Author: smcnally

Santa Monica Woman’s Club

Getting out there, meeting people in person, making and pursuing connections continue to be recurring themes. The progressions from attendee, to speaker, to sponsor are clear indications these efforts are worthwhile.

Sponsors get branding and a minute to promote themselves from the stage; most also have a booth and are consistent presences at CGLA and other events — those second and third in-person encounters go long ways to deepening the discussions. Well-worth worth investigating.

Sponsors

Three Wells

• Targeting segments in the 50+ demos
• Partnering with brands, dispensaries, medical experts, consumers

WebJoint

• POS / retail management software / front office / backoffice
• Have been sponsors at every CannaGather and other LA meetup since October
• CaliforniaCannasaurs — Running a voting /  awards program to be held in DTLA  
• Follow up w QP re persona development
• To pitch to Chris CEO about expanding their “Brands DTC” to Consumer DT Brands messaging and activations

CannaClub UCLA

• Student organization
• Started at UCLA; Now on 6 campuses
• Working to get work, exposure, experience for their members 
• Ping Adam and GWolverine on that

GrowStudios

• There again with a busy booth, a few shoutouts from the stage and Rico
• Danielle M and Morgan are Good People
• Morgan – Jeff and I met her at a meetup in Culver — we played table tennis) – She was at Hall of Flowers last week — shoots photos and videos of the events for GrowStudios

APOP Media

• Digital signage in retail locations
• reaching brand prospects at point-of-purchase
• also reaching budtenders and owner/operators
• the pods run in 15-minute loops, so retail staff gets to know the brands VERY well
• video and image creative opportunities; brand stories, content production, messaging distribution 
• a few other players are in the space for this valuable retail real estate, distribution, editorial calendars, campaign management  
• Spoke with Kirk at April’s CannaGather — need to follow-up

FLOURISH

• Talent Agency in the industry
• I’d met John @ Flourish in March
• They weren’t a sponsor then — looks like they’ve grown / decided sponsorship was worthwhile
• Worth following up with as they seem to be getting into providing work for clients in addition to talent & staffing.

James Henry

• Oakland-based — came down to sponsor
• know Rico and Virgil 
• have vapes and streetwear 

True Terpenes

Cova

• POS / retail management software / Support & Compliance  
• nice collaterals, booth, video, team — good idea of where they stand 
• they’re up against incumbents  
• John Syroka – is a follow-up 

Speakers

Rico tarver

• Runs CannaGather LA / emcees events
• Proud of the diversity and inclusion represented
• “For every dollar earned, think about the $$, lives, and freedom lost”
• Danielle M @ GrowStudios has been helping him w CGLA’s marketing site, email outreach

Virgil Grant

• California Cannabis
• “Originator of the Social Equity movement in SoCal” and beyond
• Rico and Virgil met at Women Grow
• “You’ve got to meet people face-to-face” — and in non-obvious circumstances 

Paul Rosen

• Just relocated to LA from Toronto  
• Breakwater Venture Capital
• Pantry — just-launched Wellness brand.
  • CBD and low-dose THC
  • Notes a gap he sees in edibles: “When I’m looking for a wellness product, I don’t want to buy candy.”
• He notes some investors have FoMo   
• Al Harrington (Didn’t show, but Rosen picked up the slack)

Connections & Chats

Dr. Michele Ross

Cannabis and caregiver training for medical pros

• Has course materials online
• Knows Laura A, Of course
• Clients in Canada, S. America, focusing more on US
• Needs more brand positioning, product development, prospect targeting
• We first meeting Feb 25 @ BluntTalks

Michelle’s platform is live in Canada and Brazil. They’re working to get more paid subs in the US. Interesting offering: Subs get semi-monthly one:one consults with health coaches and ongoing access to a library of info created by medical professionals. Condition-specific reading materials and ‘certifications.’

John from lab in Denver

• Relocating to LA in June
• Boss has multiple labs in CO
• John’s reconnoitering, working the regs, scoping spots
• 3rd testing lab I’ve spoken with at length
• most labs are the Pass / Fail guys “in the way” of getting product onto shelves
• many brands, retailers, distributors shop for rubber-stamp Yessers
• labs need to offer services and and position their differentiators
  • remediation and consulting
  • site inspections
  • packing consulting and production
  • (a meaningful % of Fails are remediated with packaging / labeling updates)