to access the financial resources that you need to operate your business. From merchant accounts to cash advances, virtual checking and depository banking, Evergreen Gateway has established solutions that cater to the specific needs of the cannabis industry. Get in touch today EvergreenGateway.com.

TG Branfalt: Hey there, I’m your host TG Branfalt. Thank you for listening to the Ganjapreneur.com Podcast, where we try to bring you actionable information and normalize cannabis through the stories of entrepreneurs, activists, and industry stakeholders. Today I’m joined by Catharine Dockery. She’s a founding partner of Vice Ventures, a venture-capital fund that has raised about 25 million in its first round and invests exclusively in nontraditional, quote, bad-for-you verticals, such as cannabis, alcohol, sex tech, CBD, and more. How are you doing this afternoon, Catharine?

Catharine Dockery: I’m doing well. Thank you. How are you?

TG Branfalt: I’m great. You’re the first person that I’ve ever interviewed or even really known about that is focused on the sort of bad-for-you industries. So I think we have a lot of ground to cover up, but before we do tell me about yourself. Tell me about your background and how did you end up launching a VC firm focused on vice?

Catharine Dockery: That’s a fantastic question. I grew up in the New York City with my dad, went to NYU, studied a combination of neuroscience and finance. Then my first job out of college was trading high-yield debt. I absolutely hated that job. So I quit after my second bonus, spent nine months contracting for different hedge funds, trying to figure out exactly what I wanted to do. Met up with a PR agency, ran their research team two days a week for two and a half weeks.

Then that’s when I met Andy Dunn, who’s the founder of Bonobos. I was presenting research. We got along really, really well. We decided to get dinner afterwards. We decided I should work for him, which is an incredible opportunity, and manage his venture portfolio and just finances in general.

So when Walmart acquired Bonobos, I followed Andy to Walmart. Kind of realized very quickly that Walmart M&A was not for me, despite some people absolutely loving the job. So I interviewed to leave. I had personally invested in the canned-wine business. So when I was interviewing at this consumer venture firms, I kept pitching the company. All these fund managers were like, “We love the founder. We love the brand. We love what she’s doing, but we can’t invest in alcohol. So it’s a pass for us.”

I just couldn’t believe that they couldn’t invest alcohol. I just kind of kept asking, “Why, why, why?” Finally, someone was very honest with me and they’re like, “We have a vice clause.” And I was like, “Well what’s a vice clause? And they’re like, “It just prohibits us from investing in cannabis, alcohol, and nicotine, sex tech, online gambling, sports gambling.” There’s just this whole wide range of categories I thought both had highly … just huge growth potential. Then the other one had just high multiple exit potential. And I was like, “There’s something wrong here.” So that’s how I came up with the idea.

TG Branfalt: So, I mean, that’s a really broad sort of thing. It’s sort of interesting to me if we talk about cannabis and also sort of online gambling, which is being re-legalized or legalized in many cases through the United States. So is there sort of a trend going on of this sort of, I don’t know, acceptance or normalization of vice culture?

Catharine Dockery: So that’s exactly what my Vice Ventures is trying to do. That’s the mission, besides delivering superior returns to the people who believed in us. But we also want to change culture and change stigma and prove that these quote, bad companies, actually aren’t bad at all.

TG Branfalt: What’s been the response to your fund by the venture capital community at large?

Catharine Dockery: Great question. I think some people love it and get it and understand it. I think some people are laser focused on environmental funds or they think social impact is more important, without really realizing that Vice Ventures is also a social impact fund, in a way.

TG Branfalt: Can you elaborate on why you would consider it a social impact fund?

Catharine Dockery: Yes. Because, I mean, just look at the portfolio. All our portfolio companies are harm-reduction companies, whether it’s, we just announced recently a big investment in Lucy, which is a harm-reduction nicotine business. I would call that social impact, educating people that nicotine would not … and consumed in a carcinogenic fashion, i.e. through vapes or through combustible cigarettes, it’s actually no worse than coffee, which is just as addictive as caffeine.

TG Branfalt: So what do you look for specifically when investing in the crowded cannabis space? Are you focused on the same sort of thing that you’d be focused on, say, with the nicotine cessation with Lucy?

Catharine Dockery: So really quick, Lucy isn’t nicotine cessation for the record.

TG Branfalt: My apologies.

Catharine Dockery: They’re a recreational brand. No, it’s okay. Just legally it’s important to specify. When it comes to cannabis, I looked pretty exclusively at cannabis brands, whether that’s edible, company is lower-dose THC, joints. I think it’s really important to invest in really, really sharp brands. I just don’t think we’re there yet.

TG Branfalt: What do you mean by that?

Catharine Dockery: I think we’re very early stages in the cannabis brand section. I think in the next few months, a lot of these companies will run out of money and we’ll be able to see kind of which brands stand the test of time, if you will. I think then it would be a great time to invest in them.

TG Branfalt: So you mentioned low THC. I’m a huge sort of proponent of low THC products. Massachusetts has actually a cap for recreational five milligrams, which a lot of people are like … they’ll boo and hiss at it. But for me, I’m like, “This is fantastic.” Are you seeing more and more companies offer these low-THC or are developing these low-THC products?

Catharine Dockery: Yeah, definitely. I would say almost every cannabis deal I’ve seen in the past week or two weeks or so have been all low-dose products, whether it’s low-dose beverages, low-dose chocolates, it’s low dose is definitely the future.

TG Branfalt: So do you give particular attention maybe to crossover businesses, such as companies that make THC-infused lube?

Catherine Dockery: I mean, I’m all about crossover businesses and I think as long as it fits the Vice thesis, it is definitely worth looking at. But I just think a THC lube or vice lube is a very difficult business to be in, just because it’s so niche.

TG Branfalt: So is there anything else that you … because THC lube, when it first sort of came out, and I worked in the adult shop industry for a very long time.

Catharine Dockery: Awesome.

TG Branfalt: So I saw what lubes worked and what lubes didn’t. So I have this sort of perspective there. My question is are you seeing a lot more companies trying to maybe cross over? I mean, we see beer companies getting involved in the cannabis space, big time. Are you seeing more of this sort of corporate crossover or these partnerships happening from your perspective?

Catharine Dockery: Yes, actually, which is why I think vice investing and the venture capital space is so exciting because I think because of all the crossover, there’s a lot more exit potential than say a normal CBG grocery company. You could, like a CBD beverage, for example, could get bought by Pepsi. It could get bought by AB InBev, by Constellation, by Coca Cola, by Nestle, literally by anyone. So I think that’s what’s so exciting about it.

TG Branfalt: It sounds like you’re half expecting these sort of major deals to occur.

Catharine Dockery: I think some of them will be, for sure. I think a lot of this is brand new products to the market, more so than in any other industry, in a way.

TG Branfalt: So I mean, your firm balances this social responsibility and taboo. How do you think other companies, large companies, such as the ones you mentioned, Coca Cola, Nestle, are going to be able to sort of jive that with their investors?

Catharine Dockery: I think it just comes down to overcoming stigmas. I think a lot of these companies will kind of go wherever is making the most money, as proved by the Canopy-Constellation deal.

TG Branfalt: Which is, I mean, was shocking.

Catharine Dockery: It’s huge. It’s massive.

TG Branfalt: And now they own, they’re majority stakeholders in that company.

Catharine Dockery: Yes.

TG Branfalt: Right. Yeah. Speaking of stocks, last year was not a great year for cannabis stocks. Some of the biggest players, Aurora, Canopy didn’t do particularly well towards the end of the year. What’s your take on that and sort of expectations for 2020?

Catharine Dockery: I think, I don’t know. It’s a weird analogy to me. But I think it’s very similar to Donald Trump getting elected, everybody just thinking that the market is so much bigger than it is. Then people just not admitting that they participate or don’t participate or anything. So I think that’s kind of what happened is people realized that people actually didn’t really smoke, especially when they say that they did. I think that will have some effect on cannabis exits, which is why I think a lot of these companies will go under the next 6 to 12 months. I think we’ll really see which brands resonated with consumers and all that.

TG Branfalt: What makes for a successful brand in your opinion? I mean, does it involve sort of that sort of celebrity, which we just saw Whoopi & Maya decided to close. But we do see a lot of celebrities sort of coming in the space. Or is it leadership? What sort of draws you in with regard to brands?

Catharine Dockery: So I’ll give you example a great brand. Are you familiar with the CBD water called Recess?

TG Branfalt: I am familiar with the name.

Catharine Dockery: Yes. We were early into Recess. They’ve launched in multiple cities across the country in a short 16-month period. We invested in Recess just because of the brand itself. We didn’t even test the product before making a commitment. Just the brand, the idea of taking a recess, that is a nostalgia to every single American who’s taken a recess as a kid.

TG Branfalt: Interesting.

Catharine Dockery: So that to me is a great example of a really strong brand.

TG Branfalt: Something that sort of sticks out in your head, where you hear that and you think of that.

Catharine Dockery: Yeah, exactly.

TG Branfalt: So what are the risks in investing in these industries, sort of aside from the sort of obvious ones. Right? I’m not an investor, a lot of our listeners are. They probably have a better idea on what those risks are than I do, in many ways. But aside from the basic, “You can lose money,” what really are the potential rewards here, sort of the abstract bigger picture, I guess?

Catharine Dockery: I think some of the biggest risks are definitely regulatory, especially for CBD. Nobody knows if it’s going to be outlawed in food and bev or not. I would say also this isn’t a rant, but for cannabis, it’s definitely regulatory as well. So the laws change every three months on that. The alcohol, you need to make sure you comply with the three-tier system. Some people swear by drawing it to alcohol. But that’s even more difficult. I don’t know. There’s a lot of risks.

TG Branfalt: What do you tell your investors are the rewards in this space aside from sort of the returns? You know what I’m saying?

Catharine Dockery: No. What do you mean?

TG Branfalt: So this idea of social responsibility and this idea of sort of ending stigma, is this something when you are making that pitch to your investors that intrigues them just as much as the profits in many cases? Or is it purely profit-driven?

Catharine Dockery: I think any investment should probably be profit driven, just because you have a fiduciary responsibility to help your investors make more money than they had when they put in. Besides that, I think there’s also a social responsibility to make sure that you’re investing in really intellectually honest operators, who know exactly their products, the harm that it can give to the users and just didn’t hide it.

TG Branfalt: I like the term intellectually interesting.

Catharine Dockery: Yeah.

TG Branfalt: Several states expected to legalize this year. Where we are in New York, which we know it happened last year. You’re a lifelong New Yorker like I am, basically. We know Cuomo’s history and the legislature here is a mess. New Jersey, Connecticut, Rhode Island, Vermont lawmakers are right now in the middle of bringing in a taxed and regulated system. Does one state or a couple of states stand out to you as most ripe for investment?

Catharine Dockery: I think Oregon is a really interesting one, just because I think it’s less fragmented than the other states. I mean, tons of people are pouring money into California brands. I’m not sure that makes sense yet.

TG Branfalt: What about as far as the ones that we sort of expect this year?

Catharine Dockery: Give me an example.

TG Branfalt: Like New York, Jersey, Connecticut, Rhode Island.

Catharine Dockery: I think New York would be a great place. I think brands are built in New York City. I mean, look, you have Away, Glossier, Bonobos, Warby Parker. Really strong brands are built here.

TG Branfalt: I mean, and the other thing too, that we have to consider, is the way the medical licensing is set up. It’s really going to be a prime opportunity, I think, the way they’re going to set it up, for branding.

Catharine Dockery: Yep.

TG Branfalt: In your experience thus far with your fund, has there been a particular state that has proven to be a solid enough industry investment? Maybe Nevada, considering it is pure vice?

Catharine Dockery: Yeah. Not yet. Most of our investments to date have been between East LA and New York. Which I don’t know, maybe that’s because that’s where I spend most of my time. But definitely looking at Vice in a every state.

TG Branfalt: So what advice do you have for entrepreneurs who are looking to enter this space as far as brands go?

Catharine Dockery: Well, depends which category. I mean, nicotine is arguably more difficult than cannabis, I would say. But I think it’s all about just pairing up with somebody who’s really good at branding, finding somebody who can do operations and just going out there and doing it, finding distribution and finding partners that can help you.

TG Branfalt: Awesome. Where can people find out more about you, about the firm? Give us the plugs.

Catharine Dockery: Viceventures.com. There’s an email address on there, that’ll link you to me.

TG Branfalt: Brilliant. Thank you so much, Catherine. It’s really been nice to have you on the show, pick your brain a little bit. Like I said, it’s a super sort of interesting angle that you’ve taken there and I really appreciate your insight.

Catharine Dockery: Thank you so much.

TG Branfalt: That was Catherine Dockery. She’s a founding partner of Vice Ventures, a venture capital fund that has raised about 25 million in its first round. Invests in vice, such as alcohol, cannabis, and more.

You can find more episodes of the Ganjapreneur.com Podcast in the podcast section of ganjapreneur.com and in the Apple iTunes Store. On the Ganjapreneur.com website, you’ll find the latest cannabis news and cannabis jobs, updated daily, along with transcripts of this podcast. You can also download the Ganjapreneur.com app in iTunes and Google Play. This episode was engineered by Trim Media House. I’ve been your host, TG Branfalt.

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Oklahoma Approves Cannabis Breathalyzer Pilot Program

5/18/2020

by

Oklahoma lawmakers last week approved a bill requiring the Department of Public Safety to spend $300,000 on creating a pilot program for breathalyzers that test for cannabis impairment, the Oklahoman reports. Under the program, the results of the test would not be admissible in courts.

Rep. Scott Fetgatter (R) said that the state has “a lot of problems when it comes to medical marijuana and DUI laws and determining impairment” but that participation in the program would be voluntary and the results should not be used in a punitive manner.

Rep. Ross Ford (R) described it as a “trial program to make sure the system works.”

Department of Public Safety Spokeswoman Sarah Stewart told the Oklahoman that it could take up to a year for the pilot program to be operational because the agency has to come up with program rules and may end up having to bid out that work. She indicated that officials will want to see if other states have done similar pilot programs.

The state is reportedly considering using a THC breathalyzer from California-based Hound Labs. CEO Mike Lynn told KGOU that their device can accurately detect cannabis use within the last two hours.

“When you find THC in breath, you can be pretty darn sure that somebody smoked pot in the last couple of hours. And we don’t want to have people driving during that time period or, frankly, at a work site in a construction zone.” – Lynn in a KGOU interview

Police in California trialed a Hound Labs device in 2016. Massachusetts Gov. Charlie Baker (R) has supported the use of THC breathalyzers and in Vermont, the DUI issue has been a sticking point by lawmakers before moving into a taxed-and-regulated market.

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