Where we Currently Are in the Cannabis Space

The cannabis industry is a unique one to say the least. When I was selling dime bags of mexi-brick to kids in high school back in 1997 I never could have imagined that I would be living in the same country almost 30 years later and there would be established brick and mortar cannabis retail stores as commonplace as gas stations or liquor stores. If I could fast forward from when I was 15 years old until now I would think that I would be amazed at what progress this country has made, sadly I’m not impressed.

Cali 2006-2007

My first experience with legally grown and taxed cannabis was when I moved to Los Angeles in 2006 after I graduated from college. I was a kid in a candy shop. I never actually did get my medical license to consume cannabis when I lived in LA; California was the first state to put ANY cannabis commerce legalization on the books when it passed the medical legislation of proposition 215 and senate bill 420 which essentially legalized cannabis for medical use in the state. The reason I didn’t get my medical cannabis card was because a good buddy of mine Rooster just out of pure coincidence moved in with a farmer for one of the local dispensaries. So we bought tree off of him never having to shell out $90 for a medical marijuana card. Why buy the cow when you can get the milk for free?

The cannabis in California in the 1990s and early 2000’s was absolutely exceptional, and with the exception of what I grow at home I have never seen the likes of that quality again, certainly not in the retail space as it exists today in our (currently) 24 recreationally legal states, of which I have been to 18.

How the New Generation will Experience Cannabis

Sadly I feel like many young millennials and certainly Gen Z and Gen Alpha, will never experience good cannabis. I think the quality in most commercial grows is so bad that many people that would normally medicate with organic cannabis wouldn’t touch what comprises most retail shops with a ten foot pole.

So why is it so bad? Well I’ve written many blog posts on that so I encourage you to look over those to answer that question. What I want to focus on instead would be just my general experiences going into dispensaries. Firstly I take issue with the term Budtender. Like really? WTF man. This is obviously a take on bartender. Okay well I like to drink like most people but I don’t kid myself for a moment in thinking it isn’t poison. Alcohol doesn’t solve problems it exacerbates them, the opposite of what cannabis consumption does.

Who Are You Buying From Anyway?

As a farmer naturally I’m going to ask questions about how the cannabis is grown when I go to a dispo (which is next to never) and with the exception of a few great players in the space like L’Eagle and Verde Natural (both out of Denver), generally budtenders have no idea how it was grown. In the retail space there doesn’t even seem to be a framework for determining quality what-so-ever. It’s so bizarre. I feel like all many consumers care about is that it looks dark and is covered in trichomes, which has almost zero barring on the quality or how it will affect you as medicine; which when grown properly it 100% is just that, medicine, but when grown using the techniques most commercial grows use it’s largely poisonous.

I really don’t care about the glitz and glamour, I don’t care that your shop looks like an Apple Store, if when I blaze up the product from that store I want to puke and then kill myself from the chronic anxiety that is oftentimes accompanied by smoking mold spores and pesticides.

Interviewing At Dispensaries

It goes even deeper when I applied to work at a couple dispensaries in Denver. This was before ever working in commercial farms and realizing just how bad commercially grown cannabis can be. I applied to a company who’s name now alludes me and the woman was trying to low ball me on pay because I had not been a budtender before. What is important to note about this situation is that at the time I had been a cannabis farmer for over 12 years, was running a cannabis non-profit organization that I founded, sat on the board of Denver NORML and was their director of business development. I was also an award winning retail general manager at two Fortune 500 companies previously. I told her I’m sorry but have you even looked at my resume? I’ve had your boss’s boss’s job and it was at a Fortune 500 company not a mom and pop.

I also applied to a dispo as a general manager and they told me I was overqualified. While that may have been true, they also kept telling me I would be bored running that store. Well I don’t get bored, largely because I work so hard that the store would have picked up a significant amount of traffic if I was at the helm.

What Do We Learn?

Sadly the industry is not what it should be, a holistic, organic, safe space to help people to become well; this is largely the way I perceived the industry in Cali in 2006. What this industry is unfortunately now is an over marketed, under tested mass produced commodity and almost every dispensary is in a race to bottom on quality. Federal legalization will make things even worse because with one more layer of added taxation commercial grows will have to cut even more corners then they already are, a tall feat, but I’m confident they will find a way.

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