Some businesses are calling it ‘Green Friday,’ but the annual day-long shopping spree that follows Thanksgiving is going to be celebrated throughout many facets of the cannabis industry, according to a recent Bloomberg News article.
At least one Denver dispensary, Grass Station, will be featuring some major deals in honor of the holidays. The store will sell sixteen ounces at $50 each (about one fifth the normal price), and sixty pre-rolled joints at $1 each. “We have really high expectations,” said owner Ryan Fox. “Now we’ve got the legal means for people to give marijuana as a gift, and that’s never really been something that was feasible in the past.”
Of course, businesses may have a hard time getting the word out on any of their offerings due to strict regulations regarding marijuana advertisements. Many shop owners report being too focused on compliance with regulations to even concern themselves with the holiday season.
The marijuana market nation-wide is estimated to be worth about $2.3 billion this year. Oregon, Alaska, and Washington D.C. will be opening their doors to the cannabis industry soon, which could lead to a $10 billion industry by 2018.
Maine has been recognized as a likely candidate for one of the next U.S. states to legalize cannabis. Last week, however, a new group called Legalize Maine unveiled a legalization plan that will run counter to the Marijuana Policy Project‘s existing push for a statewide referendum.
In a press conference on Wednesday, Legalize Maine announced that their plan will focus on jobs and the industry’s opportunity for economic development in the state’s rural areas. According to Paul McCarrier, spokesperson for Legalize Maine, his organization is moving forward with their plan after hearing from individuals who worked with the MPP in other states. “We are not interested in being subjugated to MPP or the Washington D.C. policy,” he said during the press conference. “These will be competing measures and we will win.”
Catherine Louis, Director of Education for the Medical Marijuana Caregivers of Maine, also expressed concerns that a nationally funded campaign might pressure certain aspects of the medical marijuana industry in a negative way. She noted an example from Washington state’s legalization program: “They started trying to push people into the mainstream legalized market for tax purposes and it has made it so that some patients can’t access their medicine at all, and we can’t allow that here in Maine.”
The Marijuana Policy Project has been planning a referendum question for the Maine 2016 ballot for some time. During the most recent midterms, the group put legalization questions on the ballots of South Portland and Portland, where legalization passed, and also in Lewiston, where it failed. “Ideally it makes sense to have one initiative,” said David Boyers of the Marijuana Policy Project. “But if we can’t see eye-to-eye then we will move forward and we hope voters choose the plan that will make marijuana legal and stop punishing adults for using a substance safer than alcohol.”
The MPP was founded in 1995 and has been working closely with efforts to legalize marijuana across the country. The organization was involved in the successful legalization campaigns of Colorado, Washington, Oregon, Alaska, and the District of Columbia.
In addition to Maine, reports indicate that at least six other states could see initiatives to legalize cannabis on the 2016 ballot: Massachusetts, California, Missouri, Hawaii, Nevada, and Arizona.
The world’s first banking institution established to serve legal marijuana businesses could be open in Colorado by January 1, the Denver Post reports.
The Fourth Corner Credit Union received an unconditional charter from the Colorado Division of Financial Services on Wednesday. The Fourth Corner still requires insurance via the National Credit Union Administration, and will also need a master account from the Federal Reserve System. Nonetheless, organizers report that the institution is almost ready for business.
Waiting on insurance from the NCUA could take up to two years, and being approved for insurance is by no means a guarantee (marijuana is still an illegal and controlled substance at the federal level). However, “A Colorado law of 1981 allows a credit union to open its doors while an application for share-deposit insurance is pending,” explained Mark Mason, one of the credit union’s organizers. “Now, the NCUA can come and look to see how it is functioning, and determine if they will issue the insurance,” Mason said.
Mason believes that federal regulators will approve the credit union’s business plan, which focuses on safety and exercising solid business practices. “The cornerstone is the compliance department, with a world-renowned anti-money-laundering expert and former regulators helping to write the first manual of its kind in how to handle marijuana money,” Mason said. “That was critical.”
Establishing reliable banking services is an important step in regulating and further legitimizing the industry. “In every other way, the industry has been a normal business, operating in every other way businesses do, but primarily in cash,” said Chris Nevitt, Denver City Councilman and one of nine founding board members for Fourth Corner. “The one missing piece in making it completely normal was banking, the one thing that wasn’t there. Now it will be.”
A statement from Gov. John Hickenlooper’s director of marijuana coordination read, “This is the end of the line from the state’s side. We’ve done all we can do.”
The Fourth Corner Credit Union will serve legal marijuana businesses in Colorado, as well as members of nonprofits that support legalized marijuana.
Washington state’s recreational marijuana sales have only been underway since July, but already state officials have disclosed that the market is producing more revenue than originally expected.
In a report released by the Economic and Revenue Forecast Council, experts indicate that by mid-2019, the recreational marijuana industry should be bringing in more than $694 million in state revenue — about $60 million more than was originally forecast.
According to AP writer Rachel La Corte, “the state has issued 86 retail marijuana licenses, and 70 stores have opened. As of this week, revenue from total sales of recreational marijuana… totaled more than $40 million, with the state receiving more than $10 million in excise taxes.”
“We will continue to see growth in the number of producers, of processers and of retailers,” said Steve Lerch, the revenue council’s executive director. And with more retailers, “we would expect to see some growth in those revenues.”
In a recent interview with BuzzFeed News, California Attorney General Kamala Harris disclosed that she’s “not opposed” to legalization in California. In fact, she sees a “certain inevitability about it.”
Harris also argued that states shohuld have a system ready for regulating the drug if they are going to consider legalization:
“It would be easier for me to say, ‘Let’s legalize it, let’s move on,’ and everybody would be happy. I believe that would be irresponsible of me as the top cop. The detail of these things matters. For example, what’s going on right now in Colorado is they’re figuring out you gotta have a very specific system for the edibles. Marueen Dowd famously did her piece on that…. There are real issues for law enforcement, [such as] how you will measure someone being under the influence in terms of impairment to drive.”
Harris, who is often considered one of the Democratic Party’s likely prospects for higher office in California, believes that future legalization programs should take efforts in Colorado and Washington into consideration before attempting a similar experiment.
Ganjapreneur, a website dedicated to cannabis business news and culture, recently published an interview with Matt Gray, CEO of The Stoner’s Cookbook, a resource for marijuana culinary enthusiasts to find and share infused recipes. In the interview, Gray discussed how he became involved in the project over a year ago.
“I was the co-founder and CEO of a successful education startup in Toronto called Bitmaker Labs,” Gray says. “We trained full-stack software developers and got them jobs at top tech companies across North America. After exiting that business I was eager to get into the cannabis industry. I saw it as the opportunity of a lifetime. I met the founders of The Stoner’s Cookbook through a mutual friend and I knew I could help them turn their passion into a high-growth business.”
The Stoner’s Cookbook currently has over 2.8 million followers on Facebook and boasts millions of website impressions each day. The types of recipes shared, Gray says, vary dramatically. “Our most popular recipes are most of the extraction methods (cannabutter, cannaoil) and then the classic edibles (space cakes, special brownies). That said, more and more people are looking for healthy options so we have tons of vegan recipes and teach people how to use cannabis-infused coconut oil.”
Additionally, the interview covered The Stoner’s Cookbook’s recent launch of a crowd-funding campaign for a hardcover cookbook, HERB: Mastering the Art of Cooking With Cannabis. The campaign has sincesurpassed it’s goal of $22,000 and it still has 26 days remaining. Whether the campaign will triple or quadruple its original goal remains to be seen, but given its early success it seems that many people agree with Gray that “The time is right for a cookbook that emphasizes craft and dignifies cannabis as an ingredient.”
Ganjapreneur’s interview with Gray is part of an ongoing series featuring prominent “ganjapreneurs” who discuss their experiences, struggles, and successes in the industry. The website recently launched an app on Google Play and has announced that it will soon be available in the Apple App Store.
Seattle-based Privateer Holdings, the investment firm behind the popular Leafly smartphone app and online cannabis strain database, is partnering with the family of Bob Marley to create the world’s first international brand for marijuana and marijuana-related products.
As early as next year, Marley Natural plans to offer “heirloom Jamaican cannabis strains inspired by those Bob Marley enjoyed,” as well as tinctures, lotions, and other marijuana accessories. Obviously, the products will only be made available in regions that have legalized and regulated cannabis use.
“We are joining Privateer Holdings because they understand and respect our father’s legacy,” said Marley’s son, Rohan Marley, in a news release announcing the global brand.
“My dad would be so happy to see people understanding the healing power of the herb,” added Cedella Marley, Bob’s daughter. “He viewed the herb as something spiritual that could awaken our well-being, deepen our reflection, connect us to nature and liberate our creativity. Marley Natural is an authentic way to honor his legacy by adding his voice to the conversation about cannabis and helping end the social harms caused by prohibition.”
Rita Marley, mother to Rohan and Cedella, believes that her humble husband would wholeheartedly approve of the business venture being launched under his name. “This is what we dreamed of,” she said, referencing the growing acceptance and legality of Marley’s beloved herb.
The Marley family has already been marketing Bob Marley’s musical legacy for years. These ventures have included unique brands of coffee, musical equipment, as well as rolling papers and t-shirts targeting the cannabis community. Not until Marley Natural, however, has the family actually committed to joining the cannabis industry and becoming ganjapreneurs themselves.
Brendan Kennedy, the CEO of Privateer Holdings, calls the new brand a “partnership of two cannabis pioneers.” He plans to run the Marley Natural brand out of New York City, so it’s clear that any direct handling of cannabis by the company is going to be many years out at the earliest. Marley Natural, however, can still license out its brand to state-approved marijuana producers in those regions that have legalized such activities.
“This is what the end of prohibition looks like,” Kennedy explained. “Bob Marley started to push for legalization more than 50 years ago. We’re going to help him finish it.”
Special brownies have been around for a long time, but only recently has the general public become aware of the many other applications of cannabis as an herb used for cooking. The Stoner’s Cookbook is a website dedicated to marijuana culinary enthusiasts for sharing infused recipes.
We recently had the pleasure of interviewing Matt Gray, CEO of The Stoner’s Cookbook, about his experience with the company and what their plans are for the future. Spoiler alert: they just launched a crowdfunding campaign for a new cookbook, which is already at 99% with 27 days to go!
Read the full interview below:
Ganjapreneur: How did The Stoner’s Cookbook get started?
Matt Gray: The Stoner’s Cookbook was started by Dan Crothers and Lucas Young 8 years ago in New Zealand. It was made as a resource for friends to share popular cannabis-infused recipes.
When did you get involved personally? Were you hired to fill the role of CEO or did you start out in another position?
I joined the company over a year ago. I was the co-founder and CEO of a successful education startup in Toronto called Bitmaker Labs. We trained full-stack software developers and got them jobs at top tech companies across North America. After exiting that business I was eager to get into the cannabis industry. I saw it as the opportunity of a lifetime. I met the founders of The Stoner’s Cookbook through a mutual friend and I knew I could help them turn their passion into a high-growth business. It’s been an amazing journey and I’m so fortunate to be a part of this awesome team.
How long did it take for the project to become profitable?
The site has been profitable for 3 months now. We have put a ton of work into it over the past 8 years and we’re excited for what the future has in store.
How many people does The Stoner’s Cookbook employ?
The Stoner’s Cookbook currently employs 3 people.
What are some of the largest obstacles you have faced while growing the business?
Growing traffic while making sure we stay true to our users. We are customer-centric and want to make sure we give people extremely high-quality, trustworthy content. It’s important that people come to our site, find what it is they are looking for and tell their friends. We want to be leader’s in the cannabis industry.
It’s always a challenge finding high quality chefs to contribute recipes. We help millions of medical and recreational users worldwide find recipes to cook with – it is a mission that we don’t take lightly. We want to make sure all the recipes are amazing and are something we would try ourselves. We have a team of 10 chefs that contribute recipes on a regular basis, but we’re always looking for more!
What types of recipes are most popular with your users? Do you think that edibles manufacturers should do market research via The Stoner’s Cookbook?
Our most popular recipes are most of the extraction methods (cannabutter, cannaoil) and then the classic edibles (space cakes, special brownies). That said, more and more people are looking for healthy options so we have tons of vegan recipes and teach people how to use cannabis-infused coconut oil.
Edibles manufacturers could learn a lot from our audience and their preferences. We are always here to help and want to make sure that people are enjoying edibles safely.
I noticed a recipe for Infused Sweet Potatoes when I searched for “Thanksgiving Recipes” on the site, and it looked delicious. Do you have a personal favorite recipe (or a few)?
Would you say that your audience is more on the recreational side or the medical side of the cannabis consumer spectrum?
I would say it’s around 50/50.
How do you see the culinary side of the cannabis industry growing as prohibition is repealed across the country (and globally)?
I see more and more research being done and more people getting into cannabis cuisine – both chefs and users. The more people involved in the space the more ideas and experimentation – I think the future is bright! I foresee cannabis restaurants opening, lots of more amazing edibles being produced and increased attention towards edibles safety and dosing. With more research in the space people will learn the exact effects that cannabis has on them and be able to enjoy them safely and receive the desired effect.
What’s next for The Stoner’s Cookbook?
The moment and market. Prohibition is crumbling. Cannabis is legal in Colorado and Washington State, with legalization working its way through myriad other state houses. Canada is in the process of legalizing cannabis at the national level. Cannabis is increasingly mainstream and (North) Americans—from millennials through baby boomers—have never been more curious about or open to enjoying cannabis. Importantly, cannabis is being elevated from “stoner” culture into the pantheon of refined and urbane inebriants, no different than boutique rye or fine wine. The time is right for a cookbook that emphasizes craft and dignifies cannabis as an ingredient.
The book, Herb: Mastering the Art of Cooking with Cannabis fills the public’s need for a tasteful, mainstream, and informative cookbook that teaches us how to enjoy cannabis as exactly what it is—just another “herb.” By treating it as simply another ingredient, Herb desensationalizes cannabis and removes any remaining stigma. Indeed, Herb stands alone on its merits as a testament to cuisine and technique—one that plays on the increasing tide of natural and organic cookbooks. But Herb is also a cultural marker in the repeal of prohibition, something people will be proud to display on their bookshelves rather than hide away in a drawer.
Who are some of the chefs that contributed to HERB?
Melissa Parks is our main chef. She in Cordon Bleu trained and is an overall amazing person. Here is her bio:
Is it too late to get in on the crowdfunding campaign for the book? Where can people go to contribute?
It’s never too late. They can contribute to the campaign and pre-order a copy of this definitive cannabis cookbook, HERB, at www.herbkitchen.com.
What advice can you offer to aspiring ganjapreneurs?
The time is now. Prohibition is crumbling and these are exciting times for aspiring ganjapreneurs. I think it’s important to find a mentor in the space and begin developing your idea into a viable business. If you have any questions or if you need advice I’m always happy to help. I can be reached at matt@thestonerscookbook.com.
Thanks again for sharing, Matt, and best of luck with the crowdfunding campaign. At the rate it’s going, it’s looking like a major success already!
If you have questions or comments for Matt, you can reach him via email, or post your thoughts in the comments below:
Some good news: Maryland’s long-awaited medical marijuana program was finally approved by a state panel last week.
But, of course, there’s also bad news: prospective ganjapreneurs will be looking at some major front-end costs to get in on the Maryland market. The two-year licenses are going to cost $80,000 for dispensaries and $250,000 for growers — these licensing fees are higher than any other state’s except Illinois.
In 2013, the state passed a medical marijuana law that expected academic institutions to voluntarily distribute the drug — when such centers failed to step forward, however, something else needed to be worked out. Maryland lawmakers unveiled the reexamined and redrafted program earlier this year, which includes slots for 15 growers state-wide and a currently unannounced number of dispensaries.
According to John Pica, a lobbyist representing investors with plans to enter Maryland’s medical marijuana industry, these high fees aren’t necessarily going to doom the industry. In fact, “With only 15 growers, and the perceived demand, there may be plenty of business to go around,” he explained to the Baltimore Sun.
Now, the program must be approved by the state’s health secretary and attorney general before it can be officially proposed for final public review, a process that’s expected to take at least a few more months.
Medical cannabis should be available in Maryland by 2016.
Seattle Mayor Ed Murray has announced that a public symposium will be held on Nov. 20 to discuss the future of the city’s medical marijuana program.
Though Washington was one of the first states to legalize and regulate recreational marijuana, the state’s medical marijuana program is known for being largely unregulated, thereby running a higher risk of federal prosecution against patients and medicine-providers.
Currently, medical marijuana patients and business owners in Seattle are in an unfortunate state of limbo: dispensaries have been required by the city to obtain a state-issued license to stay in business beyond July 1, 2015. In fact, the city of Seattle issued 330 letters in October to hundreds of dispensaries, warning that the businesses could face a shutdown soon if they weren’t properly licensed. The problem is that the state-issued licenses don’t actually exist yet, and there’s currently no timeline for the licenses’ release.
As a result, Mayor Murray has been working with interested parties to establish a regulatory framework for patients to safely access their medicine. “We are still looking to Olympia to enact broad medical marijuana reform next session, but we need to take action here in Seattle to address immediate concerns of patients, businesses and neighbors,” Murray said. “Even if the state acts, we know implementation could stretch into 2016. We don’t want patients and businesses waiting in limbo, even as they face increasing legal risks.”
The symposium will feature panel discussions on a wide variety of issues relating to the medical marijuana business industry, according to an announcement released by Mayor Murray’s office earlier this week. These issues will include the testing of products for purity and strength, best practices for the manufacturing of medicated products, packaging and labeling requirements, and the locations of MMJ dispensaries and collective gardens.
“The panels will feature patient advocates and medical providers, marijuana business representatives, testing providers, community representatives and city agency leaders,” reads the mayor’s announcement. “The symposium will be convened by Patricia Lally, Director of the Office of Civil Rights, who will offer introductory remarks.”
Questions from the public regarding current MMJ policies and the program’s future are strongly encouraged. The event is scheduled to take place at City Hall in the Bertha Knight Landes Room on Nov. 20, and will run from 5 p.m. to 7:45 p.m.
Cubic Designs, Inc., a subsidiary company of Warren Buffet’s Berkshire Hathaway, Inc., made its first foray into the legal cannabis industry earlier this year, as reported by Bloomberg News.
The company, which offers industrial platforms built to maximize floor space in warehouses, recently sent about 1,000 fliers to Colorado marijuana dispensaries offering to help increase revenue by doubling their available growing space.
The move sparked James Winsor, CEO of ATV, Inc. (a technology and systems provider dedicated to the cannabis industry), to comment on Buffet’s involvement in the nascent and still federally-illegal industry.
Winsor noted that Mr. Buffet — who has become the third wealthiest person on the planet through a series of major investments in Dairy Queen, See’s Candies, and Coca-Cola — always generates a lot of business hype when he invests in an industry. “With the marijuana industry growing rapidly and gaining both acceptance and momentum,” Winsor said, “there are tremendous opportunities for companies that supply products, services, and technologies to this market.”
Within days of last week’s vote for legalization, the district attorney’s office in Multnomah County — which contains Portland, Oregon’s largest and most populous city — announced they will be dismissing a swath of pending marijuana cases. Additionally, the prosecutors will not pursue future marijuana cases that will soon be legal under the new law.
50 pending marijuana cases will be dismissed.
In a statement released to the Oregonian, Multnomah County District Attorney Rod Underhill’s office explained:
“Because it is clear that a significant majority of voters in Multnomah County support the legalization of marijuana in certain amounts, this office will dismiss the pending charges related to conduct which will otherwise become legal July 1, 2015. Any remaining charges not impacted by Ballot Measure 91 will be prosecuted.”
Voters in Multnomah County passed Measure 91 with an overwhelming 71 percent majority. Meanwhile, prosecutors in other Oregon counties are still deciding how to proceed in light of legalization.
Aquarius Cannabis has aims to instill an efficient, cohesive order of operations in an otherwise unorganized cannabis distributing industry via an emphasis on consistency. Despite billion dollar valuations, and forecasted valuations exceeding 10 billion just five years down the road, there’s a lot left to improve before cannabis distribution evolves as an entity that lives up to its potential.
Aquarius Cannabis and their provided mission statement hones in on the glaring weakness prevalent in so many marijuana product exchanges; consistency in regard to cannabis strain is ordered and what is finally delivered. Consumers are quick to forget a particular strain name such as Purple Haze, and its smell, taste, and effects on the mind/body will be unique most every time across growers, dispensaries, markets, etc. Simply put, Purple Haze from Seller A will fly you to the moon and back with an obligatory stop at a McDonald’s drive-thru, while Seller B’s Purple Haze might make your toes tingle for a minute, and that might’ve just been your legs falling asleep. Do consumers really want to risk paying for the latter unknowingly?
When consumers track down the strain that’s everything they want in a cannabis experience, they’re likely to stick with it for a while. Aquarius Cannabis declares themselves revolutionarily consistent, and the ultimate in U.S.-based branding companies within the cannabis industry.
Through launching a micro-brand program in both California and Oregon, the company will have the ability to help individual master growers formulate and thereafter solidify brands unique to their mission, product effects/taste/smell/etc. How does Aquarius Cannabis benefit from all this? They co-own the intellectual property of each product sold, and forego selling the cannabis product themselves.
In contrast, Cannabrand; a Denver-based cannabis industry ad agency startup once looked upon as bearing great promise, is now suffering collective distaste from the very market their agency depends on. As an ad agency, the last thing you want to do is alienate your clientele through irrational public statements. ‘We’re trying to weed out the stoners,’ as they told the New York times, just isn’t going to get it done. Cannabrand adopted an overbearingly presumptuous tone when they threw out lines such as, ‘we’re want to show the world that normal, professional, successful people consume cannabis.’ A statement like that is unintentionally driving a wedge in the cannabis consumer community by stereotyping the ‘stoners,’ while paying lip-service to ‘the successful, accomplished individuals.’
Aquarius Cannabis has executed their launch with grace, and planned moves that seek to improve the system for the cannabis consumer by taking into account the lack of consistency the average consumer is presently plagued with. Aquarius Cannabis has in no way alienated Cannabis consumer society, and it’s this overriding fact that speaks to the reality that Cannabrand is but a small time player with big aims caught in the shadow of a big league baller with a strategy to better the cannabis industry as a whole.
A political coalition called Regulate Rhode Island is making a push for Rhode Island legislators to legalize recreational marijuana in their state during the 2015 General Assembly, reports the Providence Journal. If successful, Rhode Island would become the fifth state to legalize marijuana and the first state to do so via the legislature.
“The results are in, and marijuana prohibition is on its way out,” said Director of Regulate Rhode Island Jared Moffat, who believes that at least five more states could pass some form of cannabis legalization by the end of the 2016 election season.
“Americans are fed up with wasteful and ineffective laws that punish adults for using a less harmful substance than alcohol. The [election] results are particularly encouraging since voter turnout during a midterm … is typically smaller, older, and more conservative. Clearly, support for ending marijuana prohibition spans the political and ideological spectrums.”
A 2014 legalization push led by Rep. Edith Ajello (D-Providence) and Sen. Joshua Miller died in the General Assembly. The proposed law would have generated important tax revenue, as the state is currently struggling with one of the nation’s highest unemployment rates.
Rhode Island is currently one of 23 states that allow access to medical marijuana.
Earlier this year, a poll revealed that the state of Rhode Island actually has the highest percentage of marijuana smokers per capita in the country, with 13% (or 1 in 8) of all citizens aged 12 and over having used the drug within a month before the polling.
Ganjapreneur, a website dedicated to cannabis business news and culture, has announced the third installment of their interview with Matt Brown, founder of cannabis tour agency My 420 Tours. This segment of the interview details Brown’s involvement in Colorado’s passage of Amendment 64, the bill which legalized cannabis for recreational consumption in the state, and what it was like working with politicians and medical marijuana entrepreneurs to establish rules for the state’s new market.
Brown was interviewed by Mitch Shenassa, a Ganjapreneur contributor who is also the founder of Incredibowl and the author of The Cannabis Aficionado’s Handbook. The interview was conducted in person and recorded as a podcast, and the recording is accompanied by a transcript on Ganjapreneur’s website. Their interview took place in Colorado, and in the background of the audio track, the sound of a marijuana water pipe (or “bong”) can be heard, as the pair passed it back and forth throughout their conversation.
One of the many topics discussed in this segment of Brown’s interview is the difficulty that was faced by politicians and entrepreneurs to achieve mutual understanding and compromise on key regulations affecting the new regulated industry. At one point, Brown explains how it was frequently came down to rhetoric when negotiations became difficult. One example Brown describes is how he used elementary economic principles to convince state lawmakers not to include burdensome requirements on legal cannabis businesses. “When it became clear that some form of what we would call vertical integration was going to be required, then that was the ace up my sleeve that I used and abused for the entire rest of the process. […] You cannot find an example of mandatory vertical integration in the United States.”
Over the course of the interview, Brown goes into detail about some of the key events and roles played by people involved, including himself. As someone who was intrinsically involved in the push for legalization, Brown also describes how he came to be successful in the industry as a business consultant. “I was here in Colorado, I was the only business consultant who put business out there. […] The way I see it, I was in the right place at the right time.”
The full interview is available on Ganjapreneur’s website, where they have announced that the next segment of Brown’s interview will be published in the near future. Ganjapreneur has also recently published a cannabis industry business directory for B2B services, as well as a job feed which aggregates the latest marijuana career openings from a variety of job boards around the web.
Law enforcement officials in New York City are poised to stop arresting low-level marijuana offenders and replace such punishment with a written ticket and court summons. This policy change is an effort to reduce the annual arresting of thousands of New Yorkers each year for marijuana violations, which affect minority groups at a grossly disproportionate rate.
“We don’t want to saddle someone who made one small mistake with something that will follow them all their lives,” said Mayor Bill de Blasio, who believes the change will reduce the likelihood of an arrest or misdemeanor marijuana offense following an individual through life and hindering daily processes such as applying for housing or a job. “A summons will not affect their future,” he said. “An arrest could.”
According to the New York Times, the change goes into effect November 19 and will only apply to cases involving 25 grams or less of cannabis.
The exact details of the policy change are yet unclear, but what is known is that it will come down to the involved officer’s judgment whether to ticket or arrest an individual for marijuana possession. Additionally, someone caught in the act of smoking marijuana is still subject to arrest, and will be handcuffed and brought to the station house for fingerprinting and a mugshot. Some specifics of the law are still to be discussed in City Hall, such as whether or not a criminal record could result from receiving a court summons for marijuana.
Earlier this year, the new Brooklyn district attorney, Kenneth P. Thompson, said he would stop prosecuting individuals caught up in the justice system because of low-level marijuana possession. Mayor de Blasio and Police Commissioner William J. Bratton, however, initially disagreed with Thompson’s move, and vowed to continue making such arrests.
The upcoming policy changes indicate a possible change of heart, but Mr. Thompson is worried the new policy could potentially harm the very people it’s meant to protect, because a court summons doesn’t currently warrant the involvement of a prosecutor.
“In order to give the public confidence in the fairness of the criminal justice system, these cases should be subject to prosecutorial review,” Thompson said. “By allowing these cases to avoid early review, by issuing a summons, there is a serious concern that many summonses will be issued without the safeguards currently in place. These cases will move forward even when due process violations might have occurred.”
A new candidate has emerged to replace Eric Holder as the U.S. Attorney General, media outlets report. Her name is Loretta Lynch, and she is currently a U.S. Attorney based out of Brooklyn.
News reports have pinned the likely nomination on her, though White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest said Friday morning that, “The president has not made a decision… we’re not going to have any personnel announcements.” Either way, President Obama is expected to make an official announcement when he returns from Asia, where he is traveling this week.
Ms. Lynch, 55, is a Harvard graduate and has served as the U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of New York since she was appointed there by Obama in 2010. She served in this same position under the Clinton administration from 1999 to 2001. If nominated, Lynch would become the first African American woman to hold the Attorney General title.
“She has everything that we would want in an attorney general,” said Brooklyn D.A. Kenneth Thompson. “She has intelligence, dignity, and the ability to be fair, but also tough.”
In regards to marijuana law reform, Lynch has never voiced a real opinion one way or the other. She has, however, expressed progressive ideals in regards to the War on Drugs and the modern failings of our judicial system overall. In 2001, she said on the PBS News Hour, “I do think that there were a lot of issues that went on with the war on drugs — its inception and the way it was carried out.” And more recently, at a 2013 event at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York City, she claimed, “Arresting more people or building more jails is not the ultimate solution to crime in our society. If there’s one thing we’ve learned it is that there is no one solution.”
Savvy observers have noted that President Obama is faced with a growing urgency to nominate Holder’s replacement because the Senate will soon be controlled by Republicans, and finding a candidate agreeable to both the president and a GOP majority Congress could be extraordinarily difficult.
One of Ms. Lynch’s most prominent cases of her career was a 1997 case against several New York City police officers who beat and sexually abused Haitian immigrant Abner Louima, in which Lynch secured hefty prison sentences — some as long as 30 years — for those involved in the attack. More recently, Lynch indicted Republican Representative Michael Grimm on charges of tax fraud, a case which could result in some touchy political navigation if the GOP makes moves to stop Lynch’s nomination.
There are now four states in the USA that have voted to legalize cannabis for recreational use. But how do the finer points of legalization get defined (from a legal perspective) once the voters pass a bill?
In the third segment of our interview with Matt Brown from My 420 Tours, Matt discusses what it was like being intrinsically involved in the process of determining the legal structure that Colorado constructed during its bid for legalization. He also goes into detail about how in some cases, successful negotiations with nervous lawmakers depended largely upon the rhetoric that was used.
Listen to the audio or read the transcript below.
Matt Brown Interview, Part 3:
First time here? Go back to Part 1. Part 4 of the Matt Brown interview is coming soon!
Transcript:
Matt Brown: So that started as dispensaries have to grow their own, and to a legislature that doesn’t know any better and doesn’t really give a shit about pot, that sounds very rational-
Ganjapreneur: -sensible.
Matt Brown: Right, sensible. And Chris Romer’s an economist. He studied economics at Stanford, he considers himself an economist.
Ganjapreneur: That’s how he- yeah. He doesn’t bill himself as a politician.
Matt Brown: He fancies himself as an economist, and so for him, very early on in the process- and this was clearly a sticking point, I started using the term, “vertical integration” and he’ll defend his economic sensibilities. You cannot find an example of mandatory vertical integrations in the United States. It is, from freshman year economics onward, an option of a company in a normal market that should have the option to vertically integrate or horizontally integrate or however they went, but you would never force it. And he got that, and by calling it vertical integration it changed the argument that then-
Ganjapreneur: So in a sense, you put it in a more familiar context? That he could kind of see it as- Yeah. Not so much as a sensible policy but as an economic tenant he didn’t want to violate.
Matt Brown: Drilling for oil versus energy exploration. Yes, exactly.
Ganjapreneur: And so your intent there was to sort of color-
Matt Brown: To get it to go away entirely.
Ganjapreneur: To color it to the point where it’s just distasteful?
Matt Brown: Right. When it became clear that some form of what we would call vertical integration was going to be required, then that was the ace up my sleeve that I used and abused for the entire rest of the process. Any time they would start to vote something too stupid, I would be able to come back and say, “Listen, the vertical integration thing that you’re forcing is the absolute toughest thing for me to sell because it doesn’t make any sense to anybody. There’s no support for it.” Like, “I can keep fighting the fight for you, Chris, but this is a big deal.” And so we got all sorts of other incremental horse-trading maneuvers because they’d said so early on in the process that they were not willing to go past 70 percent of the vertical integration.
Ganjapreneur: Right.
Matt Brown: Some form of like a, “In case shit happens, you can wholesale,” but they were very much opposed. So the MMIP [medical marijuana infused product] license was my work, because no one had ever done marijuana-infused food like this before.
Ganjapreneur: So what were they considering for food? How did hash get mixed into that? I think that’s a really interesting side.
Matt Brown: What happened was, again, I did tours. I took ?[Rep. Tom] Massey tours, I took Charlie Brown on tours, and I think what happened was-
Ganjapreneur: Now how did you arrange these? Were these just dispensaries that you has business relationships with and you were like, “Hey, I know you’re a good spot, can I bring some people through to show them something exemplary?”
Matt Brown: Exactly. Friends and clients. I went and sat in on a couple of the work group sessions for City Hall, and the important part here is the State of Colorado’s legislature only meets from the third week in January to the third week in May, second week in May, something like that. And this all came to a head starting July 20th. By the fall we had hundreds and hundreds of these statewide. The number was something like 700 by the end of the year.
Ganjapreneur: 700?
Matt Brown: Dispensaries statewide.
Ganjapreneur: And in a period where the legislation the couldn’t make rules.
Matt Brown: Exactly, they were not in session.
Ganjapreneur: That’s why that happened. I did not know why that happened.
Matt Brown: Mm-hmm!
Ganjapreneur: How much of this was pure luck, how much of this was the connections–the unique connections that you had, and how much of this was just being that guy who showed up and had something smart to say?
Matt Brown: Equal parts one and three, a little bit of two, and I’ve spent years off and on trying to deconstruct how much of that it is and I don’t know, so the way I see it was I was in the right place at the right time.
Ganjapreneur: For sure-
Matt Brown: I was here in Colorado, I was the only business consultant who put business out there. You have Warren [Edson] tell it… Ryan Vincent really loves telling this story: I put up four Craigslist ads in a month and a half and I was banking, like ten grand a week, twenty grand a week on just incorporation. It was copy and paste, find and replace in Word, and then have the same talk for hours on end with people over and over, teaching them. Here’s how you co-opt any other rule that exists for any other industry that looks like ours. So if you’re selling edible products, why don’t you go ahead and get ahead of the curve and follow the food handling rules that you would if you were selling cookies at 7-Eleven. I found there was some selection bias in the people who chose to pay me, so it was the right place and the right time. I also give at least equal credit to myself for recognizing I had a very unique voice and approach and angle. There was this metaphorical rope ladder hanging right there just out of my reach. If I jumped a little bit I knew I could not only get it, but I could climb up to the top bigger and better than anybody had done before. And… I was a national champion debater. Two time nationals in high school. I was ranked fifth in the nation.
Ganjapreneur: That’s why you said before you were a debater–you weren’t scared to go- okay.
Matt Brown: Yeah. I was raised from- I actually, in middle school, my gifted teacher, because I was in the gifted class-
Ganjapreneur: So you’re from Massachusetts? You went to school-
Matt Brown: Missouri.
Ganjapreneur: Missouri, okay. Missouri public schools produced this?
Matt Brown: Yes.
Ganjapreneur: Way to go, Missouri.
Matt Brown: Kansas City, Missouri has four of the top ten most competitive high school debate districts in the country. It is an incredibly intense Midwestern debate legacy that goes on.
Ganjapreneur: Interesting.
Matt Brown: Churned out a lot of politicians, a lot of lawyers, a lot of business people, because, if nothing else, you spend your high school learning how to build and deconstruct arguments on the fly and more importantly, you learn how to tailor your message to your audience.
Ganjapreneur: Yeah.
Matt Brown: From freshman year on I spent literally, it was the longest athletic, because it was considered an athletic- it was from the first week in October through the end of April, I had tournaments every single week except for two weeks off over Christmas, and from freshman year on, you had to look a stranger in the face and start to make assumptions and just read their body language and their everything to see, okay, is this a college kid who’s probably a former high school debater? Then I can speed and spread, talk fast, hit them on technicalities, do this, or is this somebody like my mom and I need to slow down, be more emphatic with my voice, drive home points that make sense?
Ganjapreneur: So now the question is this: when you’re debating someone in that context, right, is that like a boxing match where you’re trying to beat that person, or you’re trying to win over judges? Well, I guess it helps- it’s like a boxing match. You’re doing both.
Matt Brown: When you have a reputation… So, my event- so I did cross-X debate, standard high school debate, which was two people, you and your debate partner against two other high school kids on the same topic all year long, and you get cases of evidence where you have to cut cards, and so I had to learn how to synthesize an entire article into one or two of those quotes you’d cut out that fit an argument, so that when somebody would talk about Tesla coils vis-a-vis renewable energy, I could open up a box and have ready to go evidence where I’m quoting citations and sources.
Ganjapreneur: And that certainly helps when appealing to authority.
Matt Brown: Certainly, because you learn how to build an argument which is not the same as being a scientist who is proving fact.
Ganjapreneur: No.
Matt Brown: It is rhetoric. And you can abuse rhetoric, or you can use rhetoric for incredible amounts of power.
Ganjapreneur: And at the same time what I found among many people speaking at hearings before me in tie-dye t-shirts with pot leaves is there is no sensitivity to audience, number one, and number two, there’s no sense of building a rational argument. And when it comes across-
Matt Brown: It’s burying the facts, with frustration because we know these facts are fucking true!
Ganjapreneur: And regardless of that, that’s not an effective way to commit- and then there’s also the vinegar-honey argument, like, calling someone a fucking asshole fascist is really not going to convince them to see your way…
Matt Brown: …however having someone who otherwise should be on your team screaming through the windows with a bullhorn saying that everything that’s going on is fucking fascist certainly helps me look far more moderate.
Ganjapreneur: Right!
Matt Brown: Which is what we had with Robert Chase, literally screaming through the windows on the big hearing at 4/20.
One of the casualties of the “War on Weed” has been science. With less than half of the states in the US having some form of legal marijuana, and with marijuana’s status as a Schedule 1 Narcotic, the lab space available to study marijuana’s genetics and chemistry has been extremely limited. The majority of the research has been done in Dutch labs. In recent years, however, loosening marijuana laws have opened the doors for independent scientists who want to understand the plant better in the United States. Their research is revealing the origins of Cannabis, confirming some things we already knew, and changing the way medical marijuana can be used to treat patients.
The oldest marijuana bust was in the tomb of an ancient shaman in central China. The 789-gram stash was found at the head of a skeleton in a tomb 2700 years old. An article in the Journal of Experimental Biology entitled “Phytochemical and Genetic Analysis of Ancient Cannabis from Central Asia” shows the sample contained high concentrations of the psychoactive chemicals associated with modern strains of marijuana. The researchers in the paper reported they had sequenced the DNA of ancient cannabis.
This DNA is the basis of a study undertaken by a Portland-based firm, Phylo’s Bioscience.
The Cannabis Evolutionary Project (CEP) is mapping the family tree of marijuana. Mowgli Holmes, the lead scientist on the project, started the project when he came to the West Coast and saw what was going on with strain development. He says, “It was only a step from seeing what was going on with strain development to realizing that without an evolutionary map, and genetic strain-certification, no one would ever really know what they were getting. Strain names now have only a very slight correlation with reality.”
“It makes for a medical marketplace where no one ever really knows what they’re putting in their bodies,” Holmes continues. “Once we have the map in place, we can certify the identity of strains, and patients will be able to have faith that they’re getting the same thing every time. Phylo’s will create an interactive tree that will allow users to trace their strain of marijuana from the 2,700-year-old sample until today.”
The Workshop in Los Angeles, CA seeks to understand the chemistry of the marijuana plant in a way that can benefit patients by providing standardization to the buyer beware market place that currently exists in California. Jeff Raber, the founder of The Workshop, has tested thousands of samples in California over a four year period.
“We really should base our classification of Medical Marijuana on its chemical profile, rather than its appearance, Sativa and Indica,” Dr. Raber asserts. “There are no relationships between strain names, or their classification of Sativa and Indica, and the effects of the plant in the California marketplace. “
According to Dr. Raber, the strain names are more marketing tools than any kind of medical description. ”When it comes to how a particular batch of marijuana will affect a patient, growers and dispensaries often focus on the one molecule everyone knows about THC.”
Instead, he (and others before him) assert, “a better indicator of effects are the terpenes. We already know a strong-smelling marijuana flower usually produces stronger effects.” Terpenes are the chemicals that give marijuana, and other plants, their smell. In marijuana, these terpenes react with the various cannabinoids. This interaction, known as the entourage effect, contributes to the various effects of marijuana, not just the THC. Dr. Raber says there are only a few dispensaries in California using terpenes on their labels. He says patients have been receptive to the new approach because they now can find the chemical combo that works best for them.
One dispensary using Dr. Raber’s labeling method is Papa Ganja in Orange County, CA. Papa Ganja was started to be a more “medically minded” dispensary. Sunday Smith, Operations Manager at Papa Ganja’s says, “We still use strain names, but the market is slowly catching up with the science. Some patients know what strains help them, so we stick with the names for now, but on Papa Ganja’s menu the smell profile is listed directly under the strain name.” Sunday goes on to say, “When we use terpene profiles we can tell patients with nausea to use a strain with a citrus smell, Limonene, rather than a piney smelling strain, Pinene. Now, we can really pinpoint our treatments, which is much better for the patients.”
By better understanding the genetic origins and chemical makeup of the marijuana plant, scientists can begin to prescribe “Best Practices” in the field of medical marijuana. Making medical marijuana a science-based discipline will differentiate it from recreational marijuana. It is essential the differences between recreational and medical marijuana are understood by the public and government in order to keep medical marijuana patient-based.
According to this year’s Public Policy Questions in Massachusetts, voters in that state are ready to approve the legalization of recreational marijuana. The non-binding inquiries were featured on this year’s midterm ballots, and an overwhelming majority of votes were cast in support of marijuana reform.
Two different questions were posed by two different organizations, the Drug Policy Forum of Massachusetts and Bay State Repeal.
Presented in eight different counties, the DPFMA question — “Shall the State Representative from this district be instructed to vote in favor of legislation that would allow the state to regulate and tax marijuana in the same manner as alcohol?” — received between 69 and 74 percent approval.
Meanwhile, the Bay State Repeal questions detailed a potential regulatory system — similar to business regulations in the agricultural industry — for growing, selling, and possessing legalized cannabis. Three variations of the concept were posed to voters across six different counties, and approval rates ranged from 54 to 64 percent.
“PPQs are an excellent measure of voter sentiment,” said DPFMA Director John Leonard. “They represent actual votes by actual voters, not some pollster’s ideas of how citizens are likely to vote.”
In Massachusetts, the PPQ has served marijuana activists particularly well: voters signaled strong support for marijuana decriminalization in 2008 and medical marijuana in 2012, and the state has since implemented legislation to approve both drug policy reforms.
Republican Congressman Andy Harris, a U.S. House Representative from Maryland, has vowed once more to stop a voter-approved attempt to reform marijuana laws in the nation’s capital.
After D.C. voters passed Initiative 71 to legalize recreational marijuana, Harris told the Washington Post that he would “consider using all resources available to a member of Congress to stop this action.” Nevermind that Initiative 71 passed with an overwhelming 2:1 majority for marijuana legalization (only 30% of voters actually opposed the measure). Harris argues that “actions by those in D.C. will result in higher drug use among teens.”
Unfortunately for D.C., political initiatives in the capital city are subject to Congressional review before they can become law. And while Congress has openly nullified a law only one time in 40 years, it did manage to delay the implementation of the District’s medical marijuana program by nearly 15 years with relentless provisions to federal spending bills.
Rep. Harris also attempted action against the District’s decriminalization of marijuana earlier this year, at one point pushing a Republican-supported provision to stop the bill. This effort died in negotiations with Senate Democrats, however, when President Obama threatened to veto the provision outright.
Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper has proposed a $26.8 billion budget for the state’s next fiscal year, which begins July 1.
“Colorado’s economic activity continues to outperform the national expansion,” Hickenlooper said during his presentation to the Joint Budget Committee. “Total employment and personal income have steadily increased for several years running. The state’s unemployment rate stands at 4.7 percent, the lowest since 2008. Looking ahead, the most likely scenario is for the momentum to continue at a steady pace.”
The budget includes several rebates adding up to $167.2 million, but somewhere in that total is $30.5 million from the state’s legal marijuana industry. Marijuana businesses generated more revenue than was expected by the 2013 ballot measure Proposition AA — which was ratified to deal with such funds — and taxpayers could very well see some of that money returned.
The budget also calls for $33.6 million from the Marijuana Tax Cash Fund for the “enforcement and oversight of Colorado’s new marijuana industry,” and for the “continuation of several initiatives that promote public health and public safety, robust regulatory oversight, law enforcement and the prevention and deterrence of youth marijuana use.”
On the heels of an election which decided marijuana policy in several states, Ganjapreneur, a website dedicated to the legal cannabis industry, has announced a business-focused directory to help aspiring cannabis entrepreneurs and companies connect with business service providers. Ganjapreneur’s new directory includes archives of lawyers, accountants, web development agencies, security firms, and general business consultants who specialize in serving marijuana businesses.
The business directory currently has twelve categories, although a representative from the website said the scope of the project is growing. “Right now we’re focusing on B2B services,” they added, “so our directory is geared toward companies who provide a business service such as marketing or accounting.”
Ganjapreneur recently announced that they are preparing to launch a “Freelancer’s Network” for creative professionals who want to take on marijuana-related projects. The network currently has a landing page explaining the concept, and an email sign-up form to receive a notification when the network is officially launched.
The website launched over the summer, and has rapidly published a large volume of unique content including news coverage, business editorials, interviews with cannabis industry entrepreneurs, an industry job feed which aggregates classified ads from around the web, and even a dictionary of slang vocabulary terms related to marijuana. The site has also launched an app on the Google Play marketplace, and has announced that it will be available in the Apple App Store in the near future.
Two more states, accompanied by our nation’s capitol, have legalized marijuana for recreational use.
While Florida’s bid for medical marijuana didn’t get enough votes to pass, the passage of recreational laws in Oregon and Alaska has doubled the number of states that have decided to rethink federal cannabis prohibition. It is clear that the growing majority of voters who support legalization will be more difficult to ignore than ever before.
Here are the numbers: Oregon passed Measure 91 with 55% approval, while Alaska — a little too close for comfort — passed Ballot Measure 2 with just over 52% approval. Washington D.C.’s Initiative 71 was a shoe-in, with almost 65% support and less than 30% opposed.
Although the Washington D.C. measure could be challenged by the federal government, which is granted certain political powers over the district given its unique status, the capital city’s marijuana legislation may find an unexpected ally in U.S. Senator Rand Paul, a Republican from Kentucky. Paul could soon be leading a subpanel with oversight of D.C. laws, and he’s expressed that he has no interest in interfering with the district’s Initiative 71, Roll Call reports. “I’m not for having the federal government get involved,” Paul said. “I really haven’t taken a stand on … the actual legalization. I haven’t really taken a stand on that, but I’m against the federal government telling them they can’t.”
Whether federal government officials attempt to interfere or not, the D.C. city council has already begun looking into a system for the regulated sales and distribution of legal marijuana.
In Oregon, the new law allows adults aged 21 and older to possess up to eight ounces of weed and cultivate up to four cannabis plants at home. A regulated system for the production, distribution, and sale of legal cannabis will be developed by the Oregon Liquor Control Commission. This system, expected to draw inspiration from those already in place in Washington and Colorado, is to take effect by January 1, 2016.
The Alaskan law is similarly structured, but instead grants adults 21 and over the right to grow up to six cannabis plants in their home, but only carry up to one ounce on their person. The law comes into effect 90 days following the election’s certification, and then the state will have 18 months to implement a regulatory system. However, Alaska now faces a situation like the one Washington faced two years ago: without a regulated medical marijuana infrastructure, the great northern state will have to develop a system for retail marijuana sales from scratch.
