Digital Social Hour - Zechariah Lord On His NFL Career, Bad Edible Stories & Building a 9 Figure Cannabis Brand | DSH #157

Episode Date: November 14, 2023

On today's episode on the Digital Social Hour, Zechariah Lord reveals the health benefits of Cannabis, the future of the cannabis industry and growing Jardin into a cannabis powerhouse. BUSINESS INQUIRIES/SPONSORS: [e-mail] APPLY TO BE ON THE POD: https://forms.gle/qXvENTeurx7Xn8Ci9 SPONSORS: Opus Pro: https://www.opus.pro/?via=DSH HelloFresh: https://www.hellofresh.com/50dsh Deposyt Payment Processing: https://www.deposyt.com/seankelly LISTEN ON: Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/digital-social-hour/id1676846015 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/5Jn7LXarRlI8Hc0GtTn759 Sean Kelly Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/seanmikekelly/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

At Wealthsimple, we're built for whatever you're building. Built for Jane, who wants to break into the housing market. We're built for Ted, who's obsessed with what's happening in the global markets. And built for Celine, who just wants to retire and explore the world's flea markets. So take a moment and think about what you're building for. We've got the financial tools to help make it happen. Wealthsimple. Built for possibilities. Visit wealthsimple.com slash possibilities. If I had to guess a coach, who would you guess?

I'm gonna go my, my guess. I think Steve Kerr. Nah, hell no. I feel like Steve Kerr. I can't see Steve Kerr. I can see Steve Kerr. Once again, I'm not putting him on the list at all, just because, you know, I plead the fifth on all that, but. It was a shame that it was banned everywhere. It was ridiculous. Like now it's legal. The government is the biggest drug dealer in the world.

Exactly. You know how that goes, man. Until they found out. My first trip on the edible, I called the hospital. I said, there you go. She was like, you gotta come in here. And I don't touch the edibles, man. The edible, oh my God.

That's what we were talking about earlier. Sean, it just wouldn't go away like i was high for like eight hours yeah i was high high Welcome back to the Digital Social Hour. I'm your host, Sean Kelly. Here with my co-host, Wayne Lewis. What up, what up? And our guest today, Zach Lord. Salute, man.

How's it going, man? Thank you, man. Pleasure to be here, man. Thank you for having me. Thanks for coming. You were up until 6 a.m. Oh, bro. Vegas, man.

Plus, Summer League is out here, so I know y'all busy. That's why I was up until 6 a.m. Yeah, man. Summer League's been hectic for us, which is a, man. Yeah, plus Summer League is out here, so I know y'all busy. That's why I was up till 6 AM. Yeah, man, Summer League's been hectic for us, which is a good thing. Yeah. But yeah, just forget sleeping. Plus now that the NBA's are not tripping. Yeah, they just legalized, right? They're not testing for it. They're not even testing anymore, so

all the players have been pulling up left and right. Even prior to that, they were still pulling up all the time. But more low key. Yeah, all the guys smoke, even some of the coaches smoke. Really? Bro, it's stressful. Yo, if I had to guess a coach, who would you guess smokes?

I'm going to go, my guess, the coach from Denver. Mike Malone? The coach from Denver, for sure. I don't want to put anyone on blast. I feel like Spolstra smokes. I feel like. I'm going Ty Lue. Doc Rivers. I feel like, yeah, Ty i feel like i'm going tyloo doc rivers i feel like yeah

i think steve kerr nah hell no i feel like steve i can't see steve kerr i can see once again i'm not putting that at all just because you know i plead the fifth on all that but at the end of the day just know a lot of the coach smoke nfl and NBA too. Oh yeah, I mean. NFL I could see. Yeah, I don't feel like there's anything wrong. I don't personally do it. There's absolutely nothing wrong with it. Listen man, they try to pump these pills on all the players

and you know, it's way healthier. It's traditional medicine, this cannabis. So at the end of the day, man, a lot of people have some kind of ailment, whether it's stress, anxiety, depression, pain, hard time sleeping, whatever it may be, man, instead of putting these pills in your body that have all these negative effects on you, this is just a way better solution.

And instead of putting a bandaid on a gun wound, you're actually taking care of your body when you're using cannabis the right way. So you can still get that social high. But what's the right way to use? I hear smoking is terrible for you. I actually see inhaling smoke. Yeah. I mean, there's studies go back and forth on saying that.

But at the end of the day, it's all about how much you consume. I consume, but I'm not a chain smoker, put it to you like that. Shout out to the chain smokers. Those are good friends. But I'm not a chain smoker or anything like that. I'll consume, even before I work out, I'll just take one or two puffs. Really? Before I get on the treadmill.

Why? Because literally it relaxes your body wow lowers your heart rate and literally running like my partner do you want your heart rate lower while working out yeah i mean for me personally i do because like if i'm running i don't want it to just be speed i tell you get tired when it's like speeding up like that like you get exhausted a little quicker so for me i want my heart rate to be lower so i can just be calm and relaxed just be able to run right um and my buddy my partner he runs marathons he smokes before he runs no way wow dead serious yeah so you'd be surprised wow i think everyone knows michael phelps yeah yeah yeah yeah he did yeah um so before meets yeah before me yeah wait you're allowed to yeah not when he was doing it that's why i was like a big thing with shirk curry richards yeah exactly they were mad at her because she was smoking that's the

track on her right yeah yeah but it's not a it's not going to enhance your athletic performance per se but it just calms you down it calms your nerves down wow which you know to some degree kind of helps you perform a little bit better but yeah i look i look i treat it from a medicinal standpoint instead of just getting high to get high. I always tell people that come in, because I've had everyone from Travis Scott to you name the athletes coming into the shop, and I tell them, it's smoking with a purpose. So you can consume the product, just do it responsibly.

And it's surprising how many people just don't understand the science behind it. And it's been around forever, but there's been a taboo and stigma around it for a long time as well um and it's kind of cool that we're now starting to excuse me see the industry evolving more and more um so it's going to be really interesting to see what happens in the next five to ten years are you guys getting into uh mushroom soup well psilocybin right now is the next wave in my opinion i think it's ****, to be honest with you. Wow. I feel like it is, too. Yeah, I know a guy that's really big in tech, and he was like, Zach, look.

I mean, he just actually ****. Are you someone that doesn't have life insurance? Why leave anything up to chance in a worst-case scenario? Luckily, Policy Genius makes finding the right policy simple, and their team of licensed experts are on hand to help you through it. Life insurance gives your family a safety net that they can cover expenses with so they don't have to worry about money while getting back on their feet. I've had friends and family members that have passed away without life insurance. It's definitely left us with financial instabilities. Even if you already have a policy, it may not

offer enough protection for your family's needs and it may not follow you if you leave your job. With Policy Genius, you can find life insurance policies that start at just 292 per year for 1 million dollars of coverage some options offer same day approval and avoid unnecessary medical exams policy genius knows how valuable your time is their technology makes it easy to compare life insurance quotes from america's top insurance in just a few clicks to find your lowest price. Policy Genius has licensed award-winning agents who can help you find the best fit for your needs. They work for you, not the insurance companies. They don't have an incentive to recommend one insurer over another

so you can trust their guidance. Policy Genius is for parents, caregivers, and anyone else who has people who depend on them. They simplify the process of getting life insurance so you can protect the people you love. They got thousands of five-star reviews on Google and Trustpilot. Your loved ones deserve a financial safety net. You deserve a smarter way to find and buy it. Head to policygenius.com slash DSH or click the link in the description to get a free life insurance quote and see how much you could save. That's policygenius.com dsh step down from ceo but he literally was like i'll put up five million myself for psilocybin because he was giving his developers like mushrooms before you know before work and he said yeah he's microdosing and nothing crazy

and once again he said the performance and the productivity was way higher wow and so he's like he's a very big believer in it. And outside of that, just, you know, from work standpoint, it treats people with a lot of issues that they have too, like PTSD and all kinds of mental instability. So there's a lot of positive information around it. So. That's exciting. I hope they legalize it.

Yeah, it's coming soon. You know. No, it ain't got to, cause you guys are pushing for it too. Oh, a hundred percent. We're pushing for a big time. It'll expand their business. It'll 10x them.

It'll probably 100x them. And listen, like we just said, everything's okay when it comes to dosing the proper way. As long as you take care of your body and micro dosing to a lot of people that have stress and anxiety, that's why they're treating people with psilocybin. It really helps with that.

And I get bad anxiety going on planes all of a sudden as we get older, anxiety kicks in. But now I'll take like, just once again, micro dosingosing it really helps before i jump on a flight so yeah it's really cool now what age were you getting into this because i know you played in the nfl right yeah so i just smoking back then yeah i was to be honest i wasn't like some of my boys some of my boys would smoke before the games and for some reason football was i couldn't smoke four games like ed reed's a good friend he was a big smoker. He smoked for every game too. But some of my buddies and I played receiver, I couldn't do it before a game,

but working out was a lot easier. But I didn't, I mean, I would smoke after practices cause for me it healed my body. I didn't like taking pills at all. If I have a headache, I wouldn't take any pills. And not to knock the NFL or anything like that, but they used to try to pump pills on us all the time. They still do that.

Yeah, there's a pike, there's lower tabs. Like, you know, they absolutely lord tabs like you know they got to the back and next you know the running back leg not broken exactly so and it's kind of scary and it's messed up to be honest with you you know um because big pharma and the nfl kind of embed together you know they were giving them trial drugs and stuff like that and you know we don't know any better when you're 21 20 years old you have no clue you're trying to get through and you know 21, 20 years old, you have no clue. You're just trying to get through. And after a while I just started doing my own little research and I'm like, I'm not taking this stuff. So I literally stopped my rookie year. It was a bunch of us actually, we were like,

dude, we should just not take these pills. And we all were smokers anyway. And so we started doing a little bit of research on cause there's all kinds of YouTube videos and all kinds of stuff out there on the product and how it helps people with all kinds of different problems and so we're just like let's consume it the right way and once again i didn't take it seriously at that point until i got into the space but i was always an advocate of consuming it's like post-practice after workouts and stuff

like that just to like relax my body nice from being like soaring and being in pain and stuff like that so that's cool yeah a lot of athletes can benefit from it. It was a shame that it was banned everywhere. It was ridiculous. Like Josh Gordon and stuff like that. Like, you know, I really feel like Ricky Williams, all those guys kicked out of the league. Yeah, it was a joke, man.

Josh Gordon was literally the best receiver at that time. And they kicked him out and messed his career up. And like guys like that, it's like, guys, come on, man. Like, yeah, I went to jail over the stuff. So it's a joke. Yeah, it's like, you know, it's like, guys, come on, man. Like- The cats haven't went to jail. Yeah, went to jail over this stuff, so it's a joke. Yeah, it's like, you know- It's for. For.

And now it's legal. Now the government is the biggest drug dealer in the world. Exactly, you know how that goes, man. Falling out. Until they found a way to monetize it for themselves. That's the reason why it's still a Schedule 1 drug. Cause you know, Big Pharma and those guys

got their lobbying power to keep it a Schedule 1 drug. Cause once it gets descheduled, they're gonna see a big dip. Oh yeah. You know dip in their industry. So how did you actually get into the industry? What's the story behind that? I mean, I've always been an advocate of like we're talking about right now.

And the minute I- Cause you guys own the biggest pizzeria, what in- In Vegas. Well, the biggest is Planet 13, not knocking, you know, we're the biggest brand by far. As far as size wise, they're the biggest size wise. So Planet 13 is the biggest as far as size.

Yeah. As far as I brand and relevance, definitely we're not trying to cap or anything like that, but we definitely have way more of a presence culturally than Planet 13 because we deal with everyone from every single artist. Rap marketing is crazy. Yeah, we go hard on the marketing. I mean, we really understand the importance of brand because we look at the dispensary as just a platform because once again we take it on more of a medicinal level than just trying to sling

right so like we were talking about earlier about helping out with all the different ailments you may have we have a whole division in our you know dispensary at the property called harding university so upstairs yeah upstairs and that's where the training goes in. So every single girl that works behind the counter, you guys have been there before, they go through hardcore training. They're not just cute girls that work there. They have to pass a 30-day course for 60 days before they can get behind the counter. Yeah.

So they have to know everything about terpenes, how to pair products, like, you know, and just everything there is to know about this. Because once again, people are coming in with serious ailments. You know, like you'll see people coming in with cancer, people coming in trying to get off hard drugs, heroin, I mean, we see everything. So you wanna make sure that customer's getting the right treatment instead of just trying to sell the highest ticketed item. So that's been our approach since day one.

I think he's one of the owners. Adam? When I was there, yeah, he broke out cuz I was telling him I needed something for headaches. Yeah. And he broke all these things. Put a package together for me that was so nice. For sure, man.

And that's the name of the game, man. Like you gotta make sure, cause people really come with serious issues and you know, humanity, man. We gotta go back to the core of like who we are. You gotta take care of people. And you know, the knock on Big Pharma, which we all can agree,

it's just, it's all about capitalism. They're just trying to make a buck. Yeah, and it kills you, it really messes you up. But the side effects are like, bro, your liver, kidneys, heart, brain. You see these commercials, like if you took this, you got da, da, da, da, da, da, da, da, da, da, da, da, da, it just lays off like broke.

Yeah, they come and slide it in there, they show somebody running a lap, and you experience nosebleeds, vomiting, diarrhea, death, loss of hearing, and even a car accident. And that's the problem, man. It's like, come on, man, you don't see that with. You just don't.

No one's ever died. No one's going to have kidney failure, heart disease, all kinds of crazy stuff just happening. I remember my first trip on the edible. I called the hospital. I said, hey, kid. She was like, you got to come in here. And I don't touch edibles, man.

Oh my god. We were talking about earlier. Sean, it just wouldn't go away. Like, I was high for like eight hours. Yeah. I was high, high. I'm like, bro, how do y'all make this? I called the hospital.

I'm like, how do I make this go away? Oh, man, everyone's had a bad edible story, man. And now we have these drinks, too. They're called sips. Little mini killers, man. So they're 100 milligrams. Damn, you said mini killers. Bro, 100's a lot. 100 milligrams, right? But you're not supposed to take it little mini killers, man. So they're 100 milligrams. And we say mini killers.

Bro, 100 is a lot. 100 milligrams, right? But you're not supposed to take it all at once, obviously. But some people that think they could smoke, they're like, I got no problem doing this. So what they would do is try to bang it out cuz it tastes actually really good. Okay. And one of our influencers or ambassadors is, I think it was DJ Boof.

That's fabulous as DJ. And he was in town and he always pulls up to the shop whenever he comes in town and Fab had a show that night. And so we gave him some product and we're like, hey, try this new sip. So he gave him the sip and we're like, hey, listen, just put a cap full in your water before you drink it.

Don't take the whole thing at once. He's like, oh man, okay, whatever. Cause it tastes good. He banged out the whole thing. Missed the entire performance that night. He was sleeping or just tripping? Yo, he fell asleep. Didn't wake up, he wouldn't even trip and he just was out.

Cuz it's 100 milligrams, man. That's a lot. I gotta put you out. Yeah, dude, I black out on my 10. Yeah, man, I can't handle edibles at all. Obviously the liquid hits your systems a lot quicker. But yeah, man, so there's so many products that come online nonetheless. But but it's all but once again it's about how you dose the product how you take it properly so what trends do you see coming up other than psilocybin um that's a good question uh trends i don't know i think more than anything i mean cbd also cbd is really big i take it every

day it's like my multivitamin like when i wake up in the morning i take cbd i mean there's tons of health benefits around it like lowers your blood pressure good for like cholesterol level lower cholesterol level it just has tons of health benefits and it's really good for anxiety too um so when you just keep it in your system it's just good for you and it doesn't there's it's not psychoactive so what could you hire because the thc stripped out of there well there's there's a couple i got the one adam gave me i think it has a little bit of it in there yeah so there's some that have combinations of cbd and um thc then there's some that are just cbd and cbn depending on if you have a hard time sleeping uh there's cbd and cbg what's cb all these all these

different cbns like it's a cannabinoid that's specifically like designated for sleep so it really helps people that have issues sleeping yeah it knocks you out yeah cbn's really yeah it's really cool it's really good for you. And a lot of people, that's the one thing that I tell you is most of the customers come in having a hard time sleeping. That seems like the number one issue when people come in. I have it easiest, I can fall asleep right now.

But most people have an issue sleeping. So CBN is like one of those things that's like we're pushing heavy and like, you know, we're starting to do a little bit more campaigns around it. because is it addictive like in the sense of if you don't take it let's say you took it you know you may take it three four days but then when you don't take it does the hard time sleeping come back um that's a good question i'm not sure on that but it's not necessarily addictive by any person i mean but you'll notice when you're not taking it because you're gonna be like oh man i'm still up i can't go back to sleep so you're gonna need it you're gonna need

it are you gonna become dependent on this as well well it's not necessarily dependent because it's not like you're gonna be like itching like i need you know i'm not like that that's more than you know yeah i know like yeah because yeah it's it's one of those things where like for me with cbd i noticed because like i said i was getting getting anxiety as I got older. When I stopped taking CBD is when I noticed it's kicking in a little bit. Oh, you know. And so I'm like, man, what have I done differently? And I'm like, oh, I'm taking CBD. Regulus.

You got it. So I get back. So I got back on it. But once again, it's a healthier way of like dosing your body with, you know, medicine. Yeah. And the CBN you take before you go to bed or do you just take it before you go to bed? Yeah, because if you have a hard time sleeping, you want to take it like maybe 20, 30 minutes before you go to bed. Gotcha.

And then it'll have you sleeping like really nice. So, yeah. And there's, like I said, there's so many different products coming online. Back to what you're saying, CBD is a big one. But we're very bullish on the industry in general. I mean, we have over probably 2,000 SKUs of products in our shop. Jeez. About 150 flower strains.

Wow. Yeah, we have a very robust inventory because our whole mindset is the minute a customer walks in the door, we don't want them leaving with nothing. Yeah, yeah. And we want them to have something. This is a new, very new industry. It's almost like we're all startup companies, you know? And we got to make sure that people are coming in, they're seeing all the different options

they have, and we keep track of everything on the back end too. So like, let's say you came in because you know this industry is new you don't have brands like Coke Pepsi Gatorade and you know brands like that they're very well established so this is very new so most people when they get a product they don't remember what it was you know they don't know there's no real yeah because the branding isn't there yet in the space people haven't really invested so we keep track of all that on the back end. So when you do come back 10 days later, however long later, we can look at your purchase history

and say, hey, did that product work for you? Or did that product not work for you? And we look at those terpenes and we pair the terpenes with that customer based on when the bud tender has that conversation. Oh, so that's kind of like a medical history. A hundred percent. So yeah, because once again, we're taking this serious. We're a platform. And that's what Harding University is all about it's making sure that we're treating the patients properly um because once again we i have a guy that owns like six pain clinics around town or seven he sends me a lot of his patients and so you know once again he's like i can't even deny this space anymore like people are asking about he's like i actually feel guilty giving them the pills now.

So, like, that they're trying to push on these guys because they're still having these issues. They're becoming dependent and addicted. So, you know, he's tending them my way. And, you know, it's like,

and that's a feel-good moment because it's like conscious capitalism, man. We're making a couple dollars, but we're taking care of the people the right way. And we're getting them off this addiction to pills because a lot of people get addicted.

What's the youngest client or customer that you've seen that actually use well if you have a medical card believe you could be 18 to get a medical card what about seven year olds or five well that's once again that's not legal per se but um a lot of people are treating their kids to have like you know whatever problem they may have with epilepsy or you know having seizures all the time whatever it may be and these videos are out you know yeah no absolutely i've seen that's what i'm asking like low dosages of thc yeah just to help out with that and they get the shakes gone and you know but once again you got big pharma man there it's that's why we're that's why we're still scheduling drug because they want to push the

stuff that, they wanna push on the kids and it's not really helping. Are they still trying to go head to head with you guys though? Yeah, to some degree. I mean, trying to find a way to get into space and dominate the space. Yeah, but if they get into it, they're gonna mess it up.

Of course they will. They're gonna add stuff to it. Of course they will. They're gonna want you addicted to it. Exactly. So do they own the medical facility, the medical bots? Is that how it works?

No, no, no. That's still like our, so like customers that come in, that's still ours. So we have medical. it started off as just medical. You needed a car. Yeah, so we started off just as medical as well.

So Nevada started off medical 2016. We were medical for like, I think it was four or five months. And then we went wreck. But yeah, you had to have a medical card. And all the medical card is, you had to have a medical card and all the medical card is you have you can purchase a little bit more and the taxes

are a little bit different but outside of that everything else is the same direct patient but yeah so we started out medical and then go wreck yeah and the same things in every market Jersey's gonna be the same and that's usually how the rollout is Florida's just like that right now as well usually start you off medical so do you see it going federally legal because I've been hearing this since I was in high school, but it seems to be slow. For sure.

It's once again, it's all politics, man. And I think it's a bipartisan issue to be honest with you. I really think it's exactly. They're sitting down with them guys. You already know. They're sitting down with the big boys and saying, hey, look man, when do we hit this switch? Yeah, we got ready.

Exactly, because let's be honest, it is a bipartisan issue in my opinion. I mean, at the end of the day, you're creating jobs. We have over 200 employees at our shop. So you're creating jobs. Extra income for the U.S. The tax revenue. I think Nevada did over $120 million in tax revenue last year.

And just can't. Some roads, buildings. Yeah, and once again, infrastructure, all that. so you got to look at it from a bigger picture and i don't care if you're republican democrat at the end of the day it's about money and the tax revenue going to the state to schools technically it's all supposed to go to the schools we'll see but all that money's coming in and that's what just it's like 120 million 120 million and put it in perspective how this is a kicker and we don't have lobbying power obviously like alcohol and tobacco but alcohol tobacco one month combined paid i think it was like 980 000 in taxes or something like that so they'll pay 10.2 million oh so one month

just because we have lobbying power our taxes are ridiculous yeah they're taxing them i mean they're taxing the hell out of us. It's almost like they want to tax you out of business. Exactly. That's exactly what they're doing. And they're going to, in my opinion, my conspiracy theory, and me and my partner talk about this all the time, but I'm like, I really think the big boys are just trying to see

who keeps their head above water, who can survive this, because it really is hard. It's challenging this industry. Not only do you put your money in the bank, so you got cash. If you get robbed, you're more prone to getting robbed. So they kind of want to either tax you out of business or put you out of business some other way whether you keep getting robbed it's just it's too much it's too much we've been lucky out here to where there hasn't been too much you know robberies or anything like that but at the same time the taxes i mean the regulations are crazy yeah i mean it's very challenging to run

these businesses you really have to be buttoned up and we're blessed you know my partner's a lawyer we have a great cf uh chief operating officer um so we're very buttoned up from you know from operational standpoint so that we don't you know when they do come in and pop up try to hit you with all these fines and i got you you know they look at that you know it's we're always buttoned up to not get caught up on that but some shops once again they don't have the you, the manpower to be able to handle all that stuff. And they're getting hit with fines and you get hit with too many fines. All of a sudden that license is gone if you're not paying those fines.

And, you know, that's where it gets very tricky. So, and I think they're doing that intentionally so that those licenses just hang out. And then the big boys can just hold on, get these licenses. And then all of a sudden, then they hit that switch. and you only have a couple people now you're competing with from you know it seems like that people are getting shaken up yeah amazon bought like a thousand acres in north las vegas oh no what am i they're gonna sell it online listen they they're positioning themselves positioning so they know something oh yeah for sure amazon they're positioning themselves amazon they're definitely gonna have it available.

Of course, they have the infrastructure. Look at their infrastructure, it's already set. And they have the market share. Yeah, their market share, the infrastructure, it's just a plug and play for them. So you gotta think, man, when you got big boys like that, then of course, Philip Morris and some of these guys, they're all trying to tap in.

So how do you guys compete with those big brands and spots like Amazon? I'm not even really worried to be honest with you. Yeah, because at the end of the day, like- You guys are more of an experience versus just a product. Exactly, exactly. It's like a difference between walking into, you know, I don't know how to really give an example

about it, but like walking into like a Supreme store or going to like, you know, The Gap or something like that. And that might be a bad example, but nonetheless, they're not gonna have an identity. They're just gonna be more so. It's an experience. And we've created that. And to be honest with you too,

let's say Bezos or some of these guys were to tap into the space, which they are, they're just gonna look for the operators. Who's operating the right way? They might acquire you. They'll pay probably 10x of what you're actually worth, which is great for us. And they'll say, okay, we now own it, but you guys run it.

You guys still be the face. We'll give you a little percentage here and there, but we're now your boss. Which is okay. As long as you step back and let us do our thing, that's cool. But I think they're going to wait it out to see who are the better operators. And that's why we've been so focused on operations at our shop. Yeah, let's crush it with that.

Yeah, we're big on that. And we've controlled it on Destiny. We've had plenty of opportunities to partner with some bigger groups. And we've kind of just stepped back. Some of these MSOs, multi-state operators around the country in cannabis, they have a lot of cash behind them. But once again, their vision is different from ours. They want to scale fast. Yeah them. But once again, like, you know, their vision is different from ours. They want to scale. Yeah. They're trying to scale way too fast. And corporate

and all honesty is very frowned upon. Really? Oh, big time. You know, and the streets really do talk when it comes to that. Wow. Yeah. We see it firsthand. There's one big company. I want to put them out there on blast, but they're out of Chicago. And great, nice guys, but they had their chest out early on because they went public and they were doing really well. They had a bunch of stores, had licenses all over the country and they wanted to acquire us, they wanted to partner with us.

And they sold us a dream at first, but the devil's in the details. And then all of a sudden, we just felt like something was a little off with this, let's just step back from this. And we tried to tell them like, this is all about like

having an identity and culture. You can't step away from the essence of what this industry really is. Right. Because if you do, exactly, people are going to notice that.

Look at cookies, you know, so when things like that start to happen. Is that what's going on? Oh yeah, we'll talk about that in a minute, but yeah,

so like, when you see things like that, you know, the streets do talk and they see that and they kind of stop going to those stores because you got to think about people are getting arrested for cannabis for a long time. And it was those same suits that were pushing people to get arrested. They're now in the space. So why would I shop with you?

I mean, think about it, you know, so it's crazy. It may sound like there's this weird subculture cannabis that's like, they don't wanna mess with corporate cannabis. So they'd rather deal with the independents. And so once again, going back to that group out of Chicago, they had stores everywhere, they were cocky as hell. And then literally like maybe it was six to eight months later, they just saw their stock,

boom, boom, boom, taking a hit. Because what exactly what I was just talking about started to happen. They had no identity, they had no culture behind their stores. It was just little pop-ups here, there, and the other, just nothing to it. And dude, people stopped going to them.

So they came back and was like, "'Hey, look, would you guys be interested?" The conversation's over. No, but now it's not even buying us, it's just like, can we have this conversation again? And it's like, no, man, look, we're gonna go in a different direction, man. Like we try to give this to you guys, we try to's not even buying us. It's just like, can we have this conversation again? And it's like, no man, look, we're gonna go in a different direction, man. Like we try to give this to you guys.

We try to lay it out to you. They wanna listen. And we know how that goes. Then all of a sudden you do give them the blueprint and then they change things up, get cocky again and say, I see you later, scram. So we just said, no, we're gonna wait. Exactly, so we just said, we're just gonna wait this out,

do things our way and so far so good. So what's going on with cookies cookies man and look burner shout out to bernard and those guys he's doing his thing he's doing his thing but there's just a ton of litigation around him right now and you know it's where they with the mistake they made in my opinion is they try to scale too fast they had an opportunity of a lifetime and they're listen not knocking them whatsoever because they're still out there. They're still cookies. Yeah.

But one here, right? Yeah, of course. There's two here. Maybe three. No, there's two here. There's one by Flamingo and there's one on the strip and there might be another location. But nonetheless, they had a huge opportunity early on in this industry because they had a brand name already, which very few people in the space had that.

So if you were just thinking about it, everything we just talked about, culture and everything like that, they had that on lock. Burner did a great job of creating that brand. Great job. But the minute they went corporate and started just scaling so fast, that's when things started to go down.

Quality of the product went down. So people started talking trash about the actual, what's inside of the packaging. Because cookies at, you can order, there's like five or six different cultivations that are growing cookies out here. So, and I don't wanna get too far into the business model, but nonetheless, like,

and some of the cultivations are not that good. Some are actually good. So from a customer standpoint, I see this cheaper cookies proper buy that one and that's from the bad bad cultivation but then people start talking trash about cookies product instead of cookies saying you know what quality control i don't care if i'm making better margins on over here i just want my to be gas all the time right you know because that's what cookies known for gas yeah that's what's known for in california so if they

had stick to that model they had stick to that model they had stuck to that model bro they dominate the space because they already had a brand name they had stores in california everybody knows cookies yeah the the hip-hop community the streets love cookies bro you you have leverage but they wanted to just open up everywhere so fast and this industry is not like a mcdonald's like you can't scale the same way because McDonald's, no matter what state you go to, it's going to taste the exact same. It's not the same with. You got different growers all over the place growing your product.

Who's where's the quality control to make sure it's the same level of gas in every market, just not there. You know what I'm saying? So I think that's where they made a big mistake, man. And that's why we haven't scaled fast ourselves. We've taken the time because we know how hard it is to just run one store. So to open up like multiple stores all around the country

that fast, bro. You're trying to open like 20, right? Yeah, dude, it's impossible. It's impossible. The QC is not good. Because if, yeah, there's no quality control. And now all of a sudden you have a store in New York City and people are like, man, this place sucks.

The customer service is awful. Cause't know you know who's running it over there you hire but there's no one there day to day to make sure that everything's up to a certain standard which is why we take our time and now we in an opera we're in a good position now to be able to scale because everything's kind of locked in here we have great SOPs so we now my partner and I and our see our COO we can just walk away and look at other opportunities and say, okay, now we can step back. We don't need to be as hands-on as we were early on. And now we can look at other opportunities, which we're doing that right now.

That's awesome. Yeah, your marketing is insane, man. How do you get in bed with all these celebrities? Because every day there's… Yeah, I mean, a lot of it is just… You see Hardeen, you can be at the grocery stores and might have a hat on. Yeah, I know. It's crazy, man.

It's constantly reminding you. And it's cool, man. It's great because, I mean, a lot of it is just- You see Hardeen, you can be at the grocery store, somebody might have a hat on. Yeah, I know. It's crazy, man. It's constantly reminding me. And it's cool, man. It's great because, I mean, a lot of it's relationship. I've been in Vegas for 12 years. We just have a great staff and team. And Bonix, I don't know if you know DJ Bonix. Yeah, I know DJ Bonix. I said, what's Cleveland, DJ?

Yeah, so he started our ambassador program too, or he started running our ambassador program. But even prior to him being on board, we just had great relationships with a lot of these artists that come in town. And we have great relationships with a lot of the clubs around town. That's smart. And that's the big thing. And that was our lane from day one

when my partner and I sat down. We said, this is what we're going to do. All the other dismetries can do whatever they want to do. Our focus is going to be hospitality. Because that's what Vegas is. So we're going to tap into these nightclubs. Because those customers are our customers at the end of the day, to be honest.

They're partiers. They're partiers. They coming into Vegas to party. Don't get me wrong, we gotta focus on the locals as well, but we wanna tap into that and we'll build up the culture from there. You know what I'm saying? And so we have great relationships around town.

There are all the different nightclubs. And it's a tourist attraction. It's a tourist attraction, man. So many people will be happy to take pictures and hang out in the lounge. Absolutely, absolutely, man. And so's a tourist attraction. It's a tourist attraction. So many people would be happy to take pictures in your lounge. Absolutely, man. And so legitimately we've just stuck to the process as the Sixers say, trust the process.

We trusted that process, we stuck to it. And we have a board that's, they didn't understand it that first or older, but now they're starting to see where that investment went and the results of that. But we're big on branding, it's just the beginning. I mean, we're about to take it to the next level. So yeah, things have been working out.

How do you feel the introduction of the consumption lounges are gonna do here in Las Vegas? I think that's the next major wave. Just because let's be honest, the nightclubs, after a while it's like, all right, what's next? You can only do see Chainsmokers and some of these guys so many times, man. And I love them guys, they're just good friends of mine,

but you can only see them so many times. And it's after a while, it's like, what's next, man? What's the next wave? What's the next vibe? And to me, there's nothing cooler than a lounge where it's not crazy loud but you still have djs there um it's more of a social setting as opposed to just loud rah-rah pack can't go to the bathroom like 10k 20k minimums to you know you get to sit down see a group of pretty girls

in the corner oh they smoke that's what like it's easier conversation piece in my opinion because everyone drinks alcohol it's nothing worse than a drunk girl. But someone that's high, it's cool conversation. So I think, and a lot of girls smoke. Let's be honest. And so that kind of environment's more relaxing for everyone. And it's just a change up. You're not getting banged over the head

for these big minimums and people have the money but they just don't want to spend that anymore. So you guys still have alcohol there too? No, so there's a firewall between that. So we can't sell alcohol there but in my opinion like i was saying earlier the thc drinks is the next wave too because now you're going to see beverages on the thc side so and i think to in my opinion which is why a lot of these alcohol companies are trying to get involved high as hell so no no so you gotta think about it though but it's not smoking and

drinking but it's just a matter of how you dose it. Once again, it's just like drinking a beer. Like instead of having it, you know, 10 milligrams in that drink, put two milligrams in there. So you can drink it. You're not really be banged up and some people might want to just drink and not consume like smoke. So it just kind of keeps the buzz. Yeah.

Just keep just a nice little buzz. Yeah. That's all you need. And you'll have like a mixology bartender making fresh drinks. Oh, that's cool. Just it man. Is it open changing up? So we're looking at doing a huge project, which I can't get too much detail yet. you need and you'll have like a mixology bartender making fresh drinks oh that's cool just when is it open changing up so we're looking at doing a huge project which i can't get too much detail yeah i mean i was there yeah so we're working on a really big project but we're looking at doing like

uh you know something just next level that hasn't been done before you know so um we're looking at opening up a lounge because we're not rushing to do this we got the license for one of 20 to get the license out here so we to get the license out here. So we actually have the license for it, which is cool. And I think about 95% of the lounges are gonna just be couches and some lava lamps, nothing major. They're not gonna go hard on it

because once again, a lot of these dispensaries haven't invested in the branding and marketing to go hard on a lounge. And they're not as creative. Yeah, they're not creative people and not knocking them because everyone has their lane and they're just gonna stay in their lane and trying to

Exit when they want to exit But like I said like the platform that we built is for scale and to you know open up in different markets major metropolitan City, so we do the same thing in Florida same thing in New York. So this consumption lounge dispensary like I mean We're doing some fun stuff, you know Like I was putting everything together and I want to get to detail, but putting everything together to create the ultimate adult playground. Sounds exciting, man. We gotta stop by. Yeah, for sure.

I'm there, bro. We don't even smoke, that's the funny part. No, I don't, but I'm there. No, I mean, the thing about it is, man, once again, you can do your THC drinks as light drinks, so you're not banged up. And you can smoke CBD just to make yourself feel like you're smoking, to take care of your body. I mean, I can still be in the atmosphere. And you can smoke CBD just to make yourself feel like you're smoking. Yeah. To take care of your body.

I mean, I can still be in the atmosphere. I mean, I grew up around it. Yeah. So it's not something that bothers me. I just personally my cell phone. But have I tried edible before? Yeah. Yeah. It's no different than going to a nightclub some people don't drink. Yeah. Same thing.

You're just there to just like socialize and just chill out. Be in the vibe. Yeah, just be in the vibe. So to be with a group of friends. and that's another thing too, man, because you could do some fun concepts with these consumption. Just imagine having a comedy night in a consumption. And everybody in smoking. Everyone smoking and it's a comedian up there.

Exactly right. Can we can we have a relationship with Duvall, Mike? We have a relationship with all those guys. Chappelle, everybody. So, you know, we're looking at it from that perspective. Like an e-sports night too, like an e-sports night. Yeah, just different concepts. Oh yeah, dude, we're doing karaoke nights, e-sports nights,

like yeah, game, all kinds of gaming stuff, just fun. Just something different, you know, that cater to people seven days a week, man. And it's just an alternative to the night club. So 20 years is gonna be 24 or 12 hours? How you guys wanna do it? Well, we're thinking about that. I think it's gonna be 24 hours 12 hours how are you guys well we're thinking about that i think it's gonna be 24 hours to be honest with you that's the that's our thought process with this development because you really got to compete you got to out compete

everybody in that yeah it's not even not even trying to could we look at we're not even trying to compete with anyone more so we're just trying to figure out what's best for us um because we don't really look at other dispensaries as competition per se um because we have our own lane right and everyone has a lane of what they're trying to focus on. That's cool. So we're not technically trying to compete, believe it or not. We're just trying to create our own vibe, which we've kind of created already, and just stick to that program.

That's cool. Yeah, that's been our mindset from day one. Yeah, because we don't really think that some of these dispensaries, they're not even looking at the industry like we're looking at it. So even though Plant 13 is the biggest dispensary and they're close to the strip, they do great numbers, not knocking them, but they don't really have the same business model as us.

And that's fine. So, because people always ask, so your biggest competitor is Plant 13? And I'm like, no man, not at all. Like they're not at all. You probably get asked that every day. Yeah, literally, we're like no. There's no weed to go around.

There's plenty, plenty, man. know we average a thousand to fifteen hundred customers a day man holy crap yeah and that's on the east side of las vegas yeah think about that that's funny yeah i remember pulling up i was like where am i exactly so we know the minute we pick up our you know our dispensary relocated you guys are off the strip too exactly are you going to relocate yeah where we locate this project i'm talking about is being like literally prime real estate are especially relocated. You guys are off the strip too. Exactly. Are you going to relocate? Yeah, we're relocating. This project I'm talking about is being like literally prime real estate. Oh, see, I'm moving everything over there.

Everything. Nice. Everything. That's going to be a game changer. It's over. That's what I'm saying. That's what I'm saying. 36X.

We know the numbers exactly. We know the numbers we're doing now. And we're combining that with other businesses that we're going to be putting together and just create. It's going to be a massive project. I've heard the 13 numbers it's public right yeah it's probably isn't it like 60 million yeah they do yeah they do close to 60 million yeah yeah and they have no net it's just but based on location yeah they're thinking about where they are you can walk to that you can walk

exactly you know you don't mind walking it out from the wind exactly that's a lot of their traffic is foot traffic yeah you go over there right now. It's literally on every single corner. Wow. Exactly. So it's literally right there. But wait, what's the other big spot? Reef, right next to it.

Yeah, so Reef is a dispensary? Yeah, Reef is a dispensary. Reef, man. Reef is huge, bro. Reef is big. So Reef really messed up. Oh, they did? Yeah, man.

They had a huge opportunity. They were right there before Plant 13 even opened up. They were the big **** town, you know? Excuse my language, but they were the big **** town. And once again, they had a huge opportunity, but they got too comfortable. They didn't focus on the little things, the details around, like, building out their shop to make it presentable because you're dealing with all these tourists. So you might want to make it nice. I have a Minden Reef.

I don't know how it looks. They were the first one, right? They were the first one. You said it's terrible? Terrible, bro. Like, you walk in there, you're like, come on, man. I haven't been in reef. I don't know. They were the first one. They were the first. He said it's terrible. Terrible. Like you were in there.

You're like, come on, man. Like you guys, like you guys are this location and this is what you built. Like they had a huge building. It's just, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's,

it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, because when they opened up their shop, they ate up probably a good 40, 50% of their market. They crushed them, you know, to the point where it's like, it looks good aesthetically outside. And once again, you got to play defense more than offense. Like, Reef had an opportunity to build out something really nice to deter Plant 13 from even opening up right next door because if they built something nice and focused on, like, the design and, like, you know, the identity of the place,

a plan 13 would have never opened up because they would have just dominated that area. But because they cut corners, it was like, Oh, we got an opportunity here. And so they just built a better mousetrap. Yeah. And sure enough,

they ate up a ton of market share from the boys to the point where I think, you know, they ended up selling and I then another group just bought it. Not too long. Yeah. That's nuts. It's been fun, man.

Oh, for sure. I'm talking to you. Anything you want to close off with? Oh, nothing, yeah. That's nuts. Zach, it's been fun, man. Oh, for sure. I love talking to you. Anything you want to close off with? No, nothing, man. You can follow us at Hardin underscore Las Vegas. We have fun with it.

Yeah, just stay tuned. We got a lot cooking right now with this play. Stop by if you're in town, guys. Yeah, for sure. Thanks for watching, and I'll see you next time. Thanks, guys.