Here Weed Go!

Latest Episodes:

It's NFL Legend Jim McMahon! Feb 10, 2023

Show notes

How’s it growing folks? It’s Super Bowl week here in Arizona and to get into the spirit, I’ve put together a super bowl of cannabis content with this episode, featuring my interview with former NFL star and counter-coulter icon Jim McMahon.

On top of being a living legend with two super bowls, including the 1985 title with the Chicago Bears, McMahon is active in advocating for cannabis legalization. In addition to using medical cannabis to help with his many injuries and ailments left over from his playing days, he also advocates for the inclusion of cannabis as a means to deal with pain for pro-athletes and regular joes alike.

Our conversation clears the smoke around how McMahon was initially introduced to cannabis while growing up in San Jose, CA, how cannabis has helped him deal with the after effects of a 15-year career in the NFL, and what the plans are for Revenant, a cannabis company and brand he helps promote with fellow NFL veterans Kyle Turley.

Podcast is produced by Pascal Albright/Arizona Daily Star.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

It's Interstate Commerce (maybe) Feb 07, 2023

Show notes

How’s it growing folks?! Welcome to a special edition of Here Weed Go! These sort of episodes happen when the largest cannabis-legal state in the country, California, gets one step closer to possibly opening up the floodgates to interstate commerce for cannabis.

If you’ve been living under a rock the past week, here’s what happened… On January 27, California’s marijuana regulatory body, the Department of Cannabis Control, decided to officially solicit an opinion from the state’s attorney general about the opening of the California cannabis marketplace to allow for trade with other states.

“I think we have a pathway forward toward interstate commerce in cannabis,” Matthew Lee, the general counsel for the DCC, said in an interview with Politico.

If that’s true it could potentially be a game changer -- not just within the Golden State, where producers large and small have been struggling to break even since the state’s recreational program came online in 2016 -- but for other Western states and potentially any state with a medical or recreational program.

To help walk me through where California could be going, I spoke with Justin Strekal. Strekal is the former national political director for the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws, the nation’s largest cannabis consumer advocacy organization and currently is the head of BOWL Pac, the political arm of Better Organizing to Win Legalization, a group working for marijuana legalization and justice for people harmed under criminalization.

Our conversation kicks of with Strekal explaining what the letter from California’s Department of Cannabis Control is arguing for and what it would mean for nearby states.

MORE INFO

For more on Strekal: https://www.instagram.com/justinstrekal/, https://twitter.com/justinstrekal

For more on BOWL Pac: https://thebowlpac.org/

For more on NORML: https://norml.org/

For more Here Weed Go! podcast episodes: https://omny.fm/shows/here-weed-go

For the linktree to all Here Weed Go! social media: https://linktr.ee/hereweedgo

Visit TucsonMarijuanaGuide.com for all of host Eddie Celaya's cannabis content.

Subscribe to the weekly Here Weed Go! newsletter: http://tucne.ws/hereweedgo

For host Eddie Celaya's cannabis and travel adventures: https://www.instagram.com/reportereddie/

Podcast is produced by Pascal Albright/Arizona Daily Star.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

It's Dress Wedding! Feb 01, 2023

Show notes

How’s it growing folks?! Last week, I took a deep toke into the budding recreational program out in New York.

The guest I spoke with, New York cannabis farmer and entrepreneur Karli Miller-Hornick, was confident the legal market could overcome the challenges of burdensome regulations and an entrenched underground market.

Today, I’m attempting to clear some of the smoke surrounding a much more established cannabis market, one facing many of the same challenges.

I’m talking about California, of course. While many casual cannabis consumers and cannabis canna-suers think of The Golden State as the Shangri-La of pot, many within the industry point to California as a precautionary tale.

Although it is unquestionably America’s largest cannabis market, structural problems persist.

For example, the wholesale value of cannabis for adult-use from licensed farmers was $1 billion last year, down from $1.66 billion in 2021, according to a cannabis harvest report released in November by industry tracking firm Leafly.

During that same time period, the actual tonnage produced by those growers was about 12 tons more than the previous year, 2021.

Clearly, something is off.

To help me understand more about the problems facing the original cannabis state (after all, it was California’s move to start a medical cannabis program in 1996 that started this slow cascade towards legalization), I spoke with one of the people who has been involved with the industry since the very beginning: Dave Wedding Dress, or as he is better known, Dress Wedding.

As co-founder of Harbor Side dispensary, one of the first medical dispensaries to open in California, Wedding has seen the industry grow from its underground, prohibition-addled roots, to what it is today.

Along with the challenges faced by the state of California, our conversation touches on some of Wedding's personal experiences and anecdotes as well, from his time at UC Berkeley, to his protest and advocacy work outside of the cannabis space, to his latest venture as the Chief Strategy Officer for Supernet, a credit card geared towards the cannabis industry that could make both consumer purchases and business banking much easier.

MORE INFO

For more on Dress Wedding: https://www.instagram.com/therealdresswedding/

To read Wedding's book: https://get-a-life-book.com/

For more info on SuperNet: https://www.supernet.ai/

For more Here Weed Go! podcast episodes: https://omny.fm/shows/here-weed-go

To sign up for the Here Weed Go! newsletter: http://tucne.ws/hereweedgo

To access all the Here Weed Go! social media: https://linktr.ee/hereweedgo

For host Eddie Celaya's Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/reportereddie/

Podcast is produced by Pascal Albright/Arizona Daily Star.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

It's in The Empire State Jan 25, 2023

Show notes

How's it growing folks?! To find out what’s going on in New York’s budding cannabis market, I talked with Karli Miller-Hornick, the CEO of Florist Farms, a brand of organically grown cannabis flower and other cannabis products which are available on the shelves of Housing Works Dispensary, the first legal recreational pot shop in the state.

Miller-Hornick originally got into farming organic vegetables before adding hemp and now cannabis to her farms and is also CEO and founder or co-founder of an entire suite of hemp and cannabis related companies and brands.

Our conversation clears the smoke hits around the craziness of opening day back in December, what Miller-Hornick see’s as the largest hurdle for independent cannabis growers and producers in New York moving forward, and what should be done about The City that Never Sleeps well-established underground cannabis market.

MORE INFO

For more on Karli Miller-Hornick: https://www.instagram.com/karlimh/

For more on Florist Farms: https://floristfarms.com/

For more on Miller-Hornick's other brands, including Head & Heal: https://headandheal.com/, http://www.karlimillerhornick.com/

For more Here Weed Go! podcasts, video, social media pages and content: https://linktr.ee/hereweedgo

Sign-up for the Here Weed Go! Southern Arizona newsletter: http://tucne.ws/hereweedgo

For all of host Eddie Celaya's craziness: https://www.instagram.com/reportereddie/

Podcast is produced by Pascal Albright/Arizona Daily Star.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

It's Cannafriends Jan 18, 2023

Show notes

How’s it growing folks?! This episode is really one for your friends, your Cannafriends to be specific. Here in Arizona, dispensaries and other cannabis companies and brands are allowed to show off their products at vendor fairs and trade shows.

Probably the most popular of these events is a twice-monthly meet-up known as AZ Cannafriends. AZ Cannafriends events take place in both Tucson and Phoenix and can feature up to 30 vendors and more than 300 attendees.

To help shed some light on what makes these events so special and unique, I spoke with the organization's current president: Amethyst Kinney.

Kinney, known as Arizona’s Canna-queen for her boundless energy and ubiquitous presence throughout the state, is also the founder and CEO of Blue Dream Entertainment, a Limited Liability Company she set up to oversee AZ Cannafriends and her brand-ambassador service.

In our interview, she describes how she’s expanded AZ Cannafriends and what some of her 2023 plans for the event are, how she was introduced to cannabis at two very different points in her life, and her work promoting Revenant MJ -- a brand of cannabis founded in part by former NFL Quarterback Jim McMahon.

Our conversation kicks off with Amethyst telling the story of her first time getting high… and it’s hilarious.

MORE INFO

For more on AZ Cannafriends: https://www.azcannafriends.com/

For more on Amethyst Kinney: https://www.instagram.com/cannaqueenaz/

For more Here Weed Go! podcasts, stories, travel guides and videos: https://linktr.ee/hereweedgo

For more from host Eddie Celaya: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/reportereddie/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/reporterEddie

Visit TucsonMarijuanaGuide.com for more

Podcast is produced by Pascal Albright/Arizona Daily Star.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

It's the UK's Largest Cannabis Study Jan 12, 2023

Show notes

How's it growing folks?! My guest this episode is Marta Di Forti, a researcher at King’s College in London and one of the world’s foremost experts in the field of cannabis and pyschosis.

She is the lead researcher of a study named “Cannabis and Me,” what’s being hailed as the largest cannabis study of its kind in the UK, ever.

In a nutshell, Di Forti and others are looking for 6,000 participants who either use cannabis or have never (or almost never) used it. The goal is to look for a variety of environmental and biological factors behind the different effects people experience when they get “high.”

Di Forti and I dive into the different populations she’s looking to examine for the study, what cannabis psychosis is and how it manifests itself and how studies like Cannabis and Me, often criticized by many within the cannabis space, can help empower the industry with better data to help assuage some of the fears the greater public still has.

MORE INFO

More on Marta Di Forti: https://www.kcl.ac.uk/people/marta-di-forti

More on Cannabis and Me: https://www.kcl.ac.uk/news/kings-college-london-spearheads-the-largest-ever-independent-study-into-cannabis-use

Here Weed Go! content and social media: https://linktr.ee/hereweedgo

Host Eddie Celaya's Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/reportereddie/?hl=en

And don't forget to visit TucsonMarijuanaGuide.com!

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

It's Hemp Jan 04, 2023

Show notes

How's it growing folks!? It’s a new year and a new episode of Here Weed Go!, streaming to you live all over the world!

Before I jump into my interview, I want to give a quick shout out to the HousingWorks Cannabis Co. dispensary in New York City. It made history over the holiday break when on Dec. 29, 2022, it became the first legal cannabis dispensary in the Empire State to open and serve customers.

You might be asking yourself why it’s taken that long for the state to set its regulatory guidelines, issue various licenses and establish an industry testing regimen? Those are good questions I'll explore soon.

In that time it's taken to get legal cannabis off the ground, the so-called “gray” market has exploded, with technically-illegal store-fronts, consumption lounges and even mobile, food-truck-like operations proliferating throughout New York City.

I’ll be checking in with a deep smoke sesh focusing on New York’s cannabis journey in a few months, part of my goal of covering every single adult-use state at some point in 2023.

Now, on to my interview with Jorge Olson, the co-founder and Chief Marketing Officer for Hempacco Co., one of the largest manufacturers of hemp rolling papers and cigarettes in the United States.

Based out of San Diego and hailing from Tijuana, Mexico, Olson explains how he came to the industry from a background in fast-moving consumer goods sales, what the differences are between cannabis and hemp, and why he believes Hempacco is uniquely positioned not to compete with cannabis but to disrupt the trillion dollar global tobacco industry.

MORE INFO

Hempacco Co.: https://hempaccoinc.com/

More Here Weed Go! content, podcasts, stories and social media pages: https://linktr.ee/hereweedgo

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

It's The Flower Shop Dec 29, 2022

Show notes

How's it growing folks? As a canna-consumer for over 15 years, I’ve seen the industry explode in ways I'd never imagined.

But I’ve always wondered why cannabis-based and -infused beverages just haven’t taken off. Much like smoking or vaping, consuming alcohol is (usually) best enjoyed as a social act. Participating in something with others brings out good conversation and good times.

Someone who agrees with me on that is Greta Brandt, the president of The Flower Shop, a chain of medical and adult-use marijuana dispensaries in Arizona and Utah.

Originally a lawyer by trade, Brandt got into the industry originally to help with compliance, and eventually worked her way up The Flower Shop corporate ladder.

The upcoming year promises to be an interesting one for Brandt, The Flower Shop and the company's new brands, including its new cannabis-seltzer beverage company, Cannabis Beverage Company, and it’s line of six flavored seltzers, called "High Tide."

Our conversation touches on a wide range of topics, from Brandt’s introduction into the cannabis industry at The Flower Shop, what differentiates the regulatory and political environment for cannabis in Utah as opposed to Arizona, and of course why she believes, like me, that cannabis infused beverages are the next wave of the future.

MORE INFO

The Flower Shop (Arizona or Utah): https://theflowershopusa.com/

Here Weed Go! linktree to all social media pages and content: https://linktr.ee/hereweedgo

Don't forget to visit TucsonMarijuanaGuide.com for more of host Eddie Celaya's local and national cannabis content.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

It's Fast-Acting Edibles Dec 21, 2022

Show notes

How's it growing folks?! Welcome to the very last of the Here Weed Go! MJBizCon 2022 episodes!

For this episode, I sat down with Kim Rael, the President and CEO of Azuca, a cannabis company founded by Chef Ron Silver of Bubby’s in New York City that focuses on edible innovations and improvements.

One of the things that sets Azuca apart is its trade marked delivery system, called TiME INFUSION. Essentially, where normal cannabis edibles can take up two or three hours to take affect, TiME INFUSION allows for onset of effects within 15 minutes.

Rael explained how the company, with it's headquarters in New York and production facility in New Mexico, licenses TiME INFUSION to other brands, how she came to lead the company and what she sees for the future of Azuca and fast-acting edibles.

MORE INFO

Azuca: https://azuca.co/

Here Weed Go! linktree to more episodes, content and social media: https://linktr.ee/hereweedgo

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

It's Small Business Dec 15, 2022

Show notes

How's it growing folks?! During my time on the convention floor, between scheduled interviews and exploring all the new products and innovations, I ran into two dispensary operators, Weiwei “Vivian” Fellman and Monica Werkheiser.

While both women head up operations for their companies, that’s about where the similarities end.

Fellman, who immigrated from Vietnam, lives in Fargo, North Dakota and is founder and Chief Visonary Officer for Kota Botanics, a line of Hemp CBD products available both online and at Kota’s own branded shops.

Werkheiser is a former pharmacy manager who also managed a line of medical cannabis dispensaries in Pennsylvania before being awarded a recreational license in New Jersey, where she is readying here shop, Canna Remedies, for open in Fall 2023.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Our TOPPODCAST Picks

Follow Us

Stay Connected

Related Podcasts

Links

Stay Connected