UW Study May Misrepresent Washington’s Medical Marijuana Market

5/16/2016

by

A study released last week by the University of Washington-based Cannabis Law Policy Project (CLPP) found that the currently allotted cannabis canopy in Washington should be enough to satisfy both the recreational and medical marijuana markets. However, some cannabis insiders have already voiced concerns over the findings’ validity.

The study was requested by the Washington Liquor and Cannabis Board (LCB) amid concerns that state-licensed cannabis retailers might not be able to provide for the state’s medical marijuana patients after July 1, which is the deadline for all non-licensed, grey market dispensaries to permanently shutter their doors. The study confirmed that the 12.3 million square feet currently allotted for the state’s legal cannabis canopy should be sufficient.

Sean O’Connor, the report’s principal investigator, said in a statement, “It was important to design this study the right way and engage in careful empirical research reaching out directly to medical dispensaries and growers across the state.” O’Connor is faculty director for the CLPP and a Boeing International Professor at UW Law.

One factor that has some industry experts concerned, however, is that UW researchers appear to have reached this conclusion by placing faith in the findings of a December, 2015 BOTEC study that, according to many, grossly underestimated the actual demand of Washington’s medical marijuana consumers.

Jim MacRae, founder of cannabis industry consulting agency Straight Line Analytics, has argued that BOTEC’s study contained flaws at its most fundamental levels.

The report (which was conducted during the early fall of 2015) collected data from existing grey market dispensaries to determine the likely patient base and amount of cannabis supported by the medical industry. However, the problem with this logic, according to MacRae, is that when BOTEC began collecting its data on Washington’s medical marijuana last fall, the marketplace was already facing a systematic down-sizing through over-reaching, legislative restrictions.

Ultimately, the methodology came down to this: unregulated dispensaries had been asked by an organization representing the Washington state government to disclose information about how much of a federally-prohibited substance they had sold in a non-taxed and unregulated grey market.

“Many of these people have not paid any taxes,” MacRae told Ganjapreneur. “Some of these people have now had to come into the light [to be] considered compliant enough to have a chance at existing after July 1. Don’t you think there might be a systematic bias there?”

Despite his concerns about the recent study, MacRae emphasized that he still holds a certain amount of respect for Seattle’s most well-established academic institution. However, hypothetically: “If I had a child right now that was looking to go to law school — and that child was thinking about going to the University of Washington law school — I would be a little less supportive of that decision today than I would have been yesterday,” he said.

Some industry members, however, believe that regulators should be focusing more on facilitating the movement of products that already exist in the wholesale market to store shelves where they can be accessed by consumers. Licensed cannabis producer Danielle Rosellison, co-founder of Trail Blazin’ Productions in Bellingham, said she is not particularly concerned about whether or not the state has enough allotted canopy space at this time. Rather, she wonders if there are enough retailers to dispense the product already being grown.

“If you look at all the [cannabis] farmers — and how many farmers are having a difficult time selling their product — I’m not sure that opening it up … to create more products is a good idea yet,” Rosellison said. “Do I think that this is forever? No. But I think for right now, to give those people a fighting chance, … the focus should really be on opening more retail stores.”

End

Learn about Cannabis

NFL Offensive Tackle Donates $80,000 to MMJ Research

5/16/2016

by

Baltimore Ravens offensive tackle Eugene Monroe has donated $80,000 to medical cannabis research efforts, according to a press release issued last week by The Realm of Caring and CW Botanicals.

Monroe’s donation, made to Johns Hopkins University and the University of Pennsylvania, will fund studies meant to demonstrate the effectiveness of marijuana treatment for typical pro football injuries, such as chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE).

According to the press release:

Due to the NFL’s strict anti-cannibas policies, it’s difficult for current players to speak in support of the plant and its potential therapeutic uses. Despite the risks, on March 9 Eugene became the first active NFL player to call on the NFL to remove marijuana from the banned substances list; fund medical marijuana research, especially as it relates to CTE; and to urge the NFL to stop overprescribing opioids.”

“It’s time for the NFL to change its archaic standards to better protect its players and set an example for our young athletes,” Monroe wrote on his new website, EugeneMonroe.com, which lauds cannabinoids as an effective and safe method of pain management. “For too long, I’ve watched my teammates and good friends battle with opioid addiction and leave the game with a long road still ahead; it’s time to make a change.”

End

Kansas Reduces Cannabis Possession Penalties

5/16/2016

by

Kansas lawmakers approved a measure reducing marijuana possession jail sentences for first-time offenders and no longer charging second-time offenders with a low-level felony, according to an AP report.

First-time offenders will now serve no more than six months in jail, reduced from one year. Individuals on their ‘second-strike’ now face a year in jail in lieu of a felony charge. Subsequent offenders could serve 10 to 42 months in prison, the penalty under the current law for a second offense.

The bill easily passed both chambers of the Legislature in April; 38-0 in the House and 96-23 in the Senate.

The original proposal included provisions for legalizing hemp oil to treat seizure disorders, and authorized industrial hemp research. The House passed that version but it was stripped by the Senate. The House version was designed to reduce the state’s prison population by reclassifying first-time possession charges.

The enacted Senate version also increases prison time for burglary of an occupied dwelling from 31 months to 38 months. As passed, the Department of Corrections estimates it will reduce 32 adult beds in the state prison system for the next fiscal year.

The bill is expected to be signed by Republican Gov. Sam Brownback.

End

Colorado Opens Door to Out-of-State Cannabis Investments

5/13/2016

by

Colorado’s Legislature has passed a measure permitting out-of-state individuals to own and operate marijuana companies in the state; a move the Cannabis Business Alliance says will help the cannabis industry expand and remain competitive.

This change, which still needs to be signed by Gov. John Hickenlooper (D), effectively opens the door for interested parties living outside of the state — and perhaps outside of the country — to enter Colorado’s booming recreational marijuana industry. Legal cannabis has already raked in about $270 million this year, according to a Denver Post report.

“Now that Colorado has led the way and gained effective control and transparency of cannabis businesses and the industry, we must remain competitive with emerging state markets like Nevada, Oregon, and even Texas, which have municipalities that will all allow outside money to be vetted and injected into their respective cannabis industries,” Don Slaugh, executive director of the CBA said in a release. “The State of Colorado must be able to expand on the success of our $1 billion industry as we continue to grow, consolidate and position ourselves for expansion into other markets both nationally and internationally.”

The bill allows for non-Colorado residents to own stake in marijuana ventures so long as at least one company officer has been a resident for one year. The company can have no more than 15 “direct beneficial interest owners” from out-of-state, according to the bill text. Additionally, “indirect benefit interest owners” can own up to 30 percent of a company if they are considered “qualified institutional investors” by the Securities and Exchange Commission.

End

Swing State Voters Are Likely to Support Legalization, Study Shows

5/12/2016

by

A solid majority of voters in three notorious Senate election swing states — Ohio, Florida and Pennsylvania — support the legalization of cannabis. Meanwhile, super majorities of Florida and Ohio voters support making marijuana available for medicinal purposes, according to recent Quinnipiac poll results.

56 percent of Florida voters support legalized marijuana, agreeing that legislation to allow “adults to legally possess for personal use small amounts of marijuana” would be a good idea. In regards to medical cannabis, however, 80 percent of Florida respondents confirmed plans to vote for this November’s constitutional amendment to create sweeping medical cannabis reforms.

In Ohio, 52 percent of respondents approved the legalization of small amounts of cannabis for personal use, though 90 percent of voters there support the establishment of a state medical marijuana program.

Pennsylvania voters support 57 percent to 39 percent the notion of allowing adults to possess and consume small amounts of cannabis for recreational purposes. Pollsters did not ask respondents about the subject of medical marijuana, however,as Pennsylvania lawmakers have already approved such a system.

The only demographics with a majority of voters opposing legalization in any of the swing states were self-identified Republicans and respondents over the age of 65. Zero demographics, however, sported a majority of voters standing against the legalization of medical cannabis.

End

Louisiana House Passes MMJ Reforms

5/12/2016

by

Louisiana’s House of Representatives voted 61-32 in favor of SB271, making sweeping reforms to the state’s current medical marijuana program. The proposal works within the confines of the state’s 2015 legislation which provides some individuals access to oils with low THC, but does not permit “raw or crude marijuana” or inhaled forms.

This is the fourth time the state’s legislature has passed medical marijuana legislation – they did so in 1978, 1991 and 2015 – but, according to the Marijuana Policy Project, those laws were written in a way that made them ineffective, relying on doctors to prescribe marijuana, which jeopardized their license with the DEA to prescribe drugs. Instead, the new proposal protects physicians by allowing them to “recommend” medical cannabis to patients with severe and debilitating medical conditions.

The current law covers glaucoma, chemotherapy symptoms and spastic quadriplegia. Glaucoma is removed under the new proposal, but it adds wasting syndrome, seizure disorders, Crohn’s disease, spasticity, muscular dystrophy and multiple sclerosis to the list of approved conditions.

Republican Rep. Sherman Mack lobbied for an amendment which would make possessing medical marijuana without a prescription a felony, but his bid failed 32-62 and was panned by his colleagues.

“Haven’t we led to the highest incarceration rate in the world?” Rep. Tanner Magee said, according to a NOLA.com report. “You are only adding to a failed strategy.”

The bill gives Southern University and Louisiana State University the first refusal to produce the drug, which they must do by September. Private companies would be permitted production rights if they refuse.

The bill now heads to the Senate, where it is expected to pass.

End

Colorado Cannabis Company Awarded U.S. Patent for Marijuana-Based Product

5/12/2016

by

Colorado-based Mary’s Medicinals announced today in a press release that it has been awarded a U.S. patent for its transdermal cannabinoid gel technology.

“We might be the first legal cannabis company in the United States to have a patented product formulation currently available to consumers,” Graham Sorkin, Director of Business Development at Mary’s Medicinals, told Ganjapreneur.

Through Mary’s four unique transdermal gel formulations — THC Indica, THC Sativa, CBN and CBD — consumers have an accurate and discreet way of consuming medical cannabis products. Mary’s also offers CBD Transdermal Gel Pens that have been manufactured through its sister company, Mary’s Nutritionals.

“We are pleased that the Patent and Trademark Office has approved our application,” said founder and CEO Nicole Smith in a statement issued by Mary’s Medicinals today. “The PTO has only granted an extremely limited number of cannabis-related patents — almost exclusively to major international pharmaceutical corporations, research institutions and the Federal Government.

Mary’s Medicinals started as a medical cannabis flagship company in Colorado and has since expanded to markets in Washington, California, Oregon, Vermont and Arizona.

“As a small startup company, securing this protection for our intellectual property and the recognition of the uniqueness of our offerings will bolster our continued leadership in this rapidly growing industry,” Smith said.

According to the press release:

The patent application (U.S. Patent Application Serial No.14/561,091), which is owned by Mary’s Medicinals, was filed on Dec. 4, 2014 by inventor Nicole Smith. Mary’s Chief Scientist, Noel Palmer, Ph.D. is also listed as an inventor. Mary’s Medicinals has additional patent applications filed and pending for its other unique cannabis products.

End

Jim MacRae: Cannabis Business Intelligence

5/12/2016

by

Jim MacRae is the founder of Straight Line Analytics, a cannabis industry consulting and advisory firm which gathers available data on the cannabis market from a variety of sources and uses it to help cannabis business owners make better decisions. He recently joined our host Shango Los for a conversation about how this data is gathered and how he uses it, why it’s important for regulators to release this data, and how it can ultimately be used. Listen to the episode below or scroll down for the full transcript!

Subscribe to the Ganjapreneur podcast on iTunes, Stitcher, SoundCloud or Google Play.

Podcast

Read the transcript

Shango Los: Hi there and welcome to the Ganjapreneur.com Podcast. I am your host Shango Los. The Ganjapreneur.com Podcast gives us an opportunity to speak directly to entrepreneurs, cannabis growers, product developers and cannabis medicine researchers. All focused on making the most of cannabis normalization. As your host I do my best to bring you original cannabis industry ideas that will ignite your own entrepreneurial spark and give you actual information to improve your business strategy and improve your help and the help of cannabis patients everywhere.

Today my guest is Dr. Jim MacRae. Dr. MacRrae is the founder of Straight Line Analytics. Since 2014, Dr. MacRae has been using Washington state Liquor and Cannabis Board data merged with his own proprietary compilations of industry related information to produce analytic summaries, innovative metrics, and numerous insights for business clients, cannabis advocates and policy makers. Welcome to the show Jim.

Jim Macrae: Good afternoon Shango. How are you doing today?

Shango Los: I’m doing really well. Thanks for giving us some of your time. I know your time is valuable. I want to start out by saying how valuable your work is in the cannabis industry, and that’s why I asked you on this show. Most cannabis people just repeat what they’ve heard from others, and you are one of the only people I know who is digging into the raw data to create whole new understanding, real original thought. Are you surprised that the Liquor and Cannabis Board decided to make this information public so that you can massage it and learn from it?

Jim Macrae: I’m pleased that they have, and I’m certainly think we’re fortunate that they have. We’re fortunate to live in Washington, which has one of the stronger public records acts out there. They’re some what compelled to make information available. They have chosen to make fairly extensive information available to this industry. Sociologically, for studying it, for understanding it is huge. It’s such a new industry as a regulated industry that what we do here can really serve as a good set of lessons nationwide. The LCB and the state of Washington have been very complicit in allowing that to occur.

The first year, they basically were making weekly and monthly regular deliveries of aggregate information to people, which allowed us to understand at a high level what was going on in the industry. Really down even to the monthly business level sales data, and tax collection data, so really did a lot of good stuff with that.

About this time last year they began releasing a monthly copy of the traceability data base which is effectively … Think of it as transactional level of information in the industry. It’s every piece of product creation, and movement, and flow through the industry. From wholesale, to retail, to ultimately consumers.

That’s similar to some of the data that I’ve played with in Pharma, when I worked there. I just see a huge opportunity for understanding and then for commercial value out of this information.

Shango Los: The LCB recently changed its rules a bit, so that there was less information coming out and cannabis advocates just freaked out about it. Looking at the information that is no longer coming out. Has that really been a loss at all?

Jim Macrae: We nipped the hard parts of that in the bud very early. They were proposing language from the motivation that was very good. They were releasing too much information. They were releasing stuff that was absolutely inappropriate. Things like security plans for buildings. Certain financial account numbers that people had in their application packages. Things of that sort. Stuff that really shouldn’t be out there.

But they put in general language like, we will deny all government issued ID numbers, and stuff like that. From a database perspective if they did that, if I did not have the license number, which the bureau of licensing service gives them, and the UBI number, and things like that, I wouldn’t be able to merge any data together. In deed the database, the traceability database, many pieces of it would fall a part, in terms of the ability to use them productively.

We pushed back hard. I was one of the people who freaked on that early. They listened and they modified the legislation accordingly.

Shango Los: I really like that answer to, because it kind of justifies everybody. On the one hand, my in-elegant of the use of the word freak, it was appropriate for us to freak out, because like you said, without the key IDs to anchor the data to, you weren’t able to make sense of it, but at the same time it also makes a good point that it is important for us as citizens to have oversight of our regulators so that we can make sure we’re getting clean data, and we understand how our industry, and our states are evolving.

I know that there’s a growing movement of data wonks and activists pushing cannabis regulators to keep the information available and complete. Can you tell us a little bit about those efforts?

Jim Macrae: I’m part of those efforts I believe, but yes. I would say, Dr. Corva, Dominic from CASP is involved in that as well. Many people are. The local media are involved in that, because they value the ability of our state constitution and legislation to say you can get access to these records, and we can basically hold the government accountable for many things.

When you look at the data … This is like the citizen-metrics thing that we talked about. You’re effectively saying all this information about this new industry, which is a very emotionally, politically, medically loaded subject for many people is now available to people beyond those that are blessed explicitly by the government. The government has the data. Bio-track presumably has the data, our traceability central vendor, and the consultants of the government would have the data. If other people do then you have more sets of eyes looking at it, and you glean more information and value from it. We have many examples of that. I like that term, the citizen-metrics that we talked about earlier.

Just the stuff that I’ve created from it that is not necessarily your averages and totals. Many other people are making this available commercially as well. I tend to give the data away and do other things with services. Sales by inventory type, growth, pricing, mark-ups, how long product is staying on the shelves, how one store differs from another, when they started tying the lab results in. The potency numbers and the quality assurance, and safety numbers. That just opened up a huge window. Indeed, my interest in the traceability data base started from Dominic being given it as a public records request, but the first thing I looked at was the lab results data that was from the old cannabis transparency project. The database was made available. I was all excited. I was like a kid in the data candy store, but it’s a horribly, poorly documented database, whose linkages are not obvious.

After about two months of frustrating work on my part, Dominic struck together a team of very talented people. We were able to crack initially the lab results. We looked at that, and it was apparent … The labs basically do two types of testing, potency and quality assurance. Potency is cannabinoid levels. I don’t like that use of the term but it’s what it is right now. Quality assurance, which is things like anti-microbial assessments, foreign matter, residual solvents, extracts for inhalation, things like that.

We looked at that, and my eyes just opened. It was a clear odd pattern in the data. It was so odd that we took it to the LCB about a year ago almost now, and showed it to them. It was clearly not possible in the world as we understood it. That just spun a whole bunch of work, as which you’re aware of that I’ve published up on High Blog.

It showed the labs doing some funny things. We would not have been able to do that without the data. My take away on the data stuff, the transparency of the data is crucial. As the rest of the nation launches this, please, I look at what Colorado makes available and what Oregon makes available to their people, which are dramatically different. I’m so fortunate in yet another way to live in Washington State, because we understand … We have the ability to understand this marketplace. Like right now, I don’t think any of the other states can, and we’re doing it.

If the other states come on board, if it’s only the liquor board or the cannabis board, or the gaming commission or whatever sin thing, medical thing they put in charge of it, or new thing, please encourage those governments and regulators to make available as much information as possible to you, so that you can understand the market, and so that you can really manage the market, sell its benefits, and adequately educate people about how few concerns there really are about it.

Shango Los: That’s a powerful piece of advice. We’re going to take a short break and be right back. We’re going to talk more about the inconsistency in lab results when we get back. You are listening to the Ganjapreneur.com Podcast.

The Ganjapreneur Podcast is listened to by tens of thousands of cannabis entrepreneurs and enthusiasts every single week. These folks are most likely your target customers and we’d like to introduce you to each other. Our down to Earth and information-rich commercial breaks can deliver your message to the cannabis business communities and others who just find relief in getting high. If you want to reach out and connect with our audience in the most personal way that we can offer, go ahead and drop us an email at grow@ganjapreneur.com and we can talk about you becoming a commercial sponsor of the podcast. Thanks for listening and being a part of the Ganjapreneur family. Now back to the show.

Welcome back. You are listening to the Ganjapreneur.com Podcast. I am your host Shango Los, and our guest this week is Dr. Jim Macrae of Straight Line Analytics. Before the break we were talking about the importance of cannabis analytics, getting data dumps from the state, so that individual citizens can work the data and see what we find. One of the things that most excited me and originally attracted me to your work Jim, is that you started coming up with really interesting data around the potency and other analytics that were coming out of the state approved cannabis labs. What insights does the data show with which labs may be more or less friendly to the industry?

Jim Macrae: Please, don’t get sued Jim. I published a series of … Something like five articles late last year, between late November and New Years Eve, I believe, on what I called lab friendliness within the state. Effectively, based on the work out of the Cannabis Transparency Project I took it upon myself, once I cracked the other portions of the lab data, and updated it, to do an assessment on a window of time. I took June, July, August effectively of last year. Those three months of data. We had, I think 14 labs up and running in the state at that point. Some of them had just started, so I have really thin data from them. It was enough into the market that I figured that they would work the bugs out of their processes and all that. I took a look at three months of data. Basically all of this stuff that they report. It falls into two families. I’m going to talk about quality assurance first, then I’ll talk about potency, if you don’t mind.

Quality assurance is basically, is the stuff safe? Would be a good way to put that. It’s a series of five different families of test including such things as the moisture level of bud, the relative absence of foreign matter in the product, the pass/fail levels on a handful of anti-microbial and growing things test, and the residual solvents in extract ventilation, particularly in volatile solvent based extracts.

It’s interesting, there’s data in all of that stuff. Those are basically pass/fail results. If you exceed a threshold or something like that, you fail. If the product fails, and they are typically testing batches of flowers here, many pound lots, if it fails you can’t sell it as that. Presumably you can retest it and if you remediate if that’s possible, and if it passes subsequently you can sell it. It’s a big thing to fail a test.

I looked at the data and failure rates on some of the test were almost non-existent. They were extremely small. When I cut it by lab, there was a differentiation that was stunning. I’m not going to go into detail on that, but there were a handful of labs that really stood out as failing virtually nothing, or nothing. Over quite a few tests, in some cases. That’s in the context of a whole bunch of other labs that are failing relatively consistent level of failure for the most part, but non zero. Take that as you will.

I stored that away. That was the original observation, the moisture level. Which I won’t bore you with the details. It’s in the blog. If that’s true, if the implication of that is that some labs are just failing a lot less, there’s really only a few ways that that can happen. The one that’s kind of an interest to me is that there’s almost a financial interest in that. The product that does not fail such results can be sold, that which does fail cannot be sold in that form. Store that away.

Then I looked at the potency results. I don’t like the word potency. It’s actually four measures. CBD levels, THC levels, THC-A levels and a total metric, total cannabinoid. That was what they were reporting. That’s considered to be potency. It’s the only thing that’s on the label. Now, one of the big advantages of this industry is people knowing what’s in their product. It’s more expensive for the most part, it’s taxed more, you’re less likely to go to jail in Washington if you use it, that’s an advantage. But the big advantage is I’m not as likely to OD when I do an edible. I’m going to know the profile, at least within the four measure constraint that I just said of the cannabinoids of the product, and I’m going to know given the test that they’re doing for quality assurance that it’s less likely to hurt me or kill me along those dimensions. That’s a great thing.

If some of the labs are failing nothing. They’re either … They got extremely talented growers and absolutely pristine samples, and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah all the time, or something else is going on. With the potency levels, it turns out that in a naive market, people were basically shopping for THC in various flavors. They were looking for numbers and high THC were commanding a higher price. It was moving faster, and indeed when you start talking to the farmers and you look at the data some of the stuff that was lower in THC … Let’s just say it’s velocity through the system was slower than the other product.

It really a big thing. When you look at the potency. There’s some interesting patterns of growth over time that I won’t bore you with. It’s either extraordinary genetic manipulation or people dialing in their processes quickly, but the growth in cannabinoid levels we’ve seen is humongous.

There was a sideline in that, which is that the total cannabinoid level that was being reported was different, by different labs for a period of time, and that ultimately got corrected, but a very interesting dynamic there. That’s also on the blog. I looked at the labs that were not failing results, and the labs that were failing results, and I looked at the labs as they distributed on their cannabinoid levels. There were some labs that popped as really, almost apparently … They had higher results then anybody else did. Their distributions were odd in various forms. There was some interesting temporal anomalies in it. I scored the labs basically on levels where, if they were deferentially showing higher cannabinoid levels, and deferentially showing no failures, or very unexpectedly low failure rates for quality assurance, that all incremented up sort of a non-parametric metric I developed that a summary score friendliness, which is detailed in the last series of the blog post on where I did the report card.

There were three groupings of labs. There were some very clearly friendly labs that tended not to fail a lot of stuff. Tended to have higher cannabinoid levels reported. Then there were other, what I call, non-friendly labs, which were reporting stuff that didn’t look like what the friendly labs did. There’s a third group of labs that I just didn’t have enough data on to be able to make a judgement. So it’s about a third, a third, a third.

The most interesting thing about it is, that when you look now. I’m just beginning to do the final assessment of the six month follow up of that work, that the labs that I called friendly way back when, one of them fortunately … well, one of them is no longer in operation. It was the most friendly lab, I think somebody ultimately called them out, or they called themselves out for what they were doing.

The remaining four labs that I called friendly that are in business represent the majority of testing that is done in Washington today. Whatever they did then, certainly didn’t seem to help their market share within the lab testing space. The good thing about this is the LCB and the regulatory bodies have all been made available, or made knowledgeable of this work. They have recently struck a quality assurance working group to do oversight on the labs, and indeed start looking at some of the pesticide levels that are beginning to pop up. I’ve done some work in that space as well.

We are making a big step forward with that potentially in the quality of the product that is out there. My one big concern about it is the way people are still tending to go with potency as the proxy for quality, and value, and price on the product, and how quickly it moves. That’s relatively ignorant market. It’s like shopping for Everclear when you buy alcohol. It’s much better than a fine Cabernet, because it’s got more alcohol.

Shango Los: Similar connoisseurs, they are looking at THC, but they’re also looking at terpene profile, and all these other things which gives you more of whole experience than just getting really baked.

Jim Macrae: That’s pretty much it on the labs stuff. I’m very disappointed to be quite frank, in some of what I’ve seen in some of the lab data, but I’m glad that the LCB seems to be addressing some of these issues that were there.

Shango Los: I think that’s a really good point to make that we even have this data. We’ve had years and years of medical marijuana in Washington state. We could see anecdotally that this was happening. I had consultant clients that were labs, that I was helping them with their marketing. You can tell from lab to lab, the customer saying, “oh, you’re not giving me the potency results I’m looking for. I had this run two different places. I like their results better, so I’m going to take my product back to them.” Then you would hear talk at industry gatherings where, so and so has a special relationship with this particular lab. They make sure that their testing has got the wink, wink for higher potency rates.

It really became a belief that this was a true thing. Therefor the market started to attract to those labs. Then over time we all felt, we know between the lack of sure science at the lab, and also the fact that some of the labs may be gaming the system. Our test results may be off, but at least if we all get our results at the same lab they’ll all be off in a similar way. We saw that. It was making a mess of the medical market. It gave a lot of evidence to regulators to bring regulation into medical, so that we can have exactly the kind of information that you’re talking about now, and look at it, and take action on it.

The follow up question then Jim is that, if you saw this in the analysis and you mentioned it to the regulators, what are you seeing now? Are these same labs still providing outlier data, or have their results magically become more in line with the mean?

Jim Macrae: That’s a work in progress, Shango. What I have looked at thus far, there is a very interesting thing that’s almost looking like regression to the mean. The two periods of time that are notable are last spring. The LCB gave directive out to the labs that they were to begin reporting a value that I call THC Max, which is the fully decarboxylated THC as the cannabinoid total metric. Prior to that a number of the labs had been reporting that. I think very arguably the appropriate number, and the obvious number to report there.

Some of the labs had been reporting other things. That in some cases it was driving me nuts. I could not figure out from the three other metrics that were there what a couple of the labs were reporting. I almost had to multiple them by a number to get to where they were.

Turns out some of the labs were actually reporting … They were measuring a whole bunch more cannabinoids and they were just adding them in to the arithmetic total. Bottom line is they were, I called it in my articles, inflating their cannabinoid total numbers by up to 3% on average. Remember, those are the labs that now command the differential market share of testing in this industry. When that directive came from the LCB, virtually all of the labs that were inflating by that definition very quickly came in to line, almost over night, within a week.

Two of the labs did not. One was just errant and a little learning one that was just starting up its processes I’ll say. The other one was a big monolith that continued to report inflated values for five to six weeks. Subsequently that lab has said they got special, super, secret permission from the LCB to do so. It’s one of my friendlier labs, in my opinion.

Shango Los: Right on. We’re going to take another short break and be right back. You are listening to the Ganjapreneur.com Podcast.

As a cannabis entrepreneur you know how challenging recruiting quality talent can be. Your days already busy enough, and yet there’s an ever growing pile of resumes on your desk, and your team is begging you to hire more help. Hiring the right person can make a profound impact on your company. There’s no reason that you have to suddenly be an expert hiring manager. Not when there is Viridian Staffing.

Viridian Staffing recruits solely for adult use cannabis, medical marijuana, and hemp companies, and those that service them. Viridian Staffing recruiters each have over ten years of experience and they will use that experience to recruit the kind of employees that will make you look good. Whether you’re looking for a master grower, extractor, grow room support or trimming, Viridian can find an appropriate person in your area.

They can even recruit administrative or graphic design professionals who may not need cannabis experience, because you are a start up you many also need human resources help for awhile. Viridian Staffing can make sure that your HR files are complete and keep you out of trouble with state and federal employment requirements.

Because the cannabis industry is booming, cannabis recruiting companies are popping up all over the country, but good marketing does not mean good recruiting. Some of the recruiting shops that have open are run by novices who do not yet have a thorough understanding of employment law, and the complexities of hiring for cannabis.

Don’t hire an amateur to find you a professional. Consider Viridian Staffing to make that stack of resumes disappear and complete your team with the exactly the hire that you were hoping for. You can find out more at Viridianstaffing.com. That’s V I R I D I A N staffing.com and now back to the show.

Welcome back. You are listening to the Ganjapreneur.com Podcast. I am your host Shango Los, and our guest this week is Dr. Jim Macrae of Straight Line Analytics. Before the break we were talking about all of the differences that having the proper analytics on the data have had in the market. Both helping correct the potency numbers so that patients and recreational consumers know what they’re buying, but also that everybody understands now that the market that used to be medical and unregulated is now regulated.

With these numbers we’re getting to know so much more about our market. Everything from labs to sales numbers, so that people can start projecting. The Washington market has been stifled a bit by the pendulum of approving producers, and approving retailers out of sync. There’s been this too much supply, not enough supply thing. We’re in a position now that there’s simply not enough retail stores for the amount of production that’s happening, and the amount of want by the customer and patient base. Does that bear out in the data as well?

Jim Macrae: Yeah. It’s been a bit of a back and forth as the market is launched. We’re coming up on two full years of data in this market or later this year. Initially the obvious problem was there. There’s only a few farms operating. Some of them started growing two or three months before the market originally opened. Our stores opened in July of 2014. The first stores that were open sold out immediately. Prices were through the roof. Blah, blah, blah, blah. Supply was big, supply was small. Initially, supply was small.

Then it became apparent as more stores began opening, then there were areas that were undeserved by the stores. Remember, we’re in the background in Washington of having a very robust 15 plus year old medical market with dispensaries, reasonably distributed for the population that was consuming the product.

Those were beginning to see increasing regulatory pressure. Many of them beginning to get closed down in certain areas. Some local jurisdiction began to freak out a little bit about the stores coming onboard. Will this be a societal problem? Bans and moratoria were put in place, but the bottom line is as the stores began to open over the first year of the market it was almost a linear growth in terms of licensing of retail stores month to month. The growth in sales was a little bit better than that. It was going up very, very nicely. At a micro-level … Now, remember the LCB got at this point a couple of thousand probably farmer applicants, producer applicants for the industry. They’re trying to go through and license people. Get them producing. Have them produce into the market. Get their processes right as they scale up their basement grow to 3/4 of an acre sun grown. Things like that.

The dynamics of the market were extraordinarily complicated. Then the first fall harvest came along in 2014, and thank goodness it was a partial one, because it wasn’t a mature enough market to have a lot of big ones. Some of the people nailed it. That was a bolus of product without enough stores open, so prices, at the wholesale level took a big dive. Blah, blah, blah, blah. Some of the farmers almost didn’t recover from that. That’s going into the way it was in Washington and there’s a lesson there.

When Washington started everybody was taxed at 25%. Excised tax. Farmers, processors, and retailers. They’ve subsequently changed that to the taxes now at only the retail level, but it’s 37%. That was a great thing for farmers. The farmers I say, some of them are having trouble, some of them are differentiating themselves as just superb. There’s a lot of demand and demand continues to grow.

I’ve really begun focusing on some of my work on retail the last couple of months. I think I pretty much nailed a lot of the product flow at wholesale. It’s very interesting and it’s growing tremendously, but it’s the demand at retail that’s the interesting thing and that’s where your story’s looking really good. Retail is growing like crazy right now. Of course they are closing actively the remaining medical dispensaries. They will all be closed by July 1st. At the same time the LCB has allowed an additional 222 stores, on top of the original 334 that were allocated a couple of years ago. That’s way too few for the market place, but we’ll go there another time. They based it on frankly, a piece of crap study done by BoTek. It’s embarrassing. BoTek should be embarrassed about releasing that, let alone taking money for it, but they’re making policy based on it now and it’s horrible. It grossly underestimated the size of the market in Washington state. Some of the dynamics that are going on here.

The retail is growing and it’s growing at a very good clip. I’m forecasting pretty firmly total markets sales, wholesale, and retail of over a billion dollars this calendar year in Washington. That goes well beyond what the economic forecast research council of the state is forecasting. There forecast are getting better. They’re very talented, but for some reason the legislature wants to under ball those numbers. We’re doing very well. Some of the retailers are a little worried because of the gross impact of 280E on their taxes, their margins, their operating margins.

The growth of the market is going to be stronger than people suspect. It’s looking pretty good here. Growth can be explosive, and it is explosive at least from what I’ve seen in Washington. Every way that I’ve looked at it. When a new store opens that first little bit is very big. That’s becoming less now that there’s more competing stores. They’re looking pretty good.

Shango Los: Yeah, no doubt. We all knew that there was going to be a lot more pent up demand than they expected. So much of this has been happening in the casual and black market … There were no metrics. Folks like BoTek were magic wanding it to better or lesser effects. Jim, when I started letting some of the industry leaders here in Washington know that I was going to have you on the show, they were really excited to get some free access to your analysis.

I can imagine. We’ve got listeners to all over the country. Even some outside of the country. For folks who are listening to you and they identify with, this guy understands data. I would love to be able to talk to him about my market in Oregon or Colorado. Do you work with folks? I mean, are you working on data in other states, or are you pretty much Washington centric?

Jim Macrae: I’ve been talking to people in Colorado, Oregon, and Alaska. No where near to the level that I’m doing here. Mainly because we have better data here. There are some folks particularly out in Colorado, and Oregon right now that I’d say are trying to maximize access to the information that is available in their states. There are a couple of entities that are doing a more macro-level across the states and the country that are very good work. I’m not working with them right now. I might in the future. I’m focusing on Washington, but I’m interested in branching out to the other states, because the lessons we’ve learned here will be somewhat different in those other ares, because of how they implemented the markets. If people got three market, or two well functioning markets now with lots of data, and a third one coming online, wouldn’t you like to know the good lessons out of that to make your market more effective to meet the public health and policy needs and, frankly, the financial needs of the industry people.

Shango Los: Yeah, absolutely. My dad always use to tell me that it’s fine to learn from your mistakes but it’s really great if you can learn from somebody else’s mistakes.

Jim Macrae: We’ve got a lot of them we can learn from here.

Shango Los: Yeah, so Jim that’s all the time we have for today. Thanks so much for being on the show.

Jim Macrae: Thank you very much Shango. All the best. Talk to you soon.

Shango Los: To find out more about Dr. Macrae and Straight Line Analytics, you can go to his website at highintelligence.org or you can email him at jim@straightlineanalytics.biz.

You can find more episodes of the Ganjapreneur Podcast in the podcast section at Ganjapreneur.com and in the Apple iTunes store. On the Ganjapreneur.com website you will find the latest cannabis news, product reviews, and cannabis jobs updated daily along with transcriptions of this podcast. You can also download the Ganjapreneur.com app in iTunes and Google Play. Do you have a company that wants to reach our national audience of cannabis enthusiast? Email grow@ganjapreneur.com to find out how. Today’s show is produced by Pat Packet. I’m your host Shango Los.

End

Ohio House Approves Medical Cannabis Bill

5/11/2016

by

In an historic vote, the Ohio House has approved a bill that would legalize medical marijuana in a 71-26 vote, according to a Cincinnati Enquirer report. It was the first time members of the GOP-controlled House had a serious and impassioned discussion about the plausibility of marijuana being medicinal.

“I am absolutely convinced that there is therapeutic value in medical marijuana,” said the bill’s sponsor, Rep. Stephen Huffman (R-District 80). “There is absolutely no doubt in my mind.”

The proposal — though likely to face further tweaks before earning the Senate’s approval — could still make it to Ohio Gov. John Kasich’s desk by the end of the month. Gov. Kasich said he would sign a medical marijuana bill if it was well-written and there was a recognizable need.

Unfortunately, the law is more strict than medical cannabis advocates would have liked. Patients would not be allowed to smoke cannabis, and would instead vaporize or consume orally their medicine. There would also be a 35% potency cap for THC in plants and flower products, and a 70% potency cap for concentrated products. There are also concerns over strict limitations placed on doctors that many fear will deter the medical industry from embracing the new law.

“Very few doctors will be willing to enter into a system that doesn’t trust them to make decisions that are in the best interest of their patients and ties their hands with regulatory red tape,” said Aaron Marshall, spokesman for Ohioans for Medical Marijuana.

“[W]e are not going to let the passage of a bad bill deter us … The bottom line is that this bill will not provide patients with access to medical marijuana. We are going to continue to move forward with a plan that provides access to medical marijuana for thousands of Ohioans with serious debilitating illnesses.”

There are two ballot initiatives underway in Ohio that would establish a more robust medical marijuana program via amendments to the state constitution.

End

Cannabis Companies Named in Lawsuit Over Fatal Shooting

5/11/2016

by

Two recreational cannabis companies in Colorado — Gaia’s Garden LLC, a manufacturer of infused edibles, and Nutritional Elements Inc., a retailer of recreational cannabis products — have been named as defendants in the first wrongful-death lawsuit against the U.S. cannabis industry.

According to The Denver Post, the lawsuit claims that both companies failed to issue appropriate warnings about the potency and potential side-effects of a cannabis-infused candy purchased by Richard Kirk on April 14, 2014. Hours later, Kristine Kirk called 911 out of fear that her husband might hurt her. However, the mother of three was shot and killed by Kirk, who now faces first-degree murder charges in his wife’s death.

The lawsuit was filed on behalf of the couple’s children by Kristine Kirk’s parents and sister. “While nothing can bring their parents back, this lawsuit will seek justice and change in an edible industry that is growing so fast it failed these young kids,” said attorneys Greg Gold and David Olivas, who represent the family. “Edibles themselves are not the evil, it is the failure to warn, the failure to properly dose, the failure to tell the consumer how to safely use edibles, that is the evil.”

A partially consumed “Karma Kandy Orange Ginger” infused candy was found in the residence, which was the size of a tootsie roll and contained roughly 100 milligrams of THC, or ten doses. A toxicology report indicated there were trace amounts of THC in Kirk’s bloodstream the night of the shooting — though his intoxication level was still well below the legal driving limit. No signs of alcohol or other drugs were found.

Colorado updated edible label requirements in January, 2015, requiring companies to provide detailed dosage information on recreational cannabis products. Edibles must now be either individually wrapped or somehow clearly separated into doses of 10 milligrams or less.

End

Alabama’s Limited Medical Cannabis Program Rolling Out June 1

5/11/2016

by

Alabama’s cannabidiol medical marijuana program will roll out on June 1, decriminalizing possession of CBD oils commonly used to treat epilepsy, according to a report from The Cannabist. The law allows the oil to be imported from other states, rather than produced in Alabama.

The measure, nicknamed Leni’s Law, allows for oils to contain up to 3 percent THC and follows a 2014 law allowing CBD oil to be studied by researchers at the University of Alabama at Birmingham.

Gov. Robert Bentley, who is also a physician, said the law provides patients with chronic and debilitating diseases “every possible option for treatment.”

“With Leni’s Law, citizens in Alabama will have access to cannabidiol that may help with treatment. Through a study at UAB, we have seen the benefit of cannabidiol to help with chronic seizures,” Bentley, said. “I hope we will be able to collect information that will determine the efficacy of this substance in other chronic debilitating diseases.”

Bentley’s Republican colleague Rep. Mike Ball sponsored the 2014 bill after meeting with families struggling with epilepsy and other medical conditions.

Leni’s Law draws its name from Leni Young, a 4-year-old who was diagnosed with an epilepsy condition and cerebral palsy shortly after birth. Young had hundreds of daily seizures and her medication rotted her teeth and made her lethargic. Her family moved to Oregon in order to utilize CBD therapies after she was denied access to participate in the UAB trials.

About 50 percent of the patients in the UAB study of pharmacy-grade CBD oil Epidox found “sustained improvement in seizure control” and two are seizure-free, according to the UAB report released in March. Epidox contains just .2 percent THC.

“She’s progressed further than we were ever told was a possibility for her,” Amy Young, Leni’s mother, said. “I can’t wait to watch our friends’ children progress.”

End

Medical Marijuana Consultant Classes Now Available in Washington

5/10/2016

by

With the July 1 implementation of Washington’s controversial Cannabis Patient Protection Act looming, Washington officials, entrepreneurs and educators are working to ensure there will be an infrastructure in place to provide medical marijuana patients the medicine they need.

The Cannabis Patient Protection Act (SB 5052), which was designed to fold the state’s less-regulated medical marijuana market into the state-licensed recreational cannabis system, bans medical dispensaries from operating past July 1, 2016 unless they have been issued a retailer license under the state’s recreational regulations. One of the often overlooked aspects of Washington’s I-502 legalization law, however, says that budtenders in recreational stores cannot discuss with consumers any of marijuana’s potential medical benefits.

Because medical marijuana patients will soon be sourcing medicine from recreational retailers as their only legal option, regulators have begun approving educators for offering courses on medical marijuana consulting. These classes, according to the state, will qualify individuals to discuss the medical benefits and/or drawbacks of cannabis with patients. Without at least one employee who is certified as a medical marijuana consultant, cannabis retailers will not be allowed to register for offering medical cannabis.

Two institutions have had medical marijuana consulting programs approved by the state: NRG Enterprises will be offering 3-day, in-person courses — the first of which begins May 27 — and the Seattle Central College and The Academy of Cannabis Science Division of Extended Learning launched its first online course earlier this week.

Continuing education classes will be required for individuals wishing to maintain their qualification as a medical cannabis consultant.

“[Our] course costs $499 and is a 20-hour, self-paced online program that must be completed within 2 weeks,” said Kat Oak, Marketing Manager for Seattle Central College’s Center for Extended Learning. “If students have questions on the material, there will be a series of optional online Q&A sessions held by our expert instructors — covering legal, medical, ethical and horticultural considerations — but otherwise the course can be completed in their own time. Because it’s online, anyone within the state of Washington can take it.”

A new class will start every other Monday through early July, Oak told Ganjapreneur, at which time the institution will reassess demand and determine the frequency of future medical cannabis consulting courses.

“Very few people have had an opportunity for formal training when it comes to cannabis, so that’s why we’re excited,” said Trey Reckling, founder of The Academy of Cannabis Science. Reckling said that the institution has been planning its course — which is offered in conjunction with Seattle Central College — since February. Throughout the course, students will have access to top experts from Washington’s medical, legal, and horticultural spectra of modern cannabis.

The course — as per requirements from the Washington State Department of Health — will cover topics ranging from qualifying medical conditions, the effects of certain cannabinoids, the potential risks vs. benefits of certain cannabis products, state laws regarding medical marijuana, and ethics and customer confidentiality.

“We’ve really taken a lot of time to emphasize that there’s a firm line we can’t cross, and that’s practicing medicine without a license,” Reckling said. “We continue to remind our consultant students that we’re going to educate them and give them a great amount of knowledge in a 20-hour course, but at the end of the course they will not be medical professionals. They will not be pharmacists, they won’t be nurses, but they will be the most educated, qualified and recognized employees in the industry … to date.”

Reckling also said that, as the first version of what he expects will become a long road of cannabis consulting education, they will always be working to improve the course.

“We’ll be welcoming feedback from students and input … from the community,” Reckling said. “We want to show that we are contributing, we support patients’ rights … and we want to do our best to elevate the standards and expectations of what service is when you go into a recreational marijuana store.”

End

U.S. Marijuana DUI Laws Not Based on Facts, AAA Study Finds

5/10/2016

by

A study by AAA’s safety foundation found that driving under the influence of marijuana laws in the U.S. are not based on scientific research. Instead, researchers determined that the traditional method – testing for THC in the bloodstream – is not an adequate way of testing for impairment.

According to the study, drivers with low levels of THC content in their blood can still be unsafe, while others with high levels might not be as dangerous, according to the RT report.

Researchers found that people with high THC levels in their blood were sometimes safer drivers than those with lower concentrations. The blood-alcohol-content limit for alcohol-related DUI impairment is .08 percent. Three of the six states with marijuana-DUI benchmarks, Colorado, Washington and Montana, set the BAC marker for marijuana-DUIs at 5 nanograms per milliliter of blood, but cannabis is not metabolized by the body the same way as alcohol, and the presence of THC, high or low, is often not a true indicator of how impaired a driver may, or may not, be.

Some regular cannabis users might always exhibit higher continuous THC levels and might not be under the influence at all when their blood is taken for DUI suspicion – but the test would indicate otherwise. On the flip side, a moderate cannabis user might have very low proportions of THC in their blood but could still be under the influence. Those users might also be more impaired by a small amount of marijuana compared to regular users.

“It’s an attempt to try to do an apples-to-apples comparison with blood alcohol concentration,” Marijuana Policy Project senior legislative analyst Chris Lindsey said.

AAA recommended that police officers be trained in spotting signs of impairment, such as field sobriety tests, rather than relying on BAC testing.

End

Orlando, Florida Decriminalizes Personal Amounts of Cannabis

5/10/2016

by

City Council members have voted 4-3 to make Orlando the next Florida municipality to decriminalize small amounts of cannabis, according to a WESH 2 report.

The decriminalization measure passed in a 4-3 vote on Monday afternoon. The change means that individuals who are caught with up to 20 grams of marijuana will no longer face automatic criminal charges. Instead, law enforcement officers will have the option of issuing fines: $100 for a first offense and $200 for a second offense — subsequent offenses would require a court appearance and warrant fines of up to $500.

People who can’t afford the fines will have the option of doing volunteer services for the city or attending drug education courses.

City commissioners first approved the legislation last month, but the bill has since undergone several changes that tightened restrictions and raised the fee amounts.

Orlando Mayor Buddy Dyer approved of the changes. “What we’re saying is to someone who has made a youthful mistake for the first time and they have no other background of any sort and are not associated with any crimes, we’re probably going to be able to give them a second chance,” Dyer said.

The measure was opposed by two former police officers who serve on the City Council, Commissioners Tony Ortiz and Samuel Ings, and Commissioner Jim Gray.

End

Ganjapreneur Podcast Changes: In-House Production, Updated Channels

5/09/2016

by

If you’re a regular reader here at Ganjapreneur, you’re probably familiar with the Ganjapreneur.com Podcast. The show is heard by tens of thousands every week, and creates endless opportunities for podcast host Shango Los to delve deep into cannabis business and health topics with industry pioneers.

We’re very grateful for the healthy and thoughtful engagement that each episode spurs with today’s most important cannabis industry issues.

Recently, we have brought production of the show in-house, and, because of that change, many of our podcast feeds have changed too.

Some of our subscribers may need to update their subscription information on certain platforms to continue receiving the latest episodes of the Ganjapreneur.com Podcast. Our official podcast channels are on iTunes, Stitcher and Soundcloud. You can also view every podcast episode we’ve ever done right here on our website, and we do offer an RSS feed for podcast-specific content.

This also means that we are now placing our own commercials. From now on, during our short commercial breaks, we will tell you about a cannabis company we believe in, talk briefly about their product or service, then get right back to the show. If your company would like a personal connection with our audience as a podcast sponsor, email grow@ganjapreneur.com to get the conversation started.

End

Massachusetts Voters Split Over Cannabis Legalization

5/09/2016

by

Voters in Massachusetts are split on legalizing recreational marijuana for adult use, according to a Suffolk University/Boston Globe poll, which found 43 percent of likely voters would support such a ballot initiative compared to 45.8 percent opposed.

Proponents lost a bit of ground in the poll released Saturday. A July 2014 poll found 48 percent were pro-legalization, with 47 percent opposed.

Fifty percent of those polled were also opposed to citizens growing their own cannabis for personal use, while 40 percent approved of the proposal.

The spike in disapproval numbers comes just two months after Gov. Charlie Baker (R), Boston Mayor Marty Walsh and state Attorney General Maura Healey penned on op-ed in The Boston Globe espousing prohibitionist rhetoric.

The state has already decriminalized marijuana via a 2008 ballot question, and has medical infrastructure thanks to a 2012 referendum. Another poll in March, by WBZ-TV, WBZ NewsRadio and UMass Amherst, found 53 percent approval for recreational marijuana, with 40 percent opposed – that poll was released just days before the article by Baker, Walsh and Healey was published.

The legalization ballot question is likely to appear on Massachusetts ballots in November. The 2004 decriminalization initiative passed with 65 percent support, and the 2012 medical cannabis initiative with 63 percent support.

End

Protesters Call for International Cannabis Reform in Global Marijuana March

5/09/2016

by

Participants in the annual Global Marijuana March — a.k.a. the Million Marijuana March or Global Cannabis March — took to the streets in hundreds of cities across the world on Saturday, May 7. The first Global Marijuana March was organized in 1999, and it has since become a fundamental event in the international effort to legalize and regulate cannabis.

According to an RT report, protesters in 829 cities in 72 countries marched on Saturday to raise awareness about drug policy issues and to pressure their governments to undo the gross overstepping of power that is the Drug War.

Citizens in Medellín and Bogota, Colombia — where marijuana laws are significantly more relaxed than most other countries — marched with particularly eye-catching flair. Protesters proudly displayed massive smoking apparatuses constructed with over-sized, hand-crafted joints that had been stuffed into various fruits, including apples, pineapples, watermelons and pears.

International cannabis reform has grown increasingly more popular on the global stage. In North America, medical cannabis is legal in Canada and the federal government has announced plans for full legalization in 2017. Mexico also announced plans to decriminalize possessing up to an ounce, and will develop a national medical marijuana program to be unveiled sometime next year. Nearly half of all U.S. states have now passed some form of medical marijuana legislation, and four states plus Washington D.C. have legalized its recreational use.

Germany recently revealed plans for a government-run medical marijuana program, and all illegal drugs have been decriminalized in Portugal.

Cannabis has been fully legalized in Uruguay.

End

Happy World Naked Gardening Day!

5/06/2016

by

Congratulations, home gardeners: the annual World Naked Gardening Day (WNGD) is happening Saturday, May 7.

In case you’ve never heard of it, WNGD is an annual event that takes place on the first Saturday of May each year:

Events like WNGD can help develop a sense of community among people of every stripe. Taking part in something that is bigger than any one household, naturist group, or gardening club can move gardeners with an ‘au naturel joie de vivre’ toward becoming a community. And in the case of WNGD, it’s fun, costs no money, runs no unwanted risk, reminds us of our tie to the natural world, and does something good for the environment.

Not everyone has the luxury of outdoor gardening — especially when it comes to home-growing cannabis, our personal favorite. But if you’ve got the venue — or find yourself feeling a little risque this Saturday — get outside, take your clothes off, and plant something!

U.S. weather reports predict a spattering of spring storms across the Great Plains this weekend, with uncharacteristic sunshine imminent in the Northwest region. So wherever you are, maybe consider consulting a local weather report, but we hope that the prospects of a little muddy gardening or lightening showers won’t deter you.

End

Top Canadian Pharmacy Exec. Wants to Dispense Medical Cannabis

5/06/2016

by

The top executive of one of Canada’s largest pharmacy and grocery chains wants in on the nation’s medical marijuana market, according to The Toronto Star.

Galen G. Weston, president and executive chairman of Loblaws, said Thursday that Canada’s pharmacists are well-positioned for safely dispensing a controlled substance like cannabis.

“We’re an industry that is extremely effective at managing controlled substances,” he said. “It gives pharmacists the opportunity to work directly in real time with patients as opposed to doing it through the mail, working on their doses and making sure it actually has the therapeutic effect that it is intended to have.” If it were allowed, Loblaws would offer medicinal cannabis to patients with a doctors’ prescription, Weston said.

Pharmacists would provide a much more personal interaction with patients than the current online and mail delivery system, Weston said, though he admits to seeing no “safety or credibility” issues with the current system.

Loblaws isn’t lobbying the federal government in Ottawa to make changes, however. Rather, it is supporting a move by The Neighbourhood Pharmacy Association of Canada to do so. The organization is alarmed by what it calls a “lack of clinical oversight” in Canada’s current medical marijuana program, and argues that pharmacies should play a more central role in the dispensing of cannabis.

Ottawa has announced it is considering changes to the program, which are likely to be finalized sometime in August.

End

Federal Agents Raid Three Michigan Dispensaries

5/06/2016

by

Federal law enforcement officers executed search warrants on three HydroWorld dispensaries in Lansing, Michigan on Wednesday, confiscating plants, personal belongings, supplies, and cash from the shops on Cedar Street.

Trisha Burch, a HydroWorld vendor who was at one of the locations when the raids occurred, said agents from the FBI, DEA and ATF handcuffed everyone inside and ordered them to the floor.

“Initially when I got there I thought they were robbed, she said in a WLNS 6 report. “I didn’t know they were robbed by the FBI.”

The raid comes as the City Council considers a moratorium on new medical marijuana dispensaries and new ordinances for existing dispensaries. Michigan’s 2008 medical marijuana legislation permits use of medical cannabis by those authorized by a physician. Licensed patients and caregivers are allowed to grow their own; however so-called “provisioning centers” remain outlawed.

In 2011, Lansing’s City Attorney Office indicated that local dispensaries were operating “at their own peril.” In 2013, Michigan’s Supreme Court ruled that the state’s public nuisance law could be used to shut down dispensaries.

HydroWorld owner Danny Trevino said he was surprised law enforcement chose to raid the locations instead of using the public nuisance law. Despite the setback, Trevino plans to stay in business.

“This is what I do. This is all I know,” he said.         

End

California Voters Will See Cannabis Legalization on November’s Ballot

5/05/2016

by

Voters in California will decide whether or not The Golden State will legalize cannabis for recreational purposes this November.

Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom announced Wednesday that proponents of the Adult Use of Marijuana Act have collected enough signatures to see a legalization measure appear on November’s ballot. Advocates claim to have submitted about 600,000 signatures, and only 366,000 are needed to qualify.

The measure would make it legal for anyone 21 and older to possess up to an ounce of cannabis, and would establish a regulatory framework for the commercial cultivation and distribution of recreational pot. The law would impose a 15 percent tax on all retail cannabis sales, which is expected to generate hundreds of millions in new tax revenue for the state.

California voters turned down a similar proposal in 2010. Since then, however, four other states — Washington, Colorado, Oregon and Alaska — and Washington D.C. have passed recreational legalization laws.

Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-Costa Mesa), who supports the measure, calls this an issue of personal freedom. “I can’t think of a bigger waste of government money than to try to use it to control the private lives of adults,” said Rohrabacher. “The walls of cannabis prohibition and this tyranny that our people have faced is coming down. Join us in tearing down this wall.”

Newsom, who is personally against marijuana use, says he is more concerned about the effects of prohibition than the drug itself:

“You do not have to be pro-marijuana to be pro-legalization. We are not promoting something that is not already ubiquitous in the state of California. Survey after survey, our kids say the same thing: It is easier to get marijuana than it is to get alcohol.”

End

Oakland, CA Expands Medical Cannabis Market

5/05/2016

by

Oakland’s City Council voted unanimously to expand the city’s number of medical cannabis dispensaries and related businesses on Wednesday. The move allows an additional eight dispensary permits each year, 12 delivery services, five distributors, five transporters, two testing facilities, 28 manufacturers and 30 cultivators.

Lawmakers hope the new law will bring some of the black market into “regulatory sunlight,” according to the East Bay Times.

One of the law amendments dictates that half of the licensees for dispensaries opening in certain areas of the city must be issued to residents of that area. That individual must maintain at least a 51 percent ownership stake in the business. The areas, all in East Oakland, were identified as having higher marijuana-related arrest rates than the rest of the city.

The amendment, authored by Councilmember Desley Brooks, also permits applicants who have previous marijuana-related offenses in Oakland to own a dispensary. Brooks anticipates these amendments will lead to more minority-run ventures.

“When you look at the cannabis industry around the country, it is predominantly white,” Brooks said in the East Bay Times report. “When you look at the cannabis industry here, with respect to ownership, it is predominantly white.”

Currently, Oakland’s eight dispensaries generate about $4 million in taxes but Greg Minor, an assistant to the city administrator, declined to estimate the potential tax revenues the new dispensaries and other businesses could generate.

California’s “Adult Use of Marijuana Act” — which would legalize marijuana for recreational use — is likely to appear on ballots in November.

End

Colorado Lawmakers Reject Organic Cannabis Certification Bill

5/05/2016

by

Colorado lawmakers rejected a bill that would have created an organic certification for cannabis, according to an Associated Press report.

The proposal was written to help consumers easily determine whether cannabis had been produced without pesticides. “Cannabis consumers, or tomato consumers, or any product consumer wants to know what goes into what they’re using,” said Ben Gelt, of the Denver-based Organic Cannabis Association.

The bill was defeated 4-3 in a Senate committee Tuesday. Some lawmakers were concerned that the certification, which would have been the first of its kind, would have led consumers to believe that cannabis is harmless.

“It will mislead people to thinking marijuana doesn’t have any health effects, that it’s okay.” said Sen. Rollie Heath (D-Boulder). “It kind of puts a stamp of approval on it.”

Sen. Pat Steadman (D-Denver), who sponsored the bill, disagreed: “Does that label mean there are no health effects? That’s it’s healthy, it’s wholesome? . . . I don’t think anyone is going to be under any false illusions.”

Others feared that U.S. Department of Agriculture would take issue with the state if it began certifying cannabis crops as organic—organic certification is regulated at the federal level, where cannabis remains illegal.

Concerns about pesticide use in Colorado cannabis were sparked last year, when Denver health authorities took thousands of plants from growers who, authorities suspected, were using banned pesticides.

End

Michael Gordon: Cannabis Tourism

5/05/2016

by

Michael Gordon is the co-founder of Kush Tourism, a national cannabis tour company. When Washington and Colorado voted to legalize cannabis in 2012, many knew there would be opportunities related to tourism, both in the sense that many people would want to visit a place where they could consume legally, and also in the sense that people would be curious to see behind-the-scenes at these new, legally-operating cannabis farms and retail shops. Michael recently joined our host Shango Los for a conversation about how Kush Tourism has found its niche, what a cannabis tour generally involves, and more. Listen to the episode below, or scroll down for the full transcript.

Subscribe to the Ganjapreneur podcast on iTunes, Stitcher, SoundCloud or Google Play.

Listen to the podcast:

Read the transcript:

Shango Los: Hi there, and welcome to the Ganjapreneur.com podcast. I’m your host, Shango Los. The Ganjapreneur.com podcast gives us an opportunity to speak directly to entrepreneurs, cannabis growers, product developers and cannabis medicine researchers, all focused on making the most of cannabis normalization.

As your host, I do my best to bring you original cannabis industry ideas that was will ignite your own entrepreneurial spark, and give you actionable information to improve your business strategy, and improve your health, and the health of cannabis patients everywhere. Today, my guest is Michael Gordon. Michael is co-founder of Kush Tourism, a national cannabis tour company. Their tours create the opportunity for locals and tourists to get behind the scenes of the new cannabis industry. Welcome to the show, Michael.

Michael Gordon: Hi, Shango, thanks for having me.

Shango Los: So, Michael, I’ve been watching Kush Tourism grow over the years. As your business model grew and evolve, and I suspect that the history of your company, which we’ll talk about, has many lessons for cannabis entrepreneurs that are going to be in the early days of any state that’s normalizing. Let’s start by establishing what Kush Tourism is today. What are your offerings?

Michael Gordon: Shango, we started as a tour company a few years ago, and we’ve really been expanding. Our roots here, of course, are in Seattle, Washington, one of the first two states to legalize cannabis. We offer a behind the scenes tour, kind of like a winery or brewery tour, we get to introduce you to that master grower, to somebody who does oil extractions, glass blowing. So, you can learn everything from A to Z of how it’s made.

We’re able to offer this sort of experience in four states now, because we’ve got Colorado, Washington, Oregon and Alaska coming online. No matter where you go, you’re going to have access as either a … Say you’re a curious adult, and you want to take your wife out on something fun, or maybe you’re that entrepreneur who really wants to understand how a new industry’s evolving.

It’s a really great personal opportunity to go behind the scenes.

Shango Los: You’re website shows that you are in these different states, and as the states normalize, I’m assuming that your … That the tours evolve over time. Because, it takes a while, so the cannabis is legalized, but then there are not companies there for you to give tours at for day one. What do you see as being the key markers, when you know that it’s time to set up a tour in a new state?

Michael Gordon: That’s a great question. Boy, and it really has evolved here in Washington state. Our first cannabis tour here in Seattle was two months before the first retail store opened up. You could imagine the challenges of: What is a cannabis tour? At that point. What is cannabis culture, how do you define that? One of the nice things, especially here in Seattle, is cannabis culture has been around for such a long time. You look at Seattle Hempfest, which has been here for 20 plus years. You’ve got Jimi Hendrix. We’ve had some of the best bud up here in the North West between BC and Humboldt for a very, very long time, so it’s deeply rooted in our culture.

The first step was saying, “Hey, we want to share this culture with everybody.” You can do that by talking about the medicine, by going to testing facilities, by going to a place like Hempfest Central. As the things started to evolve, we had retail stores open up so people could legally buy their product. We started having growers who understood that it was important to get their brand out there and share education and awareness around the plant. The same thing happened for processors.

Getting the magic spark is not only having tourism available, but having an industry that is open to the idea of education. That’s the foundation of everything that we do, Shango, is making sure that we’re providing access to something that’s typically been black market, and hidden behind closed doors, and saying, “Hey, you know what, guys? This is a mother. She worked as a lawyer for twenty years, she coaches her girl’s soccer team and softball team, but she also is a master grower.” Incredibly professional, she’s on top of her game, and she wants to tell you all about it.

When you’re able to expose people from all over the world to that sort of individual, all the stigma disappears.

Shango Los: I was going to say I like that idea too, because what you’re doing is you’re making the industry seem less scary to newbies, which is really the whole point of normalization, so that the stigma’s taken away.

Michael Gordon: Sure, and it doesn’t even just seem less scary, it is less scary. It’s a highly regulated market, the people who are in the legal industry right now have been working extremely hard and diligently, and that’s the only way they got there. So, we don’t see people running around with guns and masks, it’s quite the opposite. You might get sandwiches at a local shop after work and smoke a joint, but there’s no scary gangster mentality. It’s all but disappeared here in Washington.

Shango Los: You mentioned that your first tour happened about two months before the first store opened, but I’ve seen your company name around longer than that. Were you guys giving tours in the pre-recreational market when it was just medical?

Michael Gordon: Yeah, absolutely. It was so much fun, because we were able to take people into a medical facility, and say, “Hey, here’s what the candy shop looks like.” There are 40 jars here, the strains … This is why CBD is good, here are the cannabinoids, and really provide access to this education for the first time anywhere in the entire world. But, there are also the challenges, because your average person can’t go into a medical store and buy pot, which of course they’re interested in, but I’m not sure if you guys are familiar with companies like Winterlife Coop back before recreational stores opened up. There were these deliver companies in Seattle, Washington. They were providing what was dubbed as a stop gap measure.

It was legal to sell weed, it’s legal to smoke it, it’s legal to buy it, but there were no stores open, so these delivery services started saying, “Hey, pot is medical for everybody. We’ll start delivering it to you.” They were placing ads in magazines and newspapers, they had a website, it was like, “Holy cow. What is happening in this industry right now?” I can’t believe these guys are professional drug dealers with a website, and not getting in any trouble. Although there weren’t retail stores opened up, surely we could point them to The Stranger back page, and say, hey, look at all these retail stores. Sorry, look at all these delivery services. I know they’re not probably legal, but the police chief has said that they’re providing a stop gap measure. Here’s an issue of The Stranger, you guys have fun and stay out of trouble.

There was always interesting workarounds. I’ve never been able to buy, sell or touch marijuana, but I’m here on the education side. If you’re looking to just get higher than you’ve ever been before, maybe this tour isn’t for you. If you’d like to understand what lights they use in a grow operation, and why they take clones from where they do, you know, really focused on education, because you can get stoned back home, but you can never walk into a grow operation and ask those intimate questions.

Shango Los: What has the transition been like for you from dealing with medical company owners, and then going through the transition to working with recreational company owners? In my experience, and this is a generalization, they’ve got different approaches to the business, and I’m sure that with you bringing people into their operations, you’ve probably noticed a difference as well.

Michael Gordon: Sure. We always highlight the best in the industry that we have. For instance, I know Stephanie Viscovich was so kind to open her doors with her dispensary back before the recreational stores opened up, and she had such a heavy influence on medical. We didn’t deal with any of the shady folks, everybody was incredibly helpful and open armed, but what we’ve seen with the transition is an ability to better leverage our resources.

For instance, we produce cannabis tourism maps, so if you come into a legal state, you know where you can make a purchase, what the local laws are, what you can and can’t do. Oh gosh, Shango, we probably distribute 400,000 plus of these maps a year in three different states. Probably 2000 hotels. When I’m able to leverage that and say, “Hey, you’ve got great operation, but now I can give you advertisements and it gets printed 200,000 times every six months,” I’m able to drive these guys more value.

Then I say, “Hey, we take you to the grower. Now we can go to the retail store. You can actually try Goldstar Cannabis’ product. You saw where it was grown, you had this intimate connection with the master grower, and it produces value on all sides.” So, that’s been the most exciting part, is being able to create more value for everybody involved.

Shango Los: You know, I was thinking about the flyer that you were just … The map that you were just describing. The entrepreneur in me went, “Oh, there’s another revenue stream as well.” In the early days, as you were growing, did you find that you needed to make sure that you could develop other revenue streams in addition to the tours? Because selling advertising into your map, and then distributing it in other states, that’s almost an entirely separate business, but under the same idea, and you probably have got not only more legal flexibility, but also it’s an entirely different kind of revenue stream.

How diversified were you guys? Or, were you really, majorly focused on doing the tourism, and moving human bodies around the city?

Michael Gordon: We first got our foot into the industry via the tours. It was incredibly opportunity for PR when everything was becoming legal for the first time. We were lucky enough to have the first tour in Washington state to a slew of an incredible amount of media. We’ve been in every TV show, every radio channel, up until the point where the History Channel featured us this year, which was an incredible opportunity. But, tours are good. It creates a good job, but it’s been very difficult. It was an uphill battle trying to make a living.

One of the ways we wanted to promote our tours were in the hotel rack cards. When you were in the hotel lobby and you see them, “Let’s go whitewater rafting, let’s check out a winery tour,” I wanted it to say cannabis tours, try out the Kush Tour. The reality was though, that that startup point of our life when we were working 70, 80 hours a week, getting paid $500 a month, it was a beautiful thing that I’m so happy we’ve made it through. We couldn’t afford to advertise, and this is where one of our first big pivots occurred, Shango.

We wanted to do these brochures, but we couldn’t afford it, so what we did is we worked with a few of the local retail stores. We said, “Hey, why don’t we work together? I’m going to advertise you guys on these brochures, I’m going to advertise my tours, then we’re able to split up the cost of this distribution.” Well, that ended up being one of our biggest revenue streams. Stores really enjoyed it, it drove a lot of businesses. We work very closely with the Seattle Concierge Association as well. It worked so well to the point that we were like, hey, you know what, we should really pursue this. Now we’ve got over probably 175 advertisers in three different states, we’ve been welcomed with open arms to this. This distribution was difficult to achieve, Shango.

I called these guys every two weeks for six months before they gave me the green light to even distribute in those locations. It’s always been an uphill battle. Goodness, once the flood waters break through, you can recognize some great opportunities. We also had the good fortune of having strong online resources. If you’re looking up, if you come to Washington, recreational cannabis we pop up number one. That holds true for Oregon and Vegas and all these other states coming on. We’re able to drive a huge amount of business via our resources, in addition to our tours.

Shango Los: I think another good thing to point out here is the importance of building your alliances within the cannabis community, because you solved a capital issue, meaning you didn’t have enough money to get the maps printed, by instead of fundraising and asking for money, you went and you created agreements with other cannabis companies who shared your ideals and your goals; and then, were able to throw all of your money into the kitty to make the maps yourselves. I think that a lot of entrepreneurs, when they’re starting out, they’re thinking about all the money that they need to raise for this project or that project, and I think that’s a really good example how working together to help your allies get what they want can help you get what you want.

Michael Gordon: Yeah. There are two kind of lessons that we really learned in this. One has to do with MVP, which is called a minimum viable product, and the other one is an advertising agency model that we follow. The MVP is how do you test something out really, really fast. We’ve got this idea for the math, but how do we test it without spending $20,000 and four months to do it? Then, actually, we worked with a couple of local universities, and we postured that same question to it: How do you test this map without actually paying $20,000, and how fast can you do it?

The answer is it costs about $40 and takes about a day and a half. You find a couple people who are willing to work with you, you design something, go to FedEx, cut it up, and you put it in the connoisseur’s hands. You find out whether or not people are willing to pay for it, you find out if it’s an effective resource, and you’ve learned it in 36 hours. As a startup company, it’s important to accelerate your learning processes.

I always encourage you guys out there, especially in the cannabis industry where things are rapidly changing, test something out. It probably only is going to take you 24 to 36 hours to do it. Learn what you can from it, and then make your next decision.

Shango Los: That’s great.

Michael Gordon: The other piece to that, Shango, is the advertising agency model. We saw an interesting thing happening in print. Say you advertise in a local publication in your retail store. While you’re paying for distribution that’s in Seattle … you’re reaching this huge demographic, when the reality is you probably only want to target the people who are, say, four miles away from your store. That’s where most of your business is going to come from.

If you’re able to distribute that cost of the distribution between fifteen stores, you’re only paying for that distribution that’s around your store. You’re able to carve out that little piece of distribution you want without having to afford the entire page. Those two ideas put together really enabled us to pursue these maps.

Shango Los: That makes sense. It’s a highly targeted group. Not only is it targeted to tourists who are interested in cannabis, but then it’s also geographically targeted as well, so that they’re closer to your store.

We’re going to take a short break and be right back. You are listening to the Ganjapreneur.com podcast.

As a cannabis entrepreneur, you know how challenging recruiting quality talent can be. Your day’s already busy enough, and yet there is an ever growing pile of resumes on your desk, and your team is begging you to hire more help. Hiring the right person can make a profound impact on your company. There’s no reason that you have to suddenly be an expert hiring manager. Not when there is Viridian Staffing.

Viridian Staffing recruits solely for adult use cannabis, medical marijuana and hemp companies, and those that service them. Viridian Staffing’s recruiters each have over ten years of experience, and they will use that experience to recruit the kind of employees that will make you look good. Whether you’re looking for a master grower, extractor, grow room support or trimming, Viridian can find an appropriate person in your area. They can even recruit administrative or graphic design professionals who may not need cannabis experience.

Because you are a startup, you may also need human resources help for a while. Viridian Staffing can make sure that your HR files are complete, and keep you out of trouble with state and federal employment requirements. Because the cannabis industry is booming, cannabis recruiting companies are popping up all over the country. But, good marketing does not mean good recruiting.

Some of the recruiting shops that have opened are run by novices who do not yet have a thorough understanding of employment law, and the complexities of hiring for cannabis. Don’t hire an amateur to find you a professional. Consider Viridian Staffing to make that stack of resumes disappear, and complete your team with exactly the hire you were hoping for.

You can find out more at Viridianstaffing.com. That’s V-I-R-I-D-I-A-N staffing dot com.

And now, back to the show.

Welcome back. You are listening to the Ganjapreneur.com podcast. I am your host, Shango Los. My guest this week is Michael Gordon, co-founder of Kush Tourism. Before the break, we were talking about how your company has grown, and the product that you deliver both to tourists in the way of taking them behind the scenes of the new, legal cannabis industry, but also the outreach that you’re doing for your cannabis partners, by putting a cannabis map in the hand of tourists that may or may not actually ever end up on the tour.

You know, Michael, I was thinking, during the break, that there’s got to be some obstacles that even though cannabis is legal in the states that you have tours in, that there still must be some obstacles, either legal or cultural, that are still causing you some grief. Can you give me an example or two?

Michael Gordon: Oh, yeah, absolutely. It’s a funny thing. You would think being in the ancillary business, not buying, selling or touching cannabis, you wouldn’t have many obstacles. But, my goodness, that is not the truth. Everything from banking, can I advertise here, what does the insurance policies look like, who’s willing to work with us? Has been a major headache. To give an example, I’ve been trying to work with Visit Seattle for the past, oh gosh, two years now. And say, “Hey, can we advertise our tour here? It’s totally legal. We don’t buy, sell or touch cannabis.” We’ve climbed up the flagpole, I’ve taken the VP on a tour, the VP bought some cookies, gave one to the president as a joke, but until I get the board of directors on the tour, it probably won’t happen.

We see these obstacles all the time, Shango. I think one of the biggest ones that we had to overcome was, in cannabis tours, when there’s a certain amount of infrastructure that needs to be established. For us, that’s tours, activities and accommodations. If you come to Seattle or Colorado or Oregon, you need a place to stay where you can consume cannabis, you need things to do to really create that whole picture. If you go to Napa Valley, you can stay at the vineyard, you can do the tasting tour. You’ve got an incredible vacation plan.

What we did is we had to go out there and hit the phones up and say, “Hey, guys. Here’s our idea.” Cannabis tours, and people are going to be flocking from all over the world. Do you know someone who’s been to Amsterdam? It’s not because of windmills and bicycles, it’s because they have pot shops. So, we started creating this buzz. We said people are going to be coming, these are professionals, they need a place to stay, they need things to do. We started calling up everybody and pleading our case: “Would it be okay if someone smoked pot on your property? Maybe in the backyard? Not a big deal.”

We started developing this infrastructures of bed and breakfasts. Of hotels that are willing to work with us, and finding activities like the Kush tour, like pipe blowing classes. High painting down in Colorado. Where people could actually have a great time and enjoy their vacation.

I’d say that was one of the biggest obstacles, is it was just developing the idea of what is cannabis tours? Getting people on the bandwagon. Of course, now, people understand what Kush Tourism is, and they travel from all over the world to experience it, so thankfully that ship has sailed, but there’s still a lot of room to improve.

Shango Los: You know, I think that a lot of people, when they are considering getting into cannabis, they’re just thinking: Oh, I’m going to get in, I’m going to set up shop, I’m going to sell my stuff, I’m going to get rich. They don’t realize that we’re still at the pioneer level of this game, where especially if you’re in a normalizing state, but even in the already legal states that if you’re moving into a new niche of the industry, that you yourself are probably going to have to be the person to normalize it, just as you described, where you were the person reaching out to bed and breakfasts and say, have you ever considered allowing cannabis, because you needed to get all those people on the board, so the environment of Seattle as a whole was welcoming, so that you could even get your customers in the city to offer them a tour. I don’t think a lot of people consider that.

Michael Gordon: Yeah. I think that’s right. What it really boils down to is if you come into an idea with your heart and soul, something that you’re really passionate about, it’s something that the community will embrace and support you in. You couple that with a good idea and 60 to 80 hours of work a week, and you can do that for a couple years, there’s a good chance you’re going to make it through. What a cool time to be in this industry. Everybody working now is a pioneer. We are creating the Jim Beans and the Anheuser-Busch’s of the cannabis industry, but we’re also creating the Legion Brewings, we’re creating these little craft companies.

It’s a big ball of Play-Doh. Whatever you want to do right now, if you’ve got a dream and you know how to execute it, you can make it true. That’s the most fun, exciting part of this industry.

Shango Los: Early on, you and your co-founder, Chase, were constantly weighing risk. There’s business risk, yes. There’s, okay, do we have enough finances to last until we’re going to get our next infusion of capital. There’s that kind of risk. Then, there’s also the kind of risk where, is the city of Seattle going to bust us for coming in contact with the cannabis, and maybe being too fragrantly making money around it.

Not to say that the city of Seattle ever had those thoughts, but two years ago, we weren’t really sure how these laws were going to play themselves out. What did you and Chase do to determine how much risk you were willing to experience to make this happen?

Michael Gordon: That is a great question. For something as volatile as cannabis where you could end up in federal prison, we played it very safe. Never has cannabis consumption been a part of our tour, because in the state of Washington, according to the marijuana clubs law that was passed, it would be a class C felony to directly or indirectly contribute to somebody consuming cannabis in a public place with any sort of pecuniary gain, any sort of financial incentive is what that means. I don’t want a class C felony. I don’t want to go to jail. Goodness knows the business is, my opinion, it’s not worth it to me. The risk isn’t worth it.

You still have to play that line of the gray area of hey, I’m doing this the right way, I’ve read the laws. Through and through I’ve gotten second opinions on it, is it okay what we’re doing? And, the reality is, yeah, it is okay, and we’ve played our cards right as a certain bit of luck, but it’s also the approach that you take. If you come into this tour idea and you’ve got girls with pasties on and you’re handing out joints and blunts because you think it’s okay and it’s the gray area, you’re painting the picture of the cannabis industry that nobody wants. Nobody from the city wants, nobody who’s looking at you as a case study saying, “Here’s what cannabis tours could be,” wants to see the shady business.

If you are bringing professionals in … We see the lawyers, doctors, couples. A disproportionate number of veterinarians. When they see this group of people coming, there is no stigma, it disappears entirely. We haven’t had a single negative news report come out ever. I think they look to our company and say hey, these are the guys doing it the right way. They’re the pioneers showing us what cannabis tourism is. What is the potential of this industry? It’s really important, as somebody who is an advocate for cannabis legalization for medical … As an advocate for seeing the stigma disappear, we take the right approach. It’s our responsibility to be promoting the best that the cannabis industry has to offer, and help guide it in a positive direction.

Shango Los: You didn’t really ever go under the radar. As a tourism company, you had to be blatant and out in the media from day one. I’m curious to what degree you interacted with the city of Seattle. Not necessarily asking for permission. Maybe you did. Did you ever reach out to them to say, hey, can we get an informational meeting just to let you know who we are. How did you interact with the city?

Michael Gordon: We certainly have spoken with Pete Holmes and we’ve spoken with some of the marijuana policy people, but the reality is, because we are such an ancillary company, we don’t buy, sell or touch the product, there’s very little risk involved. It’s like a sightseeing tour. All we do is we talk about weed, granted, it’s incredibly in depth, and we get to show you some things and it’s really interactive, but at the same time tours aren’t regulated. Information is not regulated, so we were able to skirt those laws.

Staying in compliance with the Washington department of transportation and all that has it’s own challenges as well. That’s extremely difficult to do. We never had a big problem with staying in compliance when it has to do with the cannabis industry.

Shango Los: Right on. That’s good to know. It also probably helps out with the idea that you guys wanted to keep your risk as low as possible as well. It’s time for us to take another short break. We will be right back. You are listening to the Ganjapreneur.com podcast.

The Ganjapreneur.com podcast is going to sound a bit different going forward. We are now producing our podcasts in house, so we can have more control over how they sound. We want to make them an even better listening experience for you. That means the show is going to sound a little bit less produced and whiz bang, and a bit more down to Earth and pleasant on the ears. We didn’t used to control the commercial content, and we, and many of you, thought it sounded out of sync with the rest of the vibe of the show.

Going forward, during the commercial breaks, we’re going to bring you companies that we believe in. We’re going to tell you about them, we’re going to tell you how to get in contact with them, and then we’ll get right back to the show. Pretty simple really. This change also means we are booking our own commercials now. If you want to reach out and connect with our audience in the most personal way we can offer, drop us an email at grow@ganjapreneur.com, and we can talk about you becoming a commercial sponsor of the podcast.

It is our hope and intention that these changes will make the podcast an even more pleasant listening experience.

Thanks for listening and being part of the Ganjapreneur family. Now, back to the show.

Welcome back. You are listening to the Ganjapreneur.com podcast. I am your host, Shango Los. Our guest this week is Michael Gordon, co-founder of Kush Tourism.

Michael, we’ve gotten through the business aspects of it, but I know that there are people listening that are thinking to themselves, “Can I get stoned on the bus?” You’ve already been clear that you guys don’t provide cannabis, but I do know that retailers are part of your stops. So, break it down for us. For people who want to know, blatantly, can they do the tour high, and when can they get stoned? How does that play into the tour?

Michael Gordon: We eluded to earlier the fact that you’re not allowed to provide any sort of place where someone for to smoke that’s in public, or if you have any financial gain to be had. Unfortunately, the answer to that is there’s no consumption allowed between the start and end of the tour. With that being said, have I ever had a customer show up to our tour high? Most of them. Have I ever had people smoke after the tour is over? Probably 99% of them have found a way to consume … I think here in the state of Washington it’s like a $27 fine for getting caught smoking in public. I don’t know of anybody who’s gotten a ticket, but it’s surely on the lowest of low priorities.

Consumption is really not the focus of our tour. You can go home, you can get high, you can hotbox your car if you really want to, although it’s illegal and you’re not supposed to. But, what’s truly unique is the experience we’re able to provide and just the intimate acts as to the behind the scenes look of the industry.

Shango Los: Do you find people are waiting for the tour, so it hasn’t officially started, and people are toking up because they already know that they can’t toke on the tour. The folks are told in advance that you’re not going to be hitting your bong in the van?

Michael Gordon: Yeah. I think that most of the people already have shown up high. It’s never a disappointment. The tour is so interactive. You’re talking with the master grower about how they do clones and how they trim their buds and why this drain looks the way it does, and why should you grow this drain. There’s almost no time for smoking. Smoking takes away from the experience. Would I like you to be able to consume pot on the tour? Oh, heck yeah, I would love that, and at some point we’ll have those laws changed, it’s obviously going to come at some point. We’ll see these vapor lounges open up.

I know that we had Club Zero here, give it a shot in Seattle, and there was a very brief window of time where you had a place where you could go and consume it. It wasn’t a class C felony. Goodness knows, as soon as it happens again, we’re going to be there on day one for our clients.

Shango Los: Do you give your guests a don’t get too high talk at the beginning to put them in check?

Michael Gordon: We always preach responsible consumption. I’d say, typically, we don’t have the massive stoners who are taking gram dabs on our tour. We have folks who smoke in the evening, they smoke occasionally. Maybe they smoke five joints in a day, but they aren’t the kind of folks who are going to be stuck to their couch and that’s their preferred method of living.

These are the boomer population. These are the folks who are out there wanting to try new foods, explore new places, travel the world. I forget the question to be honest, Shango.

Shango Los: That’s all right. The question was just do you give them an orientation to not get too baked? You’ve certainly answered that. Let’s say I was going to go on the tour today. If I was going to go on the tour today, where would you take me in, let’s say, Seattle?

Michael Gordon: Great question. The tour is about a three and a half hour experience, and it focuses on the how it’s made of cannabis. We start at The Boro School of Glass here in Seattle. This is one of the premiere pipe blowing schools. It’s run by Nathan Aweida, who goes by Nate Dizzle. The inventor of the SwissPerc which is this incredible percolation device, if you’ve never tried it. We take you through how to make a pipe in the first pipe blowing school here on the west coast. You can see it from start to finish. Heck, you can even purchase your pipe and smoke from it later that day, if you’d like.

From there, we visit Dawg Star Cannabis, and learn how plants are grown, how they are brought into flower, how they’re trimmed, how they’re cured. Once again, it’s the how it’s made tour. We’re able to talk to you … Jeff there, their master grower, who’s actually a professional arborist for over 30 years. I know Dawg Star was looking to bring somebody who wasn’t within the industry to bring this incredible cultivation knowledge in a different approach. Jeff does a great job.

I know that their Blue Deisel … just tested over 30%. They tested it ten times to see if that was true. From there, we always try to involve a processor, so they’re able to see how cannabis oil is made. I know there’s a big negative stigma with BH, or Butane Hash oil, Butane Honey oil, because people are blowing up their houses. You’ll see in the legal industry that that is so regulated. They’re in blast proof rooms, there’s spark free lights, the air is being circulated every fifteen seconds.

It’s important to understand that dabbing has it’s uses. Not only for medical patients who need that level of potency, but because you’re removing plant matter from that equation, if you can figure out how to dab in moderation, then it’s actually going to be a cleaner high for you.

From there, we’ll of course visit one or two retail stores. I think it’s important that you have an opportunity to buy a product. There’s so many nice ones to choose from here in Seattle. We’re very, very gifted and lucky to be able to show that as our industry. We’ve tried bringing a couple Seattle viewpoints as well. So, you guys who are traveling from out of state can come here and see the sights, take that photo in front of plants, but also with Seattle as your backdrop.

Shango Los: Awesome. It actually sounds like something that I would enjoy myself.

Michael Gordon: Shango, you should come on tour sometime, I would love to have you.

Shango Los: I was actually a little jealous. I was stoked because you guys made a tour donation to the Vashon Island Marijuana Entrepreneur’s Alliance meeting last week that I was there. When it was announced that there was a free tour that you guys had put on, everybody was all excited to win the tour. Yeah, I’m going to have to get my act together and come on the tour myself.

Well, Michael, we have reached the end of our time. Thank you so much for being on the show. I’m really appreciative that you took the time to be with us, and explain to us not only how the tour works, but the trials and tribulations that you’ve had in getting it set up.

Michael Gordon: Yeah, thank you so much for having me, Shango. It’s exciting to be able to share our experiences, especially as an ancillary company, we have the opportunity to work with everybody. It’s a gift and a blessing. If you guys out there are trying to join the cannabis industry, give it a shot. It’s a once in a lifetime opportunity right now.

Shango Los: To find out more about Kush Tourism, you can go to their website at kushtourism.com. You can find more episodes of the Ganjapreneur podcast in the podcast section at Ganjapreneur.com, and in the Apple iTunes store. On the Ganjapreneur.com website, you will find the latest cannabis news, product reviews, and cannabis jobs updated daily, along with transcriptions of this podcast.

You can also download the Ganjapreneur.com app in iTunes and Google Play. Do you have a company that wants to reach our national audience of cannabis enthusiasts? Email grow@ganjapreneur.com to find out how.

Today’s show was produced by Pat Packet, I’m your host, Shango Los.

End