If you’ve read anything I’ve written — whether a blog post or a quick social media update — you’ve probably gathered that I’m not a huge fan of dispensaries. But just in case you’re new here, I’ll go over a few experiences that shaped my perspective.

The Green Solution

One of the first dispensaries I visited was The Green Solution. After smoking some of their flower, I nearly had a panic attack (never came close to having one before or after). As an everyday smoker, I knew something wasn’t right.

Seven Five Farm

The second major experience came when I worked at a commercial farm Seven Five Farm (find my blog post on them here). The practices there — especially from a medical and environmental standpoint — were abysmal.

My First Dispensary Interview

My first interview was at a dispensary in Denver, the name of that dispensary honestly I couldn’t remember, but this place was a real shit hole. Unlike what I see in IL currently where dispensaries are often times in very nice areas, in 2019-2020 in Denver dispensaries were still next to liquor stores and laundromats, usually in a seedy dark alleyway type environment.

After crushing the interview they told me that I did a great job, and had a bright future in the industry but that I would be “bored” working as a general manager at that location. Well I wouldn’t have been bored because I would have had my work cut out for me going in there and turning the place around. It’s worth mentioning that I was a former general manager at Finish Line and won store of the year over 400 other stores.

Zen Leaf Naperville

Also in this post, I want to talk about a recent interview I had at a dispensary in Naperville, Illinois, called Zen Leaf. To be fair, I went into it partly for market research. I entertained the idea of managing a dispensary in Illinois, hoping maybe I was wrong about the local scene. I hadn’t worked at a commercial farm here, so I figured perhaps the cannabis quality might be different. But based on what I’ve tried at events around Chicagoland — which I assume comes from local dispensaries — I wasn’t optimistic.

Unfortunately, the interview was every bit as disappointing as I expected — if not worse. The questions they asked were basic, fair enough, but very surface-level in terms of cannabis knowledge. When it came time for me to ask questions, though, things really went downhill. The hiring manager (who will remain nameless) really shit the bed.

Here are a few of the questions I asked, all of which were met with some version of “I have no idea”:

How is your cannabis grown? (No, I’m not kidding.)
Can you tell me about the 401(k)?
What benefits does the company offer?

It’s worth mentioning this woman was a hiring manager who’d been with the company for six years. Six years — and it never occurred to her to learn how the product is grown or what employees and customers are putting into their bodies?

These were three very rudimentary questions and she really dropped the ball. I had many more, but after these very simple questions were unable to be addressed I knew that I was right to continue down my path of cannabis entrepreneurship.

What Did I Learn?

It all circles back to my consistent message: most dispensary flower is just mid, Walmart-style commodity weed. I’ve had a few good dispensary experiences, but they are rare — and becoming rarer still as some of my favorite shops in Colorado shutter their doors. Yes their cannabis was pricier, but that is what happens when you grow responsibly instead of cutting every corner possible to create a soulless drab commodity.

As always — One Love.

Third Day Genetics – My Black Market Dispensary

Pesticides – My Personal Experiences in Commercial grows

The Nose Dive in Quality and the Commoditization of Cannabis

The Difference Between Recreational and Medical Cannabis

The Colorado Cannabis Scene Vs. Illinois

My Experience in the Commercial Concentrate World