A printed, official contract with a pen resting on top of it.

Michigan Regulators Announce Application Details for New MMJ Regime

10/13/2017

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Prospective Michigan medical cannabis industry licensees and their affiliates will be subjected to a full background check, including their criminal and financial history, whether they have maintained tax compliance, and their business litigation history, according to guidance released by the state Department of Licensing and Regulatory Affairs.

The applicant must submit their fingerprints to the agency as part of the “pre-qualification” process, which will include the background checks; the names of all persons with stake in the cannabis venture; documents related to the applicant’s business, including its bylaws is available; and all tax-related documents.

Once pre-qualified, applicants will next need to inform LARA what business license they are seeking and provide floor plans and layout of their proposed facility. Potential licensees must also provide the agency with a copy of the municipality’s ordinance authorizing cannabis industry operations, and its technology, staffing, marketing, inventory, security, and recordkeeping plans.

The announcement is the latest cannabis industry guidance released by the agency as the state moves from its so-called “gray market” medical cannabis model to a more comprehensive system. Earlier this week LARA announced they would be hosting a series of educational sessions throughout the state next month to answer questions from interested parties.

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Fires Engulf Cannabis Farms in California’s Emerald Triangle

10/12/2017

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Several cannabis farms in Mendocino County, California have fallen victim to wildfires, which have grown increasingly severe throughout the state in recent years.

Mendocino County is one of three counties that comprise the state’s famed Emerald Triangle, which is known worldwide as a leader in cannabis production. The region also includes Humboldt and Trinity counties, but they have not been as affected by the fires.

While the fires spell danger and misfortune for the entire state — there are 22 active wildfires throughout the state and at least 23 people have died so far while hundreds more have been declared missing — they are particularly dangerous toward cannabis crops, which will both easily burn and cannot be insured due to the plant’s federally illegal status.

“If their facilities burn down, a lot of these people won’t be able to get any economic relief for them from an insurance claim,” Derek Peterson, CEO of cannabis producer Terra Tech, said in a CNN Money report. “There’s no mechanism for recovery to repay them for their loss. It’s a tremendous risk for these people.”

Nikki Larestro, secretary of the Mendocino Cannabis Industry Association and co-founder of cultivator Swami Select, said that she personally knows growers who have already lost their crops. “A lot of plants have been lost in the fire, especially in Sonoma County. In southern Mendocino County, there are farms burning right now,” she said in the report.

With emergency responders and firefighters doing their part to keep people safe and contain fire damage, members of the cannabis community are also doing their part to protect the livelihoods of local growers. Cannabis grower Kevin Jodrey of the Wonderland Nursery announced on Facebook that any grower who was concerned about losing their cannabis genetics to the blazes could store their strains free-of-charge at the nursery.

His post has drummed up an outpouring of support and has been shared online more than a hundred times:

“If you’re a grower in Sonoma or Mendo and fear losing your genes to the fires I can bank the stock at my nursery. You can come get it when it’s safe. I’ve done this for years for Humboldt farmers fighting camp raids. I’ll do it for you too. Nobody will steal your [stuff] nor do you have to pay me. Stay safe.”

Jodrey could not be reached for comment by the time of this article’s publishing.

Governor Jerry Brown (D) has declared a state of emergency in eight of the state’s counties. The wildfires, though abnormally destructive this year, should not take a big toll on California‘s legal cannabis market when it launches in January — there are simply too many other cannabis producers in the state — but could spell financial doom for the affected growers.

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An outdoor, CBD-rich cannabis strain close to harvest.

Kentucky Gov. Will Not Allow Cannabis Legalization While in Office

10/12/2017

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In a Wednesday interview, Kentucky Gov. Matt Bevin told WHAS radio host Terry Meiners that he would veto any adult-use legalization measure as long as he is in office and that legalization as a way to fund the state’s pension is a “sucker’s bet.”

Bevin pointed to Colorado’s legalization experience, which he said while the state has received a “hundred-and-something-million” dollars in tax revenue, legalization is not worth “the cost.”

“… THC content in marijuana is not like it was even a generation ago. There are people overdosing based on ingestion of products and edibles and things,” Bevin said in the interview. “You have that state being sued by at least two of their border states. You have law enforcement people and emergency rooms being overrun by problems. You have homelessness, it’s spiking in that state. It has not been good for that state.”

The case brought against Colorado by Nebraska and Oklahoma over the voter-approved legalization regime was dismissed by the Supreme Court more than a year ago. There are also zero deaths in recorded history that have been attributed to a cannabis overdose.

The Republican governor, who was born in Denver, said that he planned on calling a special session “soon” for legislators to consider legislation to fix the state’s pension problem but legalizing cannabis would not be on the table as long as he is governor.

Last month, Franklin Circuit Court Judge Thomas Wingate dismissed a lawsuit challenging the state’s ban on medical cannabis on the grounds that “no constitutional right exists to violate a controlled substances law,” according to a USA Today report.

Dan Seum Jr., the son of state Sen. Dan Seum who proposed legalizing cannabis to help fund the state’s pension system, was a plaintiff in that suit. Seum planned on introducing the measure in January; however, after the governor’s comments, it is unlikely to gain much legislative support.

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California Gov. Vetoes Cannabis Edible-Shape Ban, Public Smoking Bills

10/12/2017

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California Gov. Jerry Brown has vetoed two measures that would have banned smoking in parks and on beaches statewide and another that would have prohibited “cannabis products to be made in the shape of a person, animal, insect or fruit.”

The edibles provision was struck down by the Democrat governor because the measure would interfere with the Assembly Bill 133, which made changes to the state’s voter-approved cannabis industry framework.

“As currently drafted, this bill would chapter out specific provisions in the recently enacted trailer bill,” Brown wrote in his veto message of AB.350. “Therefore, I cannot sign it at this time.”

A similar ban, which also outlawed cannabis edibles from using the terms “candy” and “candies,” took effect in Colorado last month.

The public smoking bans were directed toward tobacco products, however both SB.386 and AB.725 included language allowing the definitions of “cigar” and “cigarette” to include “any other weed or plant as an alternative or supplement to tobacco or nicotine.”

According to the veto message on both bills, Brown struck down similar legislation last year due to his belief that the bans “in every state park and on every state beach” are over-reaching and that the fines associated with violating the laws are “excessive.”

“If people can’t even smoke on a deserted beach, when can they?” Brown wrote. “There must be some limit to the coercive power of government.”

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Hawaii’s Fourth Dispensary Opens

10/12/2017

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Hawaii’s fourth medical cannabis dispensary opened its doors yesterday after receiving final approvals from the state Department of Health, according to a Pacific Business News report. Noa Botanicals is the second company approved to sell medical cannabis products in Oahu.

Brian Goldstein, Noa CEO, indicated the dispensary would have four flower strains upon opening with another “four to six” on their way along with tinctures, oils, and concentrates. Noa will offer other products, such as lozenges and lotions, as soon as Steep Hill Hawaii – currently, the only laboratory certified to test medical cannabis products in the state – is permitted to test those products.

According to the report, Ohau’s Aloha Green Apothecary opened in August along with Maui Green Therapies in Maui. Pro Life Sciences Maui opened at the end of last month.

According to Health Department figures, as of Sept. 30, there were 19,190 patients and 1,418 caregivers registered with the program. Of those patients, 65.5 percent, or 16,701, are severe pain patients. The majority, 11,398, of the state’s patient population are 46-years-old and older, compared to the 6,829 under 46. The Department of Health indicates they issue “roughly 1,200” medical cannabis registry cards per month. According to their figures, though, they issued 571 from Aug. 31 to Sept. 30 and 615 from July 31 to Aug. 31.

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An amateur cannabis grower's seedling, bathed in the purple light of an LED-based grow closet.

Australian University Nets Multi-Million-Dollar Grant for Cannabinoid Research

10/12/2017

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The University of Newcastle, in Callaghan, New South Wales, Australia, has received a $2.5 million (USD$1.95 million) grant from the National Health and Medical Research Council to set up the Australian Centre for Cannabinoid Clinical and Research Excellence, the Illawarra Mercury reports. The funds are part of a larger $6 million ($4.7 million) grant to the university for fellowships and researchers.

The cannabis research program is a partnership between the several universities across Australia, Hunter Medical Research Institute, and Hunter-New England Health. It will be headed up by Jennifer Martin, a clinical pharmacologist at the University of Newcastle and Dr. Nadia Solowij, a psychology professor at the University of Wollongong.

“It’s essentially saying we need a nationally integrated, collaborative framework, where as soon as we receive data from a variety of clinical trials with any of the cannabinoid products from around Australia, or indeed new data from overseas, we can rapidly translate that into policy and practice,” she said in the report, adding that she expects to see cannabinoid treatments “much more available in Australia within the next five years.”

Martin explained that the researchers are already engaging with the community and working with a community advisory group rather than “sitting up there in an ivory tower.”

“We’ve had a lot of patients and family advocates that have really pushed that from the Hunter area,” she said in the Mercury report. “Now we need to get the supporting evidence to guide practice.”

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The Lone Star State's state flag flying between two U.S. flags at the Texas state capitol building.

Texas’ First MMJ Dispensary Set to Open in December

10/11/2017

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Texas’ first medical cannabis dispensary is slated to open in December and according to a Houston Public Media report, there are already around 150,000 patients in the state registered to access the program. Despite the high patient count, the program is of the limited variety, offering low-THC, high-CBD oils for patients with intractable epilepsy.

Under the state’s Compassionate Use Program, just three dispensaries will be permitted to open throughout the state. The program has been derided by activists and some say that due to language in the law requiring physicians to “prescribe” cannabis the program might not serve any patients at all.

Despite the activists’ fears, Knox Medical is still opening their doors in Schulenburg, Texas on schedule. The owner, Jose Hidalgo, said even though the city has a population of fewer than 3,000 residents, they are situated “near the triangle” of Austin, Houston, and San Antonio.

“We require a large amount of land for us to even consider that and then the next consideration after that was how can we get the closest to the largest amount of the population,” he said in the report.

By the end of December, Knox Medical and other operators will be able to expand their scope to online sales, allowed by the medical cannabis law, which they will have couriered directly to the patient. However, some activists argue that patients who require CBD oil can already purchase comparable products online without a physician’s approval.

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The British Parliament buildings in London, England.

UK Lawmakers Join Activists for ‘Cannabis Tea Party’

10/11/2017

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Members of the United Kingdom Parliament joined medical cannabis activists for a “cannabis tea party” outside Parliament as part of their efforts to legalize medical cannabis throughout the nation, according to an Independent report. Liberal Democrat MP Layla Moran joined Labour MPs Paul Flynn and Tonia Antoniazzi and members of the United Patients Alliance in the demonstration, where cannabis-infused edibles were displayed openly and some activists smoked joints near the House of Commons.

Flynn, an 82-year-old member of Parliament who has introduced a bill in the House of Commons, called the failure by his colleagues in government to pass medical cannabis legislation “political cowardice.”

“They are afraid of being accused to going to pot,” he said in the report. “I’m afraid governments get brownie points for appearing to act tough.”

In a Wales Online report, Flynn remarked that Queen Victoria used cannabis “every month of her life” as cannabis was legal medicine in Britain until 1973.

“There are six or seven states in Europe where it’s possible to use cannabis medicinally but we’ve forgotten that this is the oldest medicine in the world – it’s been used for 5,000 years at least,” he said in the interview, adding that “the tide of world opinion” is shifting in favor of medical cannabis use.

MPs are expected to take on Flynn’s proposal in February, but it will unlikely gain any traction without federal government support.

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Detroit skyline pictured from a boat on the river.

MMJ Industry Operation Reforms Approved for Detroit, Michigan Mayoral Ballots

10/11/2017

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Voters in Detroit, Michigan will consider two cannabis industry-related proposals during its Nov. 7 mayoral election, Detroit Metro News reports. The proposals, championed by Citizens for Sensible Cannabis Reform, are aimed at changing the legislature-approved rules for exactly where cannabis industry operators can set up shop.

According to the News, the first proposal, “an initiative to enact medical marihuana facilities ordinance,” would reduce the 1,000-foot barrier required between dispensaries and parks, churches, liquor stores, day care centers, and other dispensaries to 500 feet. The measure would also allow dispensaries to stay open until 9 p.m. instead of 8 p.m.

The second proposal would allow medical cannabis cultivators and transporters to operate in the city’s M1-5 industrial zones.

The advocates had to take City Clerk Janice Winfrey to court to get the issues on the ballots, the News reports, because she had claimed that proposals amending Detroit city ordinances ran afoul of state law; however, the county court disagreed, paving the way for the initiatives’ inclusion on the Mayoral ballots.

Meanwhile, the Committee to Regulate Marijuana Like Alcohol has passed the 300,000-signature mark in their bid to add an adult-use use proposal to 2018 election ballots. According to the report, the campaign has until Nov. 22 to turn in more than 252,000 valid signatures from registered voters to get the issue to voters.

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Former AG Holder: Sessions’ ‘Obsession’ with Cannabis Puts DoJ in ‘Strange Place’

10/11/2017

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During remarks at John Jay College of Criminal Justice, former Attorney General Eric Holder called the 2013 Cole Memo, which directed the Department of Justice to take a hands-off approach on legal cannabis programs, “a really good policy” but seemed to not understand Congressional action on the issues, the Washington Examiner reports.

Holder, who served from 2009 to 2015, alleged that Congress has passed legislation preventing federal funds from being used for enforcement in cannabis-legal states; however, there is no federal law prohibiting such action. The only measure protecting federal crackdown is the so-called Rohrabacher-Blumenauer Amendment (formally Rohrabacher-Farr) which has been included in every federal budget since 2014 – and was recently tucked into a temporary spending measure which also provided funds for hurricane relief and raised the debt ceiling.

During the appearance, Holder was also critical of current Attorney General Jeff Sessions saying that his “almost obsession” with cannabis has put the Justice Department in a “strange place.”

“I think the policy we had in place was a good one: Let the states experiment with the notion that again we have these eight or nine federal factors and if you trigger one of these eight or nine factors the feds are going to be coming in,” Holder said.

It’s worth noting, as Tom Angell did on Twitter, that as Attorney General, Holder could have rescheduled (or descheduled) cannabis during his tenure but didn’t.

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A commercially grown cannabis plant covered in white crystals/trichomes.

Arkansas AG Denies Adult-Use Ballot Initiative Over Language ‘Ambiguities’

10/10/2017

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Arkansas Attorney General Leslie Rutledge has rejected a proposed cannabis legalization ballot initiative over “ambiguities” in the measure which she claims are “sufficiently serious” enough to prevent the campaign from ballot consideration.

In the Oct. 6 letter to Mary L. Berry, the named petitioner for the Summit-based Arkansas True Grass Ballot Committee, Rutledge says the ambiguities are related to the terms “carry/carrying on” and “personal effect” which the attorney general claims “are defined more or less interchangeably, which makes them ambiguous when used together.”

“If the definitions for these terms are substituted for the terms as they appear in section 4 (‘carrying on one’s personal effect’), the result would be: ‘having possession of an item on one’s body on one’s item that one has in one’s possession that one wears or has possession of on one’s body,’” she wrote in the letter. “This phrase is nonsensical and redundant.”

While she agreed that the Arkansas Recreational Marijuana Amendment would allow citizens to grow up to 25 mature and 25 immature plants, she questioned what would happen if an immature plant matures while the cultivator has already 25 mature plants, concluding that “it is reasonable to conclude that growing 26 or more mature plants would be illegal.”

“It is likewise unclear what would be required of a cultivator who has 25 mature plants and 25 non-mature plants,” she wrote. “Once any of the non-mature plants became a mature plant, this cultivator would be out of compliance with section 4(a) (under one interpretation of the text).”

Moreover, Rutledge argued that sections regarding the number of cultivation locations registered and how many entities could register as cultivators needed clarification due to ambiguous language.

“The ambiguities noted above are not necessarily all the ambiguities contained in your proposal, but they are sufficiently serious to require me to reject your popular name and ballot title,” she wrote in the denial letter. “I am unable to substitute language in a ballot title for your measure due to these ambiguities. Further, additional ambiguities may come to light on review of any revisions of your proposal.”

The proposal aimed for consideration on 2018 election ballots.

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A closeup image of a sheet of cannabis shatter.

Tilray to Export Full Spectrum Cannabis Oil to Germany

10/10/2017

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For the second time in as many weeks, Canadian medical cannabis producer Tilray has announced plans to exports its product overseas, this time sending its full-spectrum cannabis extracts to Germany where they will be distributed nationwide through pharmacies.

Brandon Kennedy, Tilray CEO, called the agreement “another strategic milestone” which comes on the heels of the company receiving approvals to export their products to New Zealand. Tilray has exported products to South America, Europe, and Australia since 2016.

The company is also partnering with health care and higher education institutions in Canada and Australia on cannabis therapy clinical trials. Kennedy suggested the company would also be working with researchers in Germany.

“As the world’s second largest pharmaceutical market with a population of more than 80 million people, Germany is an important market for Tilray products,” Kennedy said in a press release. “We are proud to be the first supplier to offer full-spectrum extracts to German patients throughout the country.”

The firm has partnered with German pharmaceutical wholesaler NOWEDA and service provider Paesel + Lorei on the exportation scheme, which will begin next week. NOWEDA is a cooperative owned by more than 9,000 pharmacists and currently supplies approximately 160,000 medicines and pharmacy goods. Paesel + Lorei has served the pharmaceutical sector since 1961 and a wholesaler, distributor, and logistics provider.

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Inside of a commercial grow room in Bellingham, Washington.

Michigan MMJ Regulators Hosting Educational Sessions Throughout November

10/10/2017

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Michigan’s Department of Licensing and Regulatory Affairs is hosting a series of five educational sessions throughout the state next month aimed at the state’s new medical cannabis licensing regime. The sessions will feature members of the regulatory agency and the Bureau of Medical Marihuana Regulations to answer questions from individuals and businesses interested in state grower, processor, transporter, dispensary, and compliance facility businesses.

Representatives from Franwell, developers of Metrc – the seed-to-sale software chosen to track products cultivated and sold throughout Michigan – will also be on hand to demonstrate the product.

The Nov. 8 and 9 sessions will be held at Oakland Community College in Farmington Hills, and Saginaw Valley State University in University Center, respectively. On Nov. 13, the event will be held at the Great Wolf Lodge in Traverse City, and at the Wing’s Conference Center in Kalamazoo on Nov. 14. The final sessions will be held at the Kellogg Conference Center in East Lansing.

All of the sessions begin at 9 a.m. and are free but interested parties must register for the events by Nov. 1 “to guarantee themselves entrance.” The Nov. 8 and 15 sessions will be live-streamed on the BMMR website.

Michigan will be making medical cannabis operator licenses available on Dec. 15.

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Online MMJ Card Company Expands to New York, Maryland & Pennsylvania

10/10/2017

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Software provider OnePath Medical, which connects would-be medical cannabis patients with physicians to recommend its use, has expanded its services to Maryland, New York, and Pennsylvania. The company, founded earlier this year, previously only served Washington D.C. and is the only firm offering the software solution on the East Coast.

“People around the world recognize the healing power of cannabis, but many are unable to legally and securely access it or find doctors who will evaluate and approve them for medical cannabis use, especially on this side of the U.S.,” said Joshua Green, co-founder, OnePath Medical, in a press release.

Patients in New York, Maryland, and Pennsylvania must register on the OnePath website and build their online profile before undergoing a telemedicine examination with a licensed physician who will determine whether or not to recommend cannabis. The firm secures its patients’ data on servers encrypted with SSL certificates and stored on data protection servers in order to meet HIPPA standards on electronic medical record keeping.

The service costs $199 regardless of where the patients reside; however, they only pay OnePath if they are approved for a medical cannabis recommendation. The company boasts a 99 percent approval rate.

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A police helicopter commonly used in the DEA's cannabis eradication program.

DEA Destroyed 5M Plants, Arrested 5,657 People in 2016 Cannabis Eradication Efforts

10/09/2017

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According to the Drug Enforcement Agency’s 2016 Final Domestic Cannabis Eradication/Suppression Program report, the agency destroyed nearly 5 million outdoor-cultivated cannabis plants and seized more than $51.9 million in assets linked to illegal cannabis operations in the U.S.

The federal law enforcement agency eradicated a total of 5,528 illegal outdoor cannabis cultivation sites in 2016, the bulk of which in California where the DEA eliminated 1,483 such operations. Ohio ranked second in the U.S. regarding eradicated illicit cultivation sites, with 518. California also ranked first in the total number of outdoor-cultivated plants destroyed with 3,465,028 of the 4,942,797 total throughout the nation. Kentucky ranked second with 549,818.

The DEA also shut down 1,865 indoor cultivation sites, with 634 of those located in California; Michigan ranked second with 207 sites. In total, the agency destroyed 406,125 cannabis plants cultivated indoors.

The enforcement action by the DEA led to 5,657 arrests, with 2,002 of them coming in California. Kentucky saw 691 arrests linked to the cannabis eradication program; while Indiana ranked third with 407; followed by Michigan’s 274, and Virginia’s 253.

According to an analysis by NORML, the seizure totals are the most since 2011 and represent a 20 percent increase of 2015 figures.

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A vector image of the state of Oregon spliced over an indoor cannabis grow's thick foliage.

Oregon School Fund Nets 40% of Cannabis Sales Tax Revenues

10/09/2017

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Oregon public schools will reap 40 percent of the state’s cannabis-derived tax revenues collected from January 2016 to August 2017, or about $34 million, KATU News reports. In all, the state has collected $108.6 million in cannabis industry taxes since 2016.

The School State Fund will receive the lion’s share of the revenues while the state mental health, alcohol, and drug services fund will receive 20 percent of the tax revenues, or $17 million; the Oregon State Police will receive $12.75 million, or 15 percent; the Oregon Health Authority will receive $4.25 million, about 10 percent; and the Liquor Control Commission will receive $9.56 million.

All Oregon counties and towns will be given funds from the revenues collected prior to July 1, which totals about $17 million, or 10 percent. However, municipalities that voted to ban recreational cannabis sales will no longer receive any cannabis-derived revenues collected after July 1, 2017.

When the state adopted its adult-use cannabis regime, at least 111 communities held votes on whether or not to add a 3 percent tax to the state’s 17 percent tax on cannabis sales – more than 90 percent of those communities adopted the measure.

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A mostly empty medicine pill bottle lies on its side on a white table with its cap removed.

Another Study Finds MMJ Patients Replacing Prescription Meds with Cannabis

10/09/2017

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Yet another study suggests that cannabis could be useful as an exit drug from traditional medications, including opioids, although the research by DePaul University and Rush University researchers was based on a small sample size of 30 patients registered in Illinois’ medical cannabis program.

However, the patients, who had a mean age of 44.6-years-old and suffered from cancer, chronic pain, rheumatoid arthritis, spinal cord injury or disease, and Crohn’s disease, indicated they used cannabis as either an alternative to their traditional medications or as a complementary treatment “as a means for tapering off medications.” The participants said they were motivated to making the switch to medical cannabis due to concerns over their prescribed medications, including toxicity fears, dependence and tolerance issues.

“[Medical cannabis] appears to serve as both a complementary method for symptom management and treatment of medication side-effects associated with certain chronic conditions, and as an alternative method for treatment of pain, seizures, and inflammation in this population,” the researchers concluded.

Nevertheless, Kevin Sabet, the founder of prohibitionist group Smart Approaches to Marijuana, told the Chicago Tribune that the study was “one of the worst” he has “seen in a while.”

“It was an uncontrolled observation of 30 people who were mixing pot with other drugs,” he said in the report.

Douglas Bruce, assistant professor of health sciences at DePaul and the study’s lead author, said that Sabat’s analysis is rooted in his own bias and that “there’s power in people telling their stories in a way you can’t get in a survey.”

“It’s important to do qualitative research to understand how people are using cannabis, then figure out how to measure it,” he said in the report. “ … One of the most compelling things to come out of this is that people are taking control of their own health, and most providers would agree that’s a good thing.”

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cannabis science terms

Northern Michigan University Launches ‘Medicinal Plant Chemistry’ Degree Program

10/09/2017

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Marquette’s Northern Michigan University is the latest U.S. college to offer cannabis-related courses with the school rolling out a four-year medicinal plant chemistry degree program, the Detroit Free Press reports. The program is a mix of chemistry, biology, horticulture, marketing, and finance.

This is the first semester the major is being offered to students.

The classes include organic chemistry, biochemistry, biology, soils, biostatistics and genetics for cultivation; gas and liquid chromatography for testing; and financial management and perspectives on society for legal industry operations.

Dr. Mark Paulsen, director of Northern Michigan’s chemistry department, said the first group consists of about 12 students, but he expects the program’s enrollment to grow “with a full 12 months of recruitment.”

The program has the support of the university’s board of trustees.

“Many of the states are legalizing different substances and they’re really looking for quality people to do the chemistry and the science,” said trustee James Haveman in the Free Press report. “And it’s the university’s responsibility to produce those kinds of students for those kinds of jobs.”

Steve Mitchell, another trustee, said that there wasn’t any pushback from the board to approve the program but noted the students are not violating state and federal laws by actually growing cannabis plants.

Hocking College, one of two the Ohio institutions that applied to test cannabis for the state’s medical cannabis program, announced plans to launch their own cannabis laboratory tech major. City College of San Francisco, California, and the Vermont College of Medicine’s Department of Pharmacology are among the mainstream U.S. colleges and universities to offer medical cannabis-centric programs.

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Kentucky State Senator Proposes Adult-Use Legalization to Bridge Pension Budget Gap

10/06/2017

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A Republican state Senator in Kentucky is proposing adult-use cannabis legislation in an effort to fund the state’s faltering pension systems, according to a Spectrum News report. Sen. Dan Seum said the plan could generate $100 million in annual tax revenues, which could help pay down the $37 billion to $64 billion unfunded liabilities in the pension system.

Seum said while the state really needs “a billion dollars” a year to fund the system, he sees the cannabis legalization measure as a “jobs bill” and pointed to the state’s bourbon industry as an indicator of the ancillary jobs that could be generated from legalization.

“I’m looking at adult use, because that’s where the money is at,” Seum said in the report, noting that he was also interested in expanding casino gambling but was “not inclined to look at any new taxes” until lawmakers “explored the possibility of creating new monies.”

Seum indicated that his son, Dan Seum Jr., visited Colorado earlier this year to study the state’s initial legislation and to see how lawmakers had tweaked the measure following its passage.

Seum said he would use Colorado’s bill, and their subsequent reforms, as a guide for his legislation.

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‘Gorilla Glue’ Trademark Infringement Lawsuit Settled

10/06/2017

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The makers of the adhesive Gorilla Glue have settled with GG Strains LLC, the cannabis company with strains called Gorilla Glue #1, Gorilla Glue #4, and Gorilla Glue #5, in a trademark infringement case, according to a Cannabist report. The agreement does not involve any monetary penalties or transactions.

The agreement forces Las Vegas, Nevada-based GG Strains to transition from the Gorilla Glue names, any gorilla imagery, and similarities to the Ohio adhesive manufacturer’s trademarks by Sept. 19, 2018. The cannabis company must also shut down and transfer its gorillaglue4.com domain to the adhesives company by Jan. 1, 2020 – Gorilla Glue will not activate or use the website. GG Strains has one year to stop using the word “gorilla,” but would be allowed to reference its former namesake so long as it’s preceded by the phrase “formally known as” or on a “History” web page.

Licensees of the strain have 90 days from Sept. 19 to cease using the word “gorilla” and any associated imagery or trademarks.

Tom Hankinson, attorney for Gorilla Glue Co. said he hoped other cannabis industry participants “will respect these companies’ resolution of the matter.”

Ross Johnson, founder of GG Strains, said the suit and rebranding efforts cost the company $250,000 but the resolution allows the company to move forward.

“We’re going to survive; we’re going to overcome it,” he said in the report.

The rebranding plan will see the strains known simply as “GG1,” “GG4,” and “GG5.”

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How Your Style Guide Makes or Breaks Your Cannabis Brand

10/06/2017

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Imagine you’re a caterer and have the biggest wedding of your career this weekend. You ask 100 employees to bake you a vanilla cake with vanilla icing. Seems simple enough, right? The next day your staff comes back with 100 different versions of the cake and you’re shocked. How could vanilla on vanilla have so many versions? Some team members believed they would jazz it up with sprinkles. Some have smooth icing and others whipped. Some are round and some are square. Some cakes are small and others resemble the tiered wedding cake you had in mind. It’s a mess and now your business looks unorganized and unreliable.

Now, if you’d taken that same request but offered detailed instructions and photo examples of acceptable cakes, you would be parading into the wedding confident and in control of your product. This is the same reason your cannabis brand needs a detailed style guide.  

The cannabis industry is one of the world’s fastest growing industries and in the rush to market, business owners often neglect the policing of their brand. You cannot give away your logo to vendors, press, and partners with no instruction or guidance. Why would you, as a business owner, take so much time to build your brand only to release it into the world without the proper care it needs?  

There are four main goals for building your brand’s style guide:

  • It makes it easy to monitor how other companies use your brand.
  • It makes it easy for the press to get what they need. If you are interested in having a relationship with reviewers, media, etc, then a style guide is essential in policing your brand.
  • It makes it easy for your employees to work your brand on your behalf.
  • It protects you legally from the repercussions of misuse.

Remember this: Each time someone gets your brand right, you add value — when someone gets it wrong, you take value away.

Let’s walk through each element of a style guide so you can begin to build your own. I want to include a link to 50 Meticulous Style Guides, so that you can have a visual of how best to lay it out.

A few general tips to consider from the outset:

  • Don’t let unqualified vendors design your logo. Many products in this industry are starting to look alike because people are letting print vendors design their logos. These people are not invested in your brand, they are invested in getting your business. Be mindful of those who offer discounts or free art; you get what you pay for. I know it may seem like the easy thing to do, and vendors use this as a hook to buy their product, but taking the early time to work with a true designer to create a memorable logo to develop your brand will pay off in the long run. This is something you only want to do once, so do it right the first time.
  • Keep the finished style guide on your website. You want to make it easy for the media to cover you, so give them the tools to do so! 
If you put a lot of work into your brand or product, you should make sure it is well-represented by your employees, business partners, or in the media. Photo Credit: Rory Savatgy

The basics of a style guide include:

  • High-resolution art
  • Your brand logo
  • Your selected brand font (select a main font and complimentary font)
  • Your selected brand colors
  • Your Basic Proper Usage; the variations of your logo that you will allow the public to use. 
  • Include examples and photographs of acceptable and unacceptable use of your logos and taglines

 Complimentary applications and extensions include:

  • Reverse logos
  • Additional fonts acceptable to use
  • Trap/knock out versions of your logo  
  • Set up patterns for templates that others can use
  • Patterns, step and repeats, gradations, silhouettes
  • Merchandising examples for apparel and product development

Language

  • The verbal aspects of your brand are as important as your visual aspects. Create a verbal style guide for your brand to help teach others about its usage. This is especially important for people who sell your product or describe your services (including your staff)
  • The language in your style guide influences how you’re talked about. Some things to include in the language section of your style guide;
    • How is your brand spoken about?
    • What key phrases are used to describe your brand?
    • What material is used to introduce your brand to press? 
  • Include your mission, your passion, and your reason for being in business
  • Write your tagline and your headlines. Elaborate on your reasons for why these phrases were chosen. This will help with advertising and marketing.

Digital style

In a digital age, this is an important element to add to your style guide. Who are your customers? What do they “look” like. What does your target “sound” like? How do they move through social media? What are they sharing? These are the questions you need to ask yourself and then tailor your digital image around them when you market. 

  • Choose inspirational examples for social media. All great social media pages have a “look” and a “feel”. Make sure you communicate that in your style guide so that people posted about you can work within your brand.
  • Evaluate your brand on different digital platforms
  • Evaluate your brand on different social media platforms
  • Look at the digital ads on your city’s alternative weekly and have a designer layout an ad so you can see your presence in that space. If it works for you, add that to your style guide.
  • Add a legal notification at the end of your style guide that indicates that if someone reproduces your images improperly, it’s their liability. You can also add any intellectual property protections here. This will protect your brand at the highest level. 

As an agency, I can’t tell you how valuable this tool is and how much time is wasted if you don’t have it. 

This is an ongoing rule book for your brand’s success and value, so make sure to modify your style guide as your brand evolves. I know you’ll have tremendous peace of mind knowing your logo is shared in the way you intended and that you can forward your style guide to press, partners, and employees and have it executed perfectly.

Remember, go as far as you can see, and when you get there you’ll be able to see further.

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CBD pills and capsules can be packaged to appear just like a generic vitamin dose or another daily nutraceutical.

Indiana Excise Police Continued CBD Enforcement Actions After Announcing Policy Change

10/06/2017

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Indiana excise police – the state Alcohol and Tobacco Commission law enforcement arm – has at least twice cited stores selling CBD products despite saying in August they would back off the practice, according to a report from the Indianapolis Star. At that time, commission officials said they would no longer confiscate CBD products from stores unless they “clearly violate” state law.

On Aug. 14 – just two days after police made the announcement – a retailer in Lake County was given a violation notice for products seized in January. The following month, an Indianapolis gas station was issued a warning about its “Kush Cakes” which are made with “hemp protein.”

“If an Excise Officer were to return after the five days and… the Kush Cakes were still in the store, then the warning would become a violation,” an officer wrote in the incident report, according to the Star.

Heather Lynch, spokeswoman for the Alcohol and Tobacco Commission, said the actions were “issued in error and … withdrawn.”

The agency seized more than 3,000 products from about 60 Indiana stores during the May enforcement action, according to the report, while industrial hemp-derived CBD products were removed from the state’s controlled substance list in 2014.

It’s unclear whether the products were returned to retailers. The Star reported at the time of the state-wide seizures a spokesperson for Gov. Eric Holcomb said they would be held until the “legal analysis pursuant to Indiana law” was complete.

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Tommy Chong-Linked Cannabis Club TV Purchases Dispensary Digital Marketing Network

10/06/2017

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Cannabis Club TV, a digital infotainment network currently developing a cannabis-centric travel show with Tommy Chong, has acquired dispensary digital marketing company Vast Display Network in a stock and cash deal worth $2.75 million over two years.

Chong, 79, announced the show’s development in August. It’s described as “similar” to “Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations.”

Danny Keith, Cannabis Club TV founder and CEO, said the deal will help the company build on its integrated video entertainment services. The company currently produces content delivered directly to consumers at point-of-sale, over the Internet, and on TV.

“We’re now a fundamentally different company with a diversified set of capabilities and businesses that set us apart from the competition,” he said in a press release. “Cannabis Club TV realizes that the Pacific Northwest is a vital component to the cannabis story and our acquisition of Vast Networks is the pivot we were looking for, good people and sound relationships are paramount in this space.”

Vast founder Dan Kemmis will remain with the with the marketing and broadcast network as head of global business development as the company begins extending its network and services to retail and medical dispensaries and to consumers via mobile and in-home devices

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From Side-Hustle to Industry Leader: the Story of Leafly

10/06/2017

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If you have ever looked up information about a particular cannabis strain online, there is a good chance you are familiar with the website Leafly.com. Leafly is one of the most widely-used and well-known web resources for cannabis enthusiasts and medical patients worldwide, and it has greatly influenced the world of visual design in the cannabis industry. The website was launched in 2010 by Cy Scott, Brian Wansolich, and Scott Vickers, three friends & coworkers who still had day jobs in the tech industry. Two years later, they sold the company to cannabis investment firm Privateer Holdings, and embarked on a new mission to provide cannabis entrepreneurs reliable information to help them better run their businesses.

In this special edition of the Ganjapreneur podcast, our Chief Operating Officer, Noel Abbott, sits down with the three original founders of Leafly to hear about their experience creating the world’s largest online portal for cannabis information, and how that experience helped them prepare to launch their new company, Headset, a market data platform for cannabis business owners. Listen to the podcast below or scroll down for a full transcript!

Listen to the podcast:

Read the full transcript:

Noel Abbott: Hi there! I’m Noel Abbott,  Chief Operating Officer of Ganjapreneur.com and you are listening to that Ganjapreneur.com Podcast. The Ganjapreneur.com Podcast gives us an opportunity to speak directly with cannabis business owners, activists and industry stakeholders to bring you actionable information to improve your business strategy and to help normalize cannabis. Today, I am hosting a special edition of the ganjapreneur.com podcast recorded on site in Seattle, Washington at Headset, a market data and business intelligence platform for the cannabis industry.

I’m joined by Headset’s co-founders Cy Scott, Brian Wansolich, and Scott Vickers who were also the original co-founders of the massively popular website Leafly. Thanks for hosting me guys, how are you doing today?

Cy Scott: Great! Fantastic.

Noel Abbott: So I understand that between Leafly and Headset, you guys have been working together for about seven years now if not longer. Can you each give me a brief introduction of yourself and tell us a little bit about your individual role on the team.

Cy Scott: Sure. I’ll start. This is Cy. So yeah we have been working together in the cannabis industry for at least seven years, but even before kind of getting into this space, we’re working together at Kelley Blue Book, at kbb.com so we have I think about 10 years of work experience together. Haven’t killed each other yet. Yeah, so my role here is CEO. So helping guide the direction of the organization. I’ll let you guys dive in.

Brian Wansolich: Brian Wansolich here. I am the CDO of Headset. That’s basically everything in charge of design and some of the marketing aspects of the company.

Scott Vickers: Scott, CTO of Headset. So everything technical related data flow, point of sale integrations, visualizations, all that fun stuff.

Noel Abbott: Awesome! So we have a lot to cover today and I ultimately want to dig into the market data that you’ve been collecting with Headset, but before we get into that, I want to talk about your experience with Leafly, how you founded the business, how it evolved and what it was like to eventually sell the business to Privateer Holdings. So to start off let’s go back to the early days. What were you all doing when you first decided, I guess you just said you were working at Kelley Blue Book, but when did you first have the idea for Leafly to create a cannabis website?

Cy Scott: Okay, I’ll take that.

Scott Vickers: You take it.

Cy Scott: All right this is Cy. So it really was kind of motivated by Scott’s experience going to a dispensary for the first time. I think Scott went to a dispensary based on a recommendation from Brian. So this is California in 2010. So strictly medical. So you had to have your doctor’s recommendation. Go to a dispensary and then Scott went in, was exposed to a large number of strains, thought there needs to be a way to track this, kind of brought the idea to me. I thought it was a little crazy but also I really recognized the opportunity and the trajectory that the cannabis industry was on at the time. So I thought if we’re going to dive into something of this nature, let’s treat it in a more mainstream approach. Work to demystify these cannabis strains and what it’s all about. So that was the beginnings of the whole thing.

Brian Wansolich: Yeah, kind of a funny detail there was Scott actually kept the spreadsheet of strains that he was trying. Of course, the type of strain that it was, how it made him feel, duration, the blueprint of Leafly essentially. It was a pretty geeky thing to do, but it definitely help kick that whole effort into overdrive for us.

Noel Abbott: So that was the first data set that you started with.

Scott Vickers: Yeah that was it. I think we launched, built the site over a few months I think and nights and weekends. Brian is the design brains behind it. The size, vision of kind of the mainstream … I was just thinking on the techy sides not really how it would look at all so that really I think is a huge piece that the people I think about making a website now and I’ll think about it, it was different back then. So we started with 50 strains that we all wrote reviews for and then pushed the site out there and took off in relative short order, with a lot of people adding reviews and adding new strains.

Noel Abbott: So was there a very long period of time where it was kind of a side project where you were still working a day job and focusing on Leafly on the side?

Cy Scott: Yeah, definitely. It was all bootstrapped. So mostly nights and weekends for us, which was difficult. It’s a tough way to build anything, but we had to do that for a long time. I think it was a real byproduct of the industry at the time. In 2010, there really wasn’t a lot of venture capital that you can tap into that would help accelerate that type of development. So it was really on us to just get it going. Now it’s very different today.

It’s not all the way there with other more traditional tech verticals but there definitely is a lot more access to capital than there was back in 2010, even though it was only seven years ago it has changed quite a bit. Kind of to Scott’s point with Leafly I think one of the things that really got us a lot of traction was our nuanced approach to cannabis and treating it more in a mainstream manner. Today, it’s pretty normalized. It’s pretty standard way of doing things. It’s getting so normalized that Netflix now has a show dedicated to a dispensary. So it’s really come a long way.

Brian Wansolich: Yeah, it kind of funny that we are really careful about how we wanted to present Leafly and how it looked, because being that we worked in a corporate setting, concerned about people walking by, managers seeing screens so we made the strain tile layout because it was pretty innocuous. You wouldn’t notice pictures of ganja everywhere. So we’re very sensitive to that. We even when we started putting pictures on Leafly which we were kind of against in the beginning, we even had a safe for work mode so you could switch that on and off so it would be tiles or pictures or we’d turn the pictures off essentially.

Noel Abbott: That leads well into another question that I have which specifically relates to the design. When I was first starting out in the cannabis industry, I was doing small business web development and doing dispensary websites essentially. Most everybody wanted to emulate Leafly and they would say that specifically, we really like the style of Leafly. That’s interesting to hear that it was originally partially a result of not wanting to have your boss look over your shoulder and see what you’re doing, because I’ve definitely, when I had previous jobs, I was looking at Leafly and I felt comfortable in that safe for work mode. How do you feel that the design and the aesthetic contributed to your growth overall and then also to the normalization of cannabis as Leafly took off and kind of became that example of a normalized mainstream cannabis identity?

Brian Wansolich: I think it was like demystification. I think people can get their heads around that periodic table of elements metaphor that I made out there. It seemed kind of easy to do, logical to do, but I think that’s what needed to happen just so people could understand it really easily and quickly. That was the drive plus just making sure that we presented it in a way that was clean and Web 2.0 was still new then. So just seem to make sense. Flat design just to get geeky about that. It just made sense to make that approach for us. It was a diversion from what you were seeing out there primarily.

Scott Vickers: I think it was a huge advantage on the growth. Like Brian said it demystified it, kind of normalized. As we were starting it and building it, we were kind of hush-hush about our cannabis use around the office just because, I don’t know, you would be, but more and more we were smoking weed with other people and everybody 20 to 30 year old tech workers in Irvine were pretty big cannabis fans and just realized that it was a bit of an untapped market with sites and apps that appealed to that demographic. Now of course the tiles and the colors, it’s amazing. You see every random product that …

Noel Abbott: They’re ubiquitous.

Scott Vickers: Yeah it’s crazy.

Noel Abbott: I’ll see them in almost every dispensary that I walk into, they use that icon to represent the strains that they’re selling.

Scott Vickers: Yeah. It’s on product packaging. Even just the colors every website right now …

Brian Wansolich: A lot of clone websites out there which is great flattery but sometimes annoying.

Cy Scott: Totally.

Noel Abbott: As you’re working on Leafly and you still have a day job, at what point did you make the leap? Did you all quit at the same time? Was it kind of one at a time? Were you fully profitable at that point or was it something where you saw the potential and just decided to quit what you were doing and focus entirely on that?

Scott Vickers: Yeah, I think we did it all at the same time. It was only after got acquired by Privateer. So we never really truly made a big leap as far as going out on our own. The company was profitable at the time of course because we had very low expenses of not paying anybody. Yes, after that happened which was late 2011 so about a year and a half after the launch of Leafly.

Cy Scott: A little apprehensive. That term you might’ve heard golden handcuffs. We had that scenario. Pretty good paying tech jobs and being at the industry was what it was back in 2010. People were pretty scared to jump ship around anything like that. So we were a little apprehensive just to jump ship first and then look for investment money at that time.

Noel Abbott: So one of the inevitable experiences that people who transition into the cannabis industry go through if they’re going to pursue it full time is that coming out moment to friends and family. Did you wait to do that until you had been acquired or were you telling people about it the whole way through? What was that experience like for each of you?

Cy Scott: Sure, I’ll start. Yeah, I was definitely a little hesitant initially to say what we’re working on. Really when I would talk to people about it like, “Hey we’re doing something in the cannabis industry.” I would always qualify it. “But we’re taking this different approach and treating it more like a mainstream subject.” Then once I did that people would understand particularly when I meet new people and just have that conversation. You didn’t really know where people stood with it at the time. Friends, family, particularly family, conservative family members, they also saw the value of it.

I think that’s one thing that’s interesting about cannabis is it kind of unites multiple sides of political beliefs in a lot of ways from the more liberal minded who kind of are into decriminalization or legalization for social justice purposes to the more conservative side that sees the benefits in tax revenue, taxing something that’s already being consumed or kind of more libertarian values like government shouldn’t say what I should be able to consume. So kind of addressing the topic a little nuanced was important.

These days it’s just, “Oh the cannabis industry.” Now when we say, “Yeah, we’re in the cannabis industry”, everyone is really eager to talk to us about it. Everyone wants to learn more about it. A lot of people want to know how they can get involved in it because they see the opportunity. So just in seven years I’d say the way I talk about it is very different. I think the way the world perceives it is very different in a good way, in a much more positive way.

Scott Vickers: I think I probably waited three to six months after Leafly launched before I mentioned it to family. It was generally a positive response. I don’t think there was any negative. Surprisingly probably the most positive from my older grandparents 80, 90 years old but excited. Saw the benefits of it and just thought it was a smart idea to get in on that. Then their friends I think most knew about it and of course now because I mentioned especially living in Seattle, you meet a neighbor, mention what you do, it’s just like you work anywhere else and generally they, “Oh, do you know so and so from this company?” Cause yeah, its just kind of grown into such an industry. It’s pretty exciting.

Brian Wansolich: Yeah, kind of the same for me too. I mean friends I think they were always supportive and let them know about it. Family, I waited just for a little bit. They had known that I partake in cannabis anyway, but in terms of working on a project in a company, I held off just for a little bit just because sometimes I don’t want to say what I’m doing until it gets to a certain point just for fear of jinx and all that stuff. It was all well received. To Cy and Scott’s points earlier about just when people ask what do you do or what industry you in and you let them know.

It’s funny because I think with Leafly some people think that we know all the strains that are on there, like we’re so knowledgeable about every one of those strains and it’s pretty funny. It’s like, “We can reference those, but we don’t know everything about it.” It feels good to be thought of as sort of an expert even though I won’t totally claim that mantle. It’s like probably the founders of Wikipedia trying to be like experts in every topic.

Noel Abbott: So when you first started monetizing Leafly and you were pitching advertising to dispensary owners who were in this largely unregulated gray market, and advertising was probably a very new concept for them, or even just like putting their name out there in a place where it could be seen by anyone… What was their reaction like? Was that a new concept that they were eager to try or was it something that you really had to push for to convince them that it was worth it?

Cy Scott: Yeah, I think they were pretty eager. I think at the time they were excited about getting exposure. It’s pretty hard to find dispensaries, a little less so today, but back in 2010 you really had to know or get a referral recommendation from somebody to point to the right spot. So they were eager to get some exposure and kind of our approach with it, with Leafly, was to connect their patients via the strains.

So as people were researching, maybe find a strain for anxiety or something to help with insomnia then they would connect to that strain and then from there, they would connect to a dispensary that carries that strain. So a little more than just a map with icons on it. Although, Leafly has that as well. It was a way to connect the dots for someone that was doing some research to a location that might be able to carry that product. I think the dispensaries found value on that. I think the dispensaries and retailers still find a lot of value in that.

Noel Abbott: Did you take on most of the sales in the beginning?

Cy Scott: I guess it was kind of a little of all of us. That’s always the toughest part with a new company is kind of showing value. While they wanted to get exposure, it’s like how much is that worth to them and finding out the pricing that fits and then measuring the return for them, making sure that we are driving new customers, new patients to those locations was important. It was kind of I think a little bit of all three of us visiting shops, calling shops, handling inbound inquiries.

Brian Wansolich: While at our day jobs.

Cy Scott: Yeah, there was that overlap for sure. Not being able to take calls until we’re off the clock was kind of difficult. It’s hard to do sales when you have a finite window of time.

Brian Wansolich: Lunch hour.

Cy Scott: Yeah, exactly.

Brian Wansolich: A lot of quick trips to dispensaries.

Cy Scott: Right.

Noel Abbott: Was it something where the dispensaries were already using it or was Leafly new to a lot of the companies that you were talking to?

Scott Vickers: I think it kind of varied. We were in Orange County. A lot of dispensaries were down there, but we’d walk in and they wouldn’t have necessarily heard of us but then I think our first trip to Denver we were just … we were there for some Kush Con or something like that and then spent days canvassing the area. Just walking into dispensaries and I think one we walked into and she said, “Oh I was just on your website because I googled strawberry cough or something.” She was looking at strain information. So it was a pleasant surprise to then have us walk in the door. So that was cool as you start seeing it out there. I think a dispensary in Costa Mesa when Brian went in, she pulled out a folder and just had all of our strain pages printed out. She would just leaf through that to guide people in their decisions.

Brian Wansolich: Yeah, that’s right. She was a former RN or nurse. So that was valuable for her seriously medical patients at that time. That’s a good memory right there.

Noel Abbott: So the next thing I want to talk about is the developing the company culture when you’re transitioning from a small team. Obviously, the three of you knew each other very well. You’re working together without even paying yourself for a long time. How do you transition from that really tight-knit team to building out a large organization and keeping the personality the same as you go?

Cy Scott: I think like any company that’s probably one of the hardest things to do as you scale up a team to make sure that you keep that company culture. It really comes down to identifying what it is and with Leafly and with Headset, I think for us it was really about having a common belief in the direction of cannabis and the benefits that it could provide by decriminalizing or legalizing. So I think that’s one thing that binds everybody in the organization is that shared belief and that goes a long way. It’s more than just our company culture, there’s a ping-pong table in our break room, and whatever. It’s more kind of ingrained in kind of what you’re doing mean something and can have an impact.

So we’re trying to do that. We’re trying to do that here at Headset. It’s the way we look at what we’re doing here with data and analytics is really helping a lot of these operators be more successful by giving data they need to drive those critical decisions that they’re making every day. If they’re more successful then this industry is more successful. So that’s kind of our outlook and the outlook that’s shared with all of the team members here. That we’re providing a service that can provide a benefit. If it helps these operators, then it helps the industry. We all believe in this industry.

Noel Abbott: Was the point at which you built out your team, did that happen all at once with the acquisition or was it gradual bringing people in one by one over time, or were you largely working with people who were remote who you may not actually see face to face very often?

Cy Scott: Yeah, it was a little bit over time. We ramped pretty quickly. So once Privateer came into the picture, it was a pretty good relationship for us because they had a similar outlook on the industry. Something that the industry is going to be more mainstream and they wanted to tackle it in that direction. We had a similar vision. They were motivated to raise capital which I think once we started seeing some adult use laws going into effect became a little easier, but the benefit for us was it really allowed us to focus on building out Leafly and not have to worry about that side of the business.

It’s definitely a piece of the business now that we deal with directly with Headset and it can be time consuming and take mind share away from operations. So having Privateer there was really helpful. It allowed us to focus on scaling up the team. So yeah, it did happen pretty quickly but I think it kind of … we’d hire as needed for growing the sales staff or for growing the marketing staff or engineering staff. We’d find the right people and try and manage growth at some sort of level that was manageable, because companies do change. They change from when it’s three of you to when it’s five of you to when it’s 20, 30.

You see big inflection points happen and the company changes as well. You’re going from this kind of figuring it out to “Okay, I kind of have a sense of what’s happening to … Okay, now we have this very reproducible business model and let’s just scale it up.” So yeah, we’re kind of going through that now, growing the team at Headset. I think there’s 15 of us at the moment. So we’re just about to hit that 20-person kind of inflection moment. So it can be tough to stay on top of it and make sure that you’re growing the way you need to be growing at the same time is building the business, but the experience we have with Leafly I think taught us a lot. We’re able to apply a lot of those lessons here.

Noel Abbott: That leads really well into my next question which is, how did your experience with Leafly shape your decision to launch Headset? Having worked with dispensary owners and seeing the interactions between consumers and dispensary owners for so long, what was the need that you identified that led you to decide to put together a business intelligence and market data platform?

Cy Scott: It was a byproduct of a lot of conversations with operators in the industry that would illustrate their need for this type of data to drive decisions. It can be very costly to … if you’re a processor and you want to start creating maybe some sort of extract like a vapor pen to create … buy an extraction machine and dive into the packaging, the branding and all that entails without really understanding the market size or the competitive landscape. So it really was a byproduct of recognizing a real gap in the industry, talking to operators in the industry and kind of seeing that there’s a need for this type of information.

I think kind of growing with the industry and being part of it since 2010 where you see the needs change over time or seven years ago I think the audience wouldn’t have been large enough for an opportunity like this, but now with adult use in so many states, with more medical markets, more sophisticated people entering the cannabis industry, there’s expectations around data. You have people coming from other more established industries that have had access to data like this and their other verticals that they’ve been in. So they come to cannabis and they expect it to be available and it really wasn’t before Headset. So that’s kind of … yeah the problem we now have to solve and how we identify the problem really just being in the industry and talking to customers.

Noel Abbott: With Headset, what are the core offerings? Is it multiple different platforms or do you have one product? Who ultimately should be using Headset?

Cy Scott: We have a number of services. The way we talk about Headset is kind of infrastructure at the data level for the cannabis industry. So trying to provide a variety of services for a variety of audiences that are in the cannabis industry that need data. So we do have a few products that we offer. The first one that we launched with was a business intelligence offering designed particularly for retailers and dispensaries. It was created to help them make better sense of their own internal data.

So to understand what their store’s operations were saying, what kind of trends were occurring within their sales, what kind of inventory carry were they looking at and how could they better optimize things that might be overstocked, understocked, what did their sales staff, their budtenders … how did their performance measure up against the averages. So we made it really easy for them to understand the nuances of their business and turn be more successful.

The second product we launched was our market data platform. So that’s looking at transactions and aggregates. So all of these product sales that are happening and helping operators better understand the competitive landscape, really identifying opportunities. So back to my previous topic about deciding should we pursue a new segment of the industry of products to produce and what kind of opportunity is there, how much potential money can we make, what kind of competitors are there and so on, and really helping them understand their brand positioning as well, where they rank in the market.

Then our third product that we offer is a retailer direct data sharing platform. So sort of leveraging some of the connections we’ve created to be able to give a vendor visibility into a retailer’s store sales and inventory for their products. So they can use the kind of information to create a real collaborative relationship with the retailer. They use it to better forecast demand, to better understand production runs, to better optimize supply chain but essentially the common thread across all three products is it all has to do with data and analytics and utilizing data to drive decisions.

Noel Abbott: Is it presented in a way where somebody has never done data analysis, never potentially even looked at website analytics or anything like that before … is it presented so that someone without any knowledge or experience analyzing data will be able to easily understand what they’re looking at and still make these decisions?

Cy Scott: We try and make it as simple as possible to get the insights. So it’s very intuitive. Visual dashboards throughout most of our services. So they can quickly find the information they need. We also have the ability for them to create custom dashboards. So it’s pretty easy, you kind of drag and drop interface. So they can build out their own reports if they have certain specific needs that they’d like to see. Yeah, that’s a big key component of everything we’re doing is trying to just get the information that they need to know front and center. So whether that’s market insights that are packaged up in an easy to use UI or alerts for Headset bridge where we can tell them, “Hey, you’re running low at a particular retailer. It’s probably time to do a reorder with that group.” We just try make it as simple as possible for them.

Brian Wansolich: We kind of have a hook out there where it’s like your business’s own personal data analyst.

Noel Abbott: So where does the data ultimately come from and how do you go about getting the data if you’re spanning multiple state markets? I’d imagine you have to create partnerships in each market that you go into. Then, how do you combine it all to be presented in a digestible format?

Cy Scott: Most of our data is from our point of sale connections that we have. So we support a variety of point of sales in the industry. There’s a number of them. So we try and support as many as possible. We also in some limited capacity leverage traceability data government published data as well, but most of our insights come from the transaction at the point of sale level. So a big of piece of what we do the market data is looking at that in aggregate and kind of mapping all these transactions down to a single canonical products in our product catalog.

That’s really necessary because there are no UPC barcodes on products in this industry. So everyone is kind of entering products a little bit differently into their point of sale systems. So we have to be able to map and classify those products to individual products in our systems so we can aggregate at the product level. From there, we can roll that up into brand or segment category information from there. So to do that, we leverage a lot of technology, a lot of classification, but it’s a huge undertaking.

I think when we started Headset we did not realize how many SKUs there would be. We had a sense but I think we’re off by at least one order of magnitude on the number of products that are out there. It’s pretty striking. It just continues to grow. More and more brands are being introduced every day. More and more products are being introduced and we have the track all of it. So it’s definitely a big undertaking but I think we’re doing a pretty good job.

Noel Abbott: So as the Headset community grows, as your user base grows, you’re essentially expanding your market awareness as well because for every retailer that starts using a platform, you have another portal that you’re viewing into the commerce of the industry. I’d imagine you’d be able to come up with some very interesting top level insights as well. As you’ve put together this data with Headset, what are some of the most interesting revelations that you’ve seen related to cannabis consumption and retailing and how the market plays out?

Cy Scott: There’s a number of interesting insights. I think at the highest level kind of the breakdown of categories, it’s pretty impressive to see the volume of flower sales I think compared to other categories in industries so versus edibles or concentrates although that’s declined quite a bit. It’s still well over 50% of the market at the moment. Other interesting things I would say is kind of the amount of brands and products being introduced in comparison to the number of brands and products that are being adopted by retailers. You’re seeing this disconnect where more and more brands are entering the market, but it’s getting harder and harder for them to get shelf space which is pretty compelling.

It’s getting to be a very competitive market, which is another big reason why the Headset analytics are important for these operators. As it gets more competitive, they need all the tools they can get to stay more competitive and data is a big piece of that. We also have some cool insights around demographic information particularly around gender sales, age breakdowns. I think it’s kind of interesting to see the gender gap closing. We’re able to see that. It’s kind of a two to one male to female ratio earlier on and now it’s kind of an adult use market getting tighter and tighter and closer to one to one which is great.

Scott Vickers: Yeah, I think demographics is fascinating seeing the different buying patterns of age groups and genders like who spends more on concentrates. There’s obvious patterns there that I’m sure you can guess. On the younger side, males definitely prefer the concentrates and then of course you have the number of brands as well. Something we’ll know the exact numbers but 1,200 different edibles last month in Washington, 1,200 different SKUs sold which is … it doubles or more than doubles year over year. So yeah just the competition is fierce. Number of brands, of course more dollars being spent all the time but that shelf space is limited and retailers start to kind of shrink down the number of vendors they want to work with. So yeah the tools we provide to make that relationship easier is a benefit of course to those vendors. Yeah, it’s a very competitive market.

Brian Wansolich: Also, we put out industry reports just as a way to kind of showcase our data in a way. We just put one out for concentrates. Concentrates has just surpassed pre-rolls which in the order of categories it’s always been flower and then pre-rolls and concentrates. So concentrates have surpassed the pre-rolls in sales. Just some really interesting learning there is that category has evolved.

Noel Abbott: Can you break that down further into the specific categories of concentrates? Is there one that’s surging or is it across the board?

Brian Wansolich: It is surging. We’re seeing trends. So like RSO or whole plant extracts seem to be the biggest grower or in the subcategory of concentrates so the segments. So by far, I don’t know the number, the percentage of growth but it’s in the hundreds, that particular segment.

Noel Abbott: That’s interesting. I’ve just over the past year and a half witnessed in Washington the number of pedestrians walking around with a vape pen just like skyrocket. People are so comfortable with it now, you could probably get a ticket for that but nobody’s going to ask. You just see it everywhere. So with demographic data, does that come from the retailers as well? Are they taking surveys of their customers or do their customers create an account with the point of sale? Is that how that data gets sourced?

Cy Scott: Essentially it’s often connected to the point of sale loyalty program. So we’re able to see gender based on first name and then age. So nothing personally identifiable but just having gender and age allows us to create some pretty interesting analytics around demographic market data.

Noel Abbott: Well we’re running out of time, but I also just wanted to ask each of you. Having gone through this experience that I think so many entrepreneurs in cannabis visualized especially people in the tech side of the cannabis industry of growing a massively successful company and then selling it to an investor and then starting anew, what advice would you offer to someone who’s in that position where they may still be at their day job with someone looking over the shoulder and they’re pursuing their goals on their lunch break?

Cy Scott: Yeah, keep at it. I think there’s never been a better time to get into the industry. I think with Leafly, we’re arguably a little early for where the industry is at. It took some time to get to where we wanted to be. Yeah, you just got to keep at it. I think that now with more and more access to capital, I think it’s easier than ever to get something started, really prove some value and potentially raise some money to help continue to validate that idea. So keep going.

Scott Vickers: Yeah. Persistence, focus on what’s important, find that product market fit, take small bites and iterate and then take the amount of work you expect and multiply it by 5 or 10 to really … it’s a long slog for sure.

Brian Wansolich: Yeah and be experimental as well. There’s lots of room for new ideas in the industry. You don’t need to always follow a beaten path. So be daring to use your imagination I would say.

Noel Abbott: Awesome! Well that’s all the time we have for today. I want to thank you for the opportunity to come down here and record the show and for sharing your insights about the experience growing Leafly and what it’s like being a tech entrepreneur in the cannabis space and your transition into Headset and the data and the business intelligence that you’re digging into. I’m sure there’s a lot more wisdom to be gained from all that data. So maybe we should do this again sometime. Yeah, thanks for having me.

Brian Wansolich: Thanks Noel.

Cy Scott: Thanks Noel, appreciate it.

Noel Abbott: This has been a special edition of the Ganjapreneur.com Podcast. You can find more episodes as well as transcripts of the ganjapreneur.com podcast in the podcast section of ganjapreneur.com and in the Apple iTunes store, on Stitcher, SoundCloud or wherever you download podcasts. On the ganjapreneur.com website, you’ll find the latest cannabis news and cannabis jobs updated daily. You can also download the Ganjapreneur app in iTunes and Google play. I have been your host, Noel Abbott.

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