Editors’ Note: This is the transcript version of the podcast. Please note that due to time and audio constraints, transcription may not be perfect. We encourage you to listen to the podcast, embedded below if you need any clarification. We hope you enjoy!
Dive into the world of cannabis-infused products in today’s episode. We sit down with Ben Larson, CEO of Vertosa.
Vertosa creates the most effective and reliable active ingredients for infused product makers. They are an industry leader when it comes to cannabis infused products.
This is the episode for you whether you prefer gummies, snacks or beverages.
Featured in Today’s Episode:
- The origin and values of Vertosa
- Establishing trust as a Cannabis startup.
- Cannabis infused beverages
- Scientific cannabis research
Vertosa is focused on the sciences of surface chemistry and plant medicine, with a team of experts that work closely with their clients and lab partners throughout the manufacturing process to achieve target potency and accelerate products to market.
[00:00:00] Bryan Fields: This is the dime, dive into the cannabis and hemp industry through trends, insights, predictions, and tangents.
[00:00:11] What’s up guys. Welcome back to another episode of the dime I’m Brian Fields and Whitney has always have got my right-hand man Kellen Finney. And this week we’ve got a very special guest Ben Larson CEO of her TOSA and host of the MJ today. Podcast. Ben, thanks for taking the time. How are you doing?
[00:00:26] Ben Larson: I’m doing all right. Thanks so much guys. Really, really happy to be here. And it’s a beautiful Friday here in sunny, California. The rain has subsided, so I get to go out and play after this. I think knowing how you doing?
[00:00:38] Kellan Finney: Doing well, doing well, looking forward to chatting with Ben and talk about their technology.
[00:00:43] Bryan Fields: Cool. So, Ben, I think it’d be really beneficial for our listeners to learn a little bit about.
[00:00:48] Ben Larson: My background. Okay. Well, when I graduated college now I won’t take you through the full story. I did have a previous life as a civil engineer, which was interesting, but for the last decade, plus [00:01:00] I’ve been working with early stage companies, startups inside and out of the cannabis industry and really fell in love with just the creation phase.
[00:01:07] I love helping people create their ideas and kind of break down the barriers, help them validate it and really. You know, make it an opportunity to build wealth and kind of create your own destiny. Like that’s, that’s my, my ethos. And you know, what brought me into the cannabis industry was launching gateway, which was a startup accelerator and working with early stage companies, helping them you know, raise cap.
[00:01:31] And yeah, it’s been a journey since then, you know, few years of doing that. It was a very challenging job here in California, especially when everyone was looking towards legalization to be the panacea of like just wealth and like just, you know, an easy market and. It wasn’t bad. And so, you know, I think the big kind of mind shift for me was realizing how early it was still in the industry.
[00:01:59] [00:02:00] And if you were going to be investing in these early stage companies, like they needed to have a pathway forward to success and, and, and the supply chain wasn’t really. There yet, you know back in call it 2016, 2017, and even today in a lot of cases, depending on what market. And so I started thinking, it’s like, okay, how do we change our investment thesis to really invest into the supply chain and allow, you know, all these pitch decks that are quoting these billion dollar opportunities, like, how is that actually gonna happen?
[00:02:29] And, and what needed to happen was kind of like to remove the necessity to vertically. And do everything. And that we learned that in tech, right? Like to create value and scalability, you have to really like focus on a single aspect of a business and really just knock it out of the park. Do it really well.
[00:02:49] Let other people use it, let them scale become a platform like these are all kind of like, you know, talking points of, of a lot of early stage startups. And yeah, there was a lot of room for improvement. And so one of the [00:03:00] key aspects of that was creating reliable. You know what I just call active ingredients.
[00:03:06] Right. You know, you can call it oil extracts, you can call it normal shins. But at the end of the day, if a big brand is going to come in and they want to create a product they’re used to doing the branding and product design. And they just want to rely on, you know reliable ingredient manufacturers.
[00:03:22] And, and that was kind of the Genesis of what I’m doing today is the CEO of our Vertosa is creating reliable, active ingredients at scale that are customizable for the products that they go in. And we’re also creating kind of a geographic platform so that brands can operate in multiple states or countries.
[00:03:42] And really create the same experience in the same product. That’s, that’s unique to the product that they’ve created. Right. And so that’s the, that’s the skinny on, on my trajectory in the cannabis industry. Let’s dive a little bit
[00:03:52] Bryan Fields: into the origin of that with TOSA. Is there a certain moment where the name kind of came through?
[00:03:58] Can you kind of take a suit [00:04:00] conceptualization phase of moving into cannabis and then starting.
[00:04:03] Ben Larson: Yeah. So the name used to be managing that’s what we first started as you know, my, my business partner, Dr. Harold, hon the happy chemist that’s right. I, he has a PhD in surface chemistry. Like this is his life and he came to me with the concept and he’s like, I’m going to call it nano gen.
[00:04:20] And I’m like, okay, that’s cool. That’s like super scientific. All right. It sounds a little bit like south San Francisco. I can get down with that. And, and I, you know, at the beginning of. We need something that was trustworthy, kind of like it had the benefit of sounding very familiar, like, so like we would introduce ourselves to people for the first time.
[00:04:38] And it was like two or three of us, you know, in those days. And they’re like, oh yeah, Nana, Jeanette, I’ve heard of you guys. And I was just kind of like thinking to myself, like, no you haven’t or if you have a, it was a haircare product, maybe you’re losing your hair. You know, there’s anyway. So I told Harold pretty early on.
[00:04:55] Look there, there are some trademarks out there. If we start to get some traction, that’s [00:05:00] reasonable, then we’re going to have to like, change the name and, you know, lucky for us that happened. And so it was a pretty easy decision. Well, it was an easy decision to change the change, the name, the actual changing of the name.
[00:05:11] And coming up with the name was, was pretty arduous and long if, if anyone’s ever been through a rebranding effort. But it was fine. Like we knew it had to happen. So we kind of put our heart and soul and a lot of intention into the name and that’s how that came about. But Regardless of the name nano gen or Virto Sosa.
[00:05:27] We have one core value when we first launched the company. And I alluded to it at the beginning is like, it was trust. Like we just needed to infuse the supply chain, the community with trust and, and so. Anytime we came up with new information or uncovered something or something, you know, on the shelves was losing potency.
[00:05:47] We didn’t sweep anything under the rug. We just kind of actually highlighted it and said, okay, this is something that we can apply our horsepower to, and really try to solve and, and lift up the industry. And so it worked, that’s kind of what [00:06:00] really helped us build our brand and, and kind of kept our, our north star.
[00:06:04] In a clear as day to us you know, day in and day out, so important.
[00:06:07] Bryan Fields: And that trust that you’ve described is so critical, even more so in cannabis, because what we found is so many people have been burned early on and making them hesitant, but also so detrimental to the progress and success of the industry as a whole.
[00:06:19] So for our listeners who are a little, still a little unfamiliar with, for TOSA and our want to know, you know, where in the conversation that they would be introduced to you, can you kind of share more about the interaction between you and the rest of the.
[00:06:31] Ben Larson: Yeah, absolutely. So, so part of that building trust, right?
[00:06:34] We three years of operation. Now we’re a little bit more we are purely a B2B. Like we don’t have any of our own products. We’ve been asked many times if we’re going to do it. If it’s something that like what’s out there that it’s yours and people actually there, they’re so wired to think like that in cannabis, like, oh, is that your product?
[00:06:52] I’m like, well, we have technology that helps build that product, but no, it’s not our product. None of it’s our product. We only work with brands, [00:07:00] manufacturers, and operators. And so Our inputs are basically any extraction, any isolate. We try to create as much flexibility as possible. So if you want to create like pure like CBD beverage, like we can help you do that.
[00:07:12] If you want to create something that is built around a live resin extraction out of Humboldt, California, it could be single origin like we’ve done. That was like super awesome. Like heavy hitters just came out really a really awesome, you know, single strain product that. I’m in love with it, like it, and that’s what the future is, right?
[00:07:31] Like those differentiated products, differentiated experiences, you know, our process, we then take those inputs and apply our nanomoles and expertise to create a stable ingredient for a given product. And so it’s not a one size fits all. You know, we, we evaluate the products. We say, well, you know, what are the ingredients?
[00:07:50] What are the manufacturing processes? What are the packaging? You know, what is the intention and lifespan of this product? And then we custom tailor those ingredients to ensure. [00:08:00] It’s going to be what the consumer is expecting because that’s, that’s how you build trust with the consumer. That’s how you create a mainstream industry.
[00:08:06] And then on the, you know, the, the tail end, we, we work with probably over a hundred brands in the market now everywhere from gummies to mouth sprays to beverages just trying to really create that next generation of, of edibles product or consumables. Non-smoker bubbles, whatever you want to call it.
[00:08:23] I don’t like to actually put everything under the umbrella of edibles because. Beverages is a very different experience and I can dig into the details of probably won’t yet, unless you draw it out of me, but it’s like, beverages are different than gummies and gummies are different than a mouth spray.
[00:08:40] Right? Like, and that’s important to note because even if you use the exact same ingredient, it’s like if you were to use a high purity THC distillate, it’s going to be a very different experience between a beverage. So that’s the first thing to understand, but you know, other than brands, we also have become kind of a node for just research.
[00:08:56] And so we work we have a pharmaceutical lab partner here in the bay [00:09:00] area that we do a lot of blood work with. We’ve teamed up with doctors to understand like how we can help patients get off of opioids, faster using combinations of hemp-based cannabinoids. And then we’re doing research w you know, one of our advisors, professor Julian, McClements side of UMass, you know, doing just a lot of work in nano emulsions and trying to understand, you know, purely as a vehicle, like, how are we delivering, you know, these compounds into the bloodstream and getting the intended effects?
[00:09:26] So we work with everyone. It’s, it’s, it’s kind of fun, you know, Back from my incubator days when I was running gateway, we didn’t really have competition. We just, I guess maybe canopy growth, but we were still friendly with like Micah and, and Patrick. But it was just like, you know, it, it really kind of allowed us to build a really big strong network and, and constantly lend it to those that we work with.
[00:09:47] And we’re doing exactly that ever TOSA, anytime someone calls us like, oh, you need a co-packer you need a distributor, you need a supplier. Like we got that. And, and oftentimes. Giving it away as like kind of helping build up the categories [00:10:00] I’m coming for
[00:10:00] Bryan Fields: those signs details. But before, before I asked you, I want to start with one, one of the categories first, I want to know what do people get wrong about the infused beverage category?
[00:10:14] Ben Larson: Oh man, what do they get wrong? The thing I get the most tired of hearing all the time is like, oh, The average, isn’t a thing it’s only 2%. Well, everything starts from zero. You know, you don’t go from zero to a hundred percent overnight and like, let that be the determinant of whether something’s a thing.
[00:10:34] And so all I got to say is if, if you’re skeptical of beverage, like try one, we’ll try a good one. Try one that has a virtuoso logo somewhere on the back, you know, it’s like, it will change. And if it doesn’t, that’s fine, but people need to realize, like you’re not every consumer. And what I have seen with beverages is a great entry point into the category into cannabis.
[00:10:56] Right. And I’ve seen. People try [00:11:00] cannabis for the very first time in their sixties and seventies, because it was in a beverage and it was super easy for them to pick it up, taste it and meter it. And it’s like, they weren’t going to over-consume, you know, in a whole package, maybe it had three milligrams of THC.
[00:11:16] They could drink half of it start feeling it and decide whether they wanted to continue or not. And I’ve just seen so many incredible transitions through beverage. Like my wife’s family, like, you know, very conservative Eastern. No one had ever touched cannabis. And in fact, the first Christmas after I had entered the industry and everyone found out, you know, I’ll walk in like, Hey, drug dealer.
[00:11:39] And I’m like, oh God. And so that was the starting point. And then just this year, you know, posts like kind of, as COVID started to ease up into the community, they, they took a little like family vacation. They sent me pictures and they were all in a dispensary up in Mendocino and like, we all bought something and they were so proud of themselves.
[00:11:59] And [00:12:00] I’m just like, and I got to tell you, it all started with beverage. Like they were buying gummies, they were buying tinctures, but it started because I got them to, to try the beverage and they, they realized. It wasn’t dangerous. And so it, you know, that’s the opportunity, the beverage, it’s the new consumer, it’s the social consumer.
[00:12:15] It’s, it’s the consumer that like myself that, you know, if I take too big of a pole off of, off of a joint, like I’m probably going to be fairly anti-social for the next hour and a half. You know, we’re, we’re, I can, I can meet her at much better with a beverage and I don’t feel like I have to like it off the corner of a gummy or, or something like that to achieve it.
[00:12:32] And it’s like, it’s just natural. So. That’s what I really love about beverage. So if you’re, if you’re still hung up on the fact that it’s only two or 3% or that they’re heavy, or they take up a lot of space, it’s like, yes, they do. But they’ll also probably be the first product that you see on a mainstream shelf out of the regulated market.
[00:12:50] If I had to predict right. I would agree with that. Yeah. So that’s what I’m, except for that’s what I’m driving towards. Like they will be the first cannabis products in liquor stores, so to speak. [00:13:00] Right.
[00:13:00] Bryan Fields: I think we’re complete agreement on that. We’re extremely, extremely bullish on that. And I wonder sometimes if the beverage category isn’t a direct competitor to the edibles or the flower.
[00:13:11] They’re more of a competitor to the alcohol drinkers, right? Someone who laughter work. It’s normally like I’m going to grab myself a little whiskey, which don’t get me wrong during the pandemic was a heavy dose of my reality. And then yeah, very tired and sent me a care package. And I got to try one of those infused beverages for the first time.
[00:13:28] And my mind was completely blown away. This is it. I was like, this is exactly the category. That’s going to get those that are still kind of with that stigma of the smoking aspect and cannabis, a little more comfortable with the adoption of the category. So Kellyn, when we’re talking about beverages, is there an area that excites you the most or is there an area that makes you a little more skeptical that most common?
[00:13:49] I go back to one thing that then kind of mentioned early on it’s about reliability, right. And trust. And I think that the beverage portion
[00:13:56] Ben Larson: of the industry.
[00:13:59] Bryan Fields: Is it [00:14:00] like 30, 40%? Like you see what the vape pen industry is because the technology to infuse canabinoids into a beverage and make it taste well.
[00:14:09] Cause I mean, CBD is very bitter tea. She’s very bitter, right? Getting these two to seamlessly, be soluble in a beverage consistently. From a manufacturing perspective is not easy, right? Like that’s why the technology for TOSA has it’s special. Right. And I think that early on, there was a lot of companies that kind of gave it the good old college
[00:14:29] Ben Larson: try.
[00:14:30] Bryan Fields: And, and you got some of these beverages that were very weird. If you poured them into just a glass right there. It looked like he mixed all of oil with water and it was kind of funny. It wasn’t consistent, maybe dosages wasn’t wasn’t proper across the, across the, the can from like an imagination standpoint.
[00:14:48] So like, how did you tackle a lot of those kinds of stigmas and make sure that you guys were the most reliable
[00:14:55] Ben Larson: technology on the. Yeah. You know, part of it is just good luck and [00:15:00] timing, to be honest, like I, I, you know, I, I was running the incubator. I saw it when constellation put the $4 billion chip on, on canopy growth.
[00:15:09] I knew Abu they, they were purchased for a very large sum of money by, by constellation. And I mean, can it be, and I saw a lot of the new, like entrance into this space and I just knew the technology wasn’t there. And so. Harold had been coming around the incubator. He had liked sat in on some of our free sessions and all that kind of stuff.
[00:15:29] And then he approached me one day and he’s just like, here’s my background. I want to get involved in the space. I really compelled to like, make a difference here. Like how can I help? Like what can I do? And I’m like, wait, what’s your background. And I’m like, here’s what you do. Make a prototype that can disperse into water and be completely stable and, you know, clear and flavorless would be ideal the ideal, but I know that’s hard and he came back probably, you know, he would touch base, but like, With the prototype in hand with [00:16:00] it within six months.
[00:16:01] And I remember the night, like clear as day I was, I was sitting at port workspaces in Oakland. It’s a coworking space. I was doing a session for founder Institute, like coaching, a bunch of other early stage founders. And then Harold, like Ben, I brought it and like I sat down with him and it was. Went straight tunnel vision.
[00:16:18] It was me, Harold and the shot. And then there was just a bunch of noise of people, like all around us for the rest of the night. But I’m like, I poured it in a glass of water and it just completely dispersed. And I was like, wow, that’s pretty cool. And I drank it and I started feeling it. And I was like, I just asked him at that moment, like, Harold, I think you have something.
[00:16:34] I have a lot of questions, but my main question is, do you want to sell this technology or do you want to create a company? And he responded with the ladder. And so I basically, it was just like, We’re good. We’re going to do this. And, and, you know, in my entrepreneurial brain, I was like, okay, we just need to make the set scale and get it into everything.
[00:16:54] And that’ll be awesome. Fortunately, unfortunately, right. Like it would have been great if. You know, [00:17:00] Craig gallons upon gallons of this stuff and just put it in everything and everyone’s high and happy. It wasn’t that easy, but if it were that easy, we probably wouldn’t have a company because then, you know, anyone else could probably stumble along upon it and do it.
[00:17:11] And so now I’m at a point and I’ve been talking long enough. I don’t know if I actually answered your question.
[00:17:20] On the story though.
[00:17:25] Bryan Fields: I want to dive into some of the formulation because I’ve got endless questions and I’ve tried to limit them to a few that I think are our most kind of Highland. Does the entourage effect play a role in the beverage, exact one that you can kind of share some,
[00:17:37] Ben Larson: some insight on, oh man.
[00:17:39] Yeah, we are. We’re digging into this big time and yes, it can. It’s the question is how, and, and when you ingest something, there are many different pathways that the cannabinoids can take. And so we, we kind of boil it down to like two different components. One is like, [00:18:00] Pharmacokinetics, like how are certain drugs going into the system and what percentage is getting into the system and what have you.
[00:18:08] And then there’s there’s this other concept of like, what is happening to the compounds themselves and how are they changing as they go through the system? And, and, and so that’s what we’re evaluating in the lab right now is like, if we take something in a gummy form versus a beverage form distillate versus our emotion system, What are those different levels you’re achieving, you know, in the simplest, the simplest one to explain is a TAC.
[00:18:32] Like everyone knows that or not everyone, but most people listening to this podcast probably know that it turns to like a different compound. You know, the, the, you know, there’s a lot of hydroxy. You’re right. There you go. 11 hydroxy, man. I don’t know what’s going on with the brain today. So what happens with turpines when you consume them?
[00:18:51] And when we started asking that question, actually, because we all, like, turpines have a very strong directionality on the product and it’s like, what happens to a terpene when you [00:19:00] ignite it and consume it in the lungs? What happens to a terpene when you consume it? Like what receptors are processing these turpines and what’s causing that directionality and you ask the terpene experts.
[00:19:12] And they don’t know. And so, so we’re, we’re, we’re, we’re like trying to wrap our brain around right now. It’s like, okay, we know that we can influence the absorption of like compounds directly into the bloodstream without getting, you know, metabolized by the liver. Right. And so it’s like, okay, how does that change the profile that you’re actually consuming at the end of the day, we do know we can create differentiated effects.
[00:19:35] And so what we’re trying to do is put real science behind. Creating those cannabinoid and terpene in flavonoid profiles and then understanding what are those different forms that they take depending on the, the consumption method? So yeah, I mean, look, the, the, the long, the short, which I should have probably started with the, the short story.
[00:19:56] You know, the edibles of old used to get heavily [00:20:00] processed by the body in and largely stripped out so that it was a pretty kind of, you know, similar experience across the different types of products you consumed nowadays, you can get a very differentiated effect. And what I’m excited for is actually leaning into that.
[00:20:15] And frankly, working away, even from just this, like, I just want to put cannabinoids flavor lists into kind of a light seltzer. Like those are great. They have their place. We work with. I really excited about taking like these full spectrum extractions and building like flavor profiles around them and celebrating the plant and the experience that comes from it.
[00:20:37] Because my vision of the future for, for TOSA is yes, we want to create ingredients for everything infused, but I want to define the experience that is attributed to a certain brand because I think that’s the true opportunity with cannabis is that it has this dimension, that alcoholics. And I know people say, oh, whiskey, like, you know, whiskey drunk as much [00:21:00] different than tequila, drunk and wine drunk and all this stuff.
[00:21:02] And it’s like, yeah, there’s maybe some truth. But not as much truth as with cannabis, because with cannabis, you’re talking about like a ton of active compounds here and the entourage effect really does come into play the police into Appalachian as well, too, which I know is a big, big thing up in
[00:21:18] Bryan Fields: Northern California, those Appalachians and the fine wine, right.
[00:21:23] Champagne.
[00:21:25] Ben Larson: Oh, yeah. And I’m probably about 30 minutes out, outside of Napa. So it’s like, I spent a lot of time up there. I also love wine. But the, the there’s a strong cannabis community up there, and they’re really excited about building the cannabis brand of Napa. For all that Napa is known for, for wine.
[00:21:43] Very little of that wine is actually produced in Napa it’s the branding, right? And so the same can happen with cannabis and, and they know that certain players definitely know that I’ve been talking to Stephanie. Hoenig quite a bit from Hoenig winery. She’s also doing distribution for R and D C, which is the second largest beverage [00:22:00] distributor or alcohol and spirits distributor.
[00:22:02] And she’s also the president of the Napa valley cannabis association. So. So, all right. There’s some interesting crossover that’s really starting to happen here. Yeah. And it’s like, and then going full circle. And I just laugh when, when people say, oh, but it’s only 2% of the market. It’s like have some vision people
[00:22:24] Bryan Fields: I want to stay with the entourage effect because I’m really fascinated with this whole concept. So there are different kinds of combinations of the minor cannabinoids with certain turpines that you found can kind of lead to certain feelings. Can you kind of share more details? That.
[00:22:38] Ben Larson: Yeah. It’s you know, there’s infinite possibilities and yeah.
[00:22:42] At a certain point you get down to this granularity is like, is there really a difference by like, I’ll tell you a lot. Like, I do a lot of product testing for science, of course. For science But last night, you know, I just took one of our TCV emulsions. Right. And I’m like, oh, I actually haven’t experimented much with, with, with TCV [00:23:00] and lo and behold, like it was a nice, mild high, like I still got a bunch of work done.
[00:23:06] I wasn’t sleepy. It was just, it was an elevated feeling. And I never got the munchies and I’m, I, I almost without fail when I take our TFC emotion, like get the munchies. And I was like, oh my God, the hype is real. Yeah. Skinny weed. I was like, oh my God. And then, and then my mind starts going crazy about like all the like product development opportunities, which is really a shame because we’re never going to launch our own product, but.
[00:23:31] I just like, pass that on to like, you know, the, the different companies we work with. I’m like, oh God, like here’s I have a lot of ideas. Just take it and run with it, please. So I can stop thinking about it. So that’s just like, that’s one cannabinoid. Right? And so what we’re doing for kind of like the more, the more enlightened impact, actually, we’re actually working with Dr.
[00:23:48] Ethan Russo from credo right now to really develop some frankly like literature. Formulations. And then going to funnel that through to kind of the work that we’re doing with our, our [00:24:00] pharmaceutical lab to really understand, like how do those formulations then end up in the blood and can we like detect what all these different cannabinoids are doing in blood?
[00:24:08] And then of course the third leg of the stool is like the, the consumer impact, like, Hey, is it a differentiated experience? Which we’ve anecdotally been able to prove that we can achieve, but B is like, you know, are we getting to like 80% confidence on a certain. You know, effect, right. Because we all know everyone’s, you know, ECS is so different and like how people process these things are, are very different.
[00:24:31] But if we can get to like an 80% confidence on a particular application, like for me, that that looks like success. Right. And so. Yeah. It’s you know, turpines that are also super fascinating. You know, I, I mentioned the uncertainty about turpines, but what I am searching about is their impact. And like, we we did a project with Humphrey Slocombe in San Francisco where we did a CBD and turpines in an ice cream and it was.
[00:24:58] To successful because you know, like [00:25:00] California just passed AB 45. We didn’t have like a structured, like CBD market. And so it was like, you know, Humphreys local, it was like leading it. It’s like, okay, well, we’ll take a little bit of risk. And immediately after launching their first like CBD ice cream, like all these news articles came out about like, oh, finally, an adult ice cream.
[00:25:16] And I’m like, no, don’t say that. And it’s like, but people like, I tried it, you know, you, you consume it. You add lemonade to an ice cream with that has CBD. And all of a sudden it’s like this relaxing and very bright feeling effect where all of a sudden, like you look outside of the sun’s brighter, the clouds are more defined.
[00:25:35] And this is like, it’s like, yeah, I feel good. This is, this is a good ice cream. And so like, that’s just scratching the surface. Like there’s so much to explore and, and, and frankly for, and you can tell my mind jumps around all over the place. This industry is so great for people that are hyper curious and just eternal students, because there’s so much we don’t know.
[00:25:54] And as soon as we’re comfortable recognizing that that’s like a, that’s where the trust is built. And B that’s [00:26:00] where the opportunity lies, because like we can just keep digging and finding white space and creating blue oceans. And yeah, this is cannabis has become my forever home that I never.
[00:26:10] Anticipated being here. So feel super grateful to have had found this path for myself. There’s so much
[00:26:16] Bryan Fields: still to uncover, right? There’s like from the beverage side, there’s two different sides. You’ve got the psychoactive side, but then you almost have like the non-psychoactive side. We can talk about recovery, the sleep based ones, like fresh that are looking for, let’s say Gatorade, competitor.
[00:26:29] I mean, one like that could be a massive, massive undertaking. So do you see. I’d say big alcohol and Coca-Cola and all those big beverage companies looking to migrate into the space slowly over time. Or do you think this will be one of those where they’re going to like, Hey, we’re going to stay away. The cannabinoid industry.
[00:26:46] It’s a whole nother world. What’s your thoughts on.
[00:26:48] Ben Larson: You know, we’re, we’re seeing you know, part of the pun, but like the full spectrum. Right. You know, we see people jumping right in, we’re working with Pabst blue ribbon, you know, they’re, they’re putting their full weight behind it and they’re actually, they’re really in love [00:27:00] with the products, like truly do, do love them.
[00:27:02] We see others like. You know, Boston, beer companies saying, okay, we’re going to get in, but we’re only going to get in, in Canada because that’s where it’s federally illegal. And then once it’s legal in the U S then we’ll, we’ll migrate down. So that’s their comfortability. And then we see others like, you know, Coke, right?
[00:27:17] Like investing money into Tilray or, or, or something that that’s their comfortability. And so we see the full spectrum. I think it’s a little bit of both fast and slow on both sides. Right. When I say. They will all move fast. Once that gate drops and they’ll move fast with a lot of money and there’s going to be a ton of consolidation.
[00:27:39] And so all these brands doing the hard work there’s there’s two main goals. Yeah, I get the customer base, get them loyal, like can, has done a really great job at getting a loyal following and really doing what they’re exceptional at actually is, is kind of their product rollout. Just this constant release of cool new products.
[00:27:58] Cool new flavors. So [00:28:00] like kudos to them for doing that. The other aspect, which they do have to still worry about is like lasting long enough. We don’t know in federal legalization as is going to happen. We don’t know when that consolidation is going to happen. I mean, sure. There’s always opportunities to do kind of a midterm exit if that’s what you want to do.
[00:28:18] But I think, you know, everyone has this vision of like, okay, eventually we’re going to reach legalization. We’re a little bit ahead of the game, but w you know, we’re going to get that first mover advantage. And then we’re going to be boom at the top of the list for when the big dogs come in. And the question is, are you gonna be able to last that long or are you going to have to kind of like sell earlier to a medium sized dog?
[00:28:39] And so it is fun to know that we’re kind of like periodically adopting new big brands into the space and they’re seeing their, you know, their, their colleagues get in. And so they’re getting hungry. And so we’re working with a number of big brands, whether. THC or CBD and just kind of seeing that map of comfortability, but it is getting stronger and [00:29:00] stronger as time goes on.
[00:29:01] I think federal banking will be a boon to the industry and seeing some of these rights come in in so
[00:29:08] Bryan Fields: many ways. So I want to kind of stay with there where you’re talking about Cannes and the rollout of new products. You know, from a timeline cycle, obviously you can’t give us like an exact cause there’s too many variables, but is there a ballpark?
[00:29:19] If someone says, Hey Ben, I’ve got this incredible idea. I want to roll out this type of beverage. Is there an estimated time that you can share with our listeners? Just so they can get a ballpark on what it looks like?
[00:29:29] Ben Larson: Look, we’ve brought products to market in six weeks soup to nuts. So it can be done very quickly.
[00:29:34] We’ve also worked on products that took 18 months, and really there’s so many nuances like you mentioned, but it comes down to you as the, as the product owner. How picky are you going to be on flavors? Like, right. Like beyond flavors, it’s building partnerships with manufacturers. I mean, it is very rare now for someone to come in and do all the work, you know, on their own.
[00:29:58] And so short of doing that, [00:30:00] you just have to find the right partners. We, we make it really easy. We have the ingredients ready to go. We’ve tested a bunch of different formats. And then we have the partners on the co-packing side, depending on what market we’re in. And so we can help connect those dots and really speed it along.
[00:30:12] And now that we’ve worked with. Several hundred different skews and product types. We can help kind of troubleshoot very quickly if not get a ride on the first try. So it’s pretty quick, you just have to come ready. And I think a lot of the biggest limitations for people are often capital. So if you’re a fresh startup, hoping to raise, just know that it’s a very noisy market right now.
[00:30:35] There’s a lot of people launching and a lot of people. Are getting more and more sophisticated or have more and more capital, so you can have to bring more to the table. But yeah, it’s a, it’s an exciting category. Definitely
[00:30:45] Bryan Fields: want to continue on the beverage. But before we kind of go there for a little farther, is there any other categories that Victosa plays really well into that?
[00:30:52] You’re really excited that for the.
[00:30:54] Ben Larson: Yeah. So, so going back to it only being two to 3%, you know, that that’s tough to build a large [00:31:00] scalable business around when you’re like 2% of that final cost. Right. And so we were doing all right with beverage, but we, we set our sights on making other edibles great.
[00:31:10] And we saw a big opportunity with gummies, which is the number one product in the ingestibles category. And so we. Focused hard last year on creating an ingredient that will improve the experience with the gummy and have seen really good traction in it this year. And so taking those gummy experiences and making you feel it within the first 10 to 20 minutes and really getting that peak experience, you know, within the first at 30 to 45 minutes and it’s game changing, our whole team is super passionate about beverage.
[00:31:41] But our chief innovation officer Austin. Who has a, let’s just call it close relationship with the plant, you know, loves smoking. His new favorite product is not the beverage. It’s actually these fast acting dummies and it almost changes the consumption pattern for guns which the brands are going to love this, right?
[00:31:57] Like you can actually consume, you know, [00:32:00] 1, 2, 3 gummies in circuit instead of like having. Two guests, like how much gummy you want to have for the next like six hours. Right. And so it’s been great for sleep too. I use cannabis a lot for sleep and it was hard for me to find the exact dose without, you know, the one that would get me to sleep at the right time, keep me asleep and then like not leave me groggy in the morning and this helps it because the faster you absorb it, the faster your body’s processing it.
[00:32:27] And so, you know, I can now take a gummy closer to. It puts me right to sleep. I sleep. And then I wake up, you know, bright-eyed and bushy tailed and ready to hit the day. And I can do that, you know, five, six in the morning. So it’s pretty, game-changing, I’m excited for it to catch on. We have some customers that are just going, going, going bonkers with sales right now.
[00:32:46] So I excited for what that means. And now. Killing dive
[00:32:50] Bryan Fields: into that a little bit. Talk about the importance of the fast acting edibles. Obviously we’ve had conversations with others. Who’ve had an off-putting experience. Maybe they tried an edible in college, which is obviously not the same as [00:33:00] illegal rec market, or they’ve kind of dabbled a little bit more recently now.
[00:33:03] So the importance of trying a product like an edible and in having them feel the effects pretty quickly, I think it’s important from a consumption standpoint, but I also think it’s an it’s important from like a cultural stigma standpoint, because like early on in Colorado edibles came out and. The dosage.
[00:33:20] Wasn’t exactly what the packaging said. And you have, I think we already talked about it previously is, is when you consume, say THC, the liver processes into a different molecule.
[00:33:31] Ben Larson: And so that’s
[00:33:31] Bryan Fields: where the law. Time, it takes to actually feel an edible who really comes from, and so 11 hydroxy is more potent than normal Delta nine THC.
[00:33:41] Right. Which then is going to create a more intense feeling from a consumer standpoint. And so if you’re looking for. Consumer adoption of a product, or just trying to change the cultural stigma associated with cannabis. Right? That is something that’s very, very, it’s a hard hill to climb. Right. And [00:34:00] being able to work through those things.
[00:34:02] So by increasing its bioavailability, which is probably where the decreased onset period is coming from, right. Is actually, you’re now absorbing Delta nine. THC. I don’t think to the.
[00:34:12] Ben Larson: Science that Tosta is employing, but I’d imagine it has something
[00:34:16] Bryan Fields: to do with increase in bioavailability. And so then you’re going to have a more
[00:34:19] Ben Larson: enjoyable experience from a consumer standpoint.
[00:34:22] Bryan Fields: Right. And it’s gonna set on quicker. So like, they’re going to be able to figure out where they’re happy places from a, from an experience standpoint. And that’s going to just overall help with the
[00:34:33] Ben Larson: cultural stigma and all these other aspects of cannabis that
[00:34:37] Bryan Fields: need to occur in order to keep driving federal legalization.
[00:34:41] Ben Larson: At least in my opinion, no. Yeah, you’re absolutely right. You hit the nail on the head. It’s controlling those curves of those metabolites is kind of like what we’re really focusing on now. Like what do we, what can we do with the con the carrier oils, like long chain versus medium chain, like including other excipients that, you know, [00:35:00] Influence dazzle dilation, or kind of the sensitivity of receptors, or, you know, just really digging into the nerdy side of, of the ingredient and, and seeing how we can manipulate it.
[00:35:11] But we, we are looking at curves where it’s like, oh, you know, this particular ingredient. Has very low little 11 hydroxy. Like it’s like this little blip on the curve where you have these other, you know, dislet based products where that curve just keeps climbing and over a long period of time. And you can then correlate that to the experience that the is having, because we’re doing.
[00:35:34] You know, it’s I’ve sat in rooms probably, I guess five times now where like I have needles in my arm for like eight hours, like pulling blood periodically. It’s it’s not always the most comfortable, but you know, again for science. And at least you get to be high
[00:35:55] I will say I did learn that my blood pressure tends to drop while I’m under the influence. And it’s [00:36:00] kind of hard to find my veins, like how far this industry has come in the last 30 years. It’s amazing. It’s and like I said, it’s so much fun and you know, we’re, we’re starting to find, you know, our contemporaries throughout the industry.
[00:36:13] Also really care. Also really curious in about an hour from now, I’m going to be popping on with a Dr. Jay Hahn, Marco. Who’s got a PhD in the ECS and just kind of like, yeah, super awesome. To constantly like ping these great minds that just started thinking of it. And it’s like, oh, coalescing into an acceleration of knowledge.
[00:36:32] Every time we get a new data set and not only do we get to kind of get the information we need and the reason why we have it. Pull that data and cross compared to all the other previous data sets we have and like, what else are we learning here? How does body weight, how does, you know, male versus female?
[00:36:47] Like what are the different impacts that affect your experience in consuming cannabis? Because I think that’s the hardest thing with cannabis is like, you know, the inconsistency of experience between person to person or [00:37:00] even within oneself. Day-to-day. You know, fed or not fed you know, these, these are all important questions and they all influence your, your relationship with the plant and its driving purpose personal.
[00:37:12] That’s right
[00:37:13] Bryan Fields: with the diet influence that if you have, let’s say a very heavy carb, is there a certain type of food category you would say, Hey, this might enhance, or this might reduce that you found in your research.
[00:37:22] Ben Larson: There’s another number of them and they all influence it. So, so yeah, everything, you know, fatty acids.
[00:37:28] You know, if eating fish like could increase your absorption, especially depending on the type of ingredient that you’re consuming. Right. Caffeine sugars, like these are, these are all different things, you know, more than anything, just making sure that your. Stomach and digestive system is activated. And then when you’re putting ingredients in there, all the, the acids are ready to break down the compounds that you’re putting in and absorb into the bloodstream.
[00:37:54] And so if your body’s already activated, like warmed up, you know, like a car, right? Like, and then you can like, you know, jam on the [00:38:00] gas and get the cannabinoids in there. And I think people would be surprised at the difference. I think we’re preparing an IRB study right now that will actually speak directly to that.
[00:38:11] What does facet versus fed look like? And I think it was like a two to four X different sometimes on the absorption level. Right. Yeah, so it’s pretty crazy. So like, I know people often will like, they’ll look, they’ll blame the product, right? Like, oh, last time I had this product, I hardly felt anything. And this time I was like, oh, it’s an inconsistent product.
[00:38:32] I mean, chances are, it could probably be an inconsistent product based on where we’re at in the industry and testing requirements and all that kind of stuff. But yeah, in all likelihood it could be you too. Consider that,
[00:38:44] Bryan Fields: that’s why I wanted you to share that because I think sometimes people forget that the inconsistence would be on an internal side and their diet plays such a big factor into what goes on for that experience.
[00:38:54] And not just to blame the pro product short and easy scapegoat and likely one that could be causing issue, [00:39:00] but more than likely if you bought it from a certain location, it could be internal basis. And that’s where I advise people to start taking more counsel. What goes on prior to when they’re kind of experiencing the.
[00:39:10] Ben Larson: Yeah. And super non-scientific and just my own, like personal anecdote. Let me caveat this, that with this like I’ve heard people describe TC as an, like an amplifier, right? Like you apply like TAC to a certain minor cannabinoid. It’s going to amplify the effect of that minor. I also find TNC to be kind of an amplifier of where, like where I’m at psychologically, personally, right?
[00:39:33] Like if I’ve been working hard all week and I’m worn down, but. Allowed myself to be convinced that I’m tired. I consume THC is going to rip away those inhibitors and all of a sudden aren’t going to be, aren’t going to be tired and I’m going to go take a nap. And I’m like, oh, I might blame the TAC for be like, oh, it just made me sleepy.
[00:39:52] I don’t like that experience. But I could take the same product if I’m out in Vegas and at the tables and I take. It’s not going make me asleep. Like [00:40:00] I’m going to be in a great mood. I’m going to be social and going be gambling. And then I’m going to go to the hotel room and go to sleep, which is a beautiful, like, I mean, that’s a beautiful side effect, but yeah, I, I think, you know, in ways THC can just be an amplifier for our internal voice telling us what we need in that moment.
[00:40:15] Right. And now I’m going to start sounding like a hippie, but like, we need to listen to the plant and listen to ourselves and take those moments to just be like, you know, what’s my body.
[00:40:24] Bryan Fields: Okay. Since you’ve been in the cannabinoid industry, what has been the biggest misconception
[00:40:31] Ben Larson: that we’re all rich?
[00:40:35] Yeah. Yeah. The green rush. Yeah. We’re all like, you know, just minting money, you know, all that nonsense. Like this is a hyper inefficient industry. It’s irrational. We’re all putting in the work based on a perceived a potential. And if you’re getting into this industry just now, because you think it’s a green restaurant, it’s a way to make money and don’t get me wrong.
[00:40:58] There’s some people mint money. [00:41:00] But on the whole it’s hard and it takes a lot of work and you got to care. And that’s why, you know, from day one, I realized like to be an entrepreneur in this space, you’re an advocate you’re involved in politics. Like you’re doing all these things that you didn’t realize you’d have to do.
[00:41:15] It becomes all encompassing. It becomes your life because I have. Because it requires that much time, but it’s all totally worth it. Don’t get me wrong. Like on paper, like, you know, I have a lot of wealth. It’s just, it’s not, it’s not for reading it to cash because you know, like there, we have a long ways to go still.
[00:41:32] And that’s the biggest misconception. The other thing is just that it’s far more complicated than anyone realizes. So you can say that from a multitude of different perspectives, but from like the outside, like if you’re a consumer looking into the industry, like just even asking my wife. She’ll like, hold up a product.
[00:41:48] She’s like can I have this? I’m like, sure. It’s CBD. She’s like, it’s going to get me a high I’m like, I’m like, I have failed you. I, I I’ve I’ve I’ve, I’ve been in this industry for six years now. How do you not know [00:42:00] the difference? And this is like, she’s like, no, well, I know that. Do you, and like, I get super judgy, which is probably not good for our marriage, but, you know, it’s like, it’s so complicated.
[00:42:08] And then we now we’re in this realm of like people just trying to survive. And I rail on these people. And I’m probably about to, when I, when I record my podcast about like, you know, this gray area of like chemically synthesized cannabinoids coming from the hemp plant and it’s muddying the waters and people.
[00:42:24] I about to drop an F bomb, but like people are going to get more and more confused. And the people we don’t want to get confused are the regulators and the FDA, because when they get confused, they overcorrect and cast down rules and it’s going to hit us like a ton of bricks. And I don’t want that to happen.
[00:42:41] I have a little bit of a pessimistic. I think it’s my, my survival mode as an entrepreneur. Yeah, I just encouraging people to stop adding confusion. I didn’t know if killing.
[00:42:52] Bryan Fields: Do you want it to chime in there? I know that is a, I know, I know the pessimistic card for
[00:42:57] Ben Larson: sure. And I mean, I’m very frustrated with the [00:43:00] whole synthetic cannabinoid industry, if you will.
[00:43:03] I mean, Delt eight now, Delta 10 and then
[00:43:06] Bryan Fields: science. And like what it
[00:43:08] Ben Larson: takes to make like a synthetic pharmaceutical. It’s just like, and
[00:43:12] Bryan Fields: then you see that it’s just flooding the market. It’s like the facilities that need to be utilized to produce a
[00:43:17] Ben Larson: pure
[00:43:18] Bryan Fields: synthetic compound are not facilities that are doing it on the internet and you can get high.
[00:43:24] Yeah.
[00:43:25] Ben Larson: It’s totally illegal.
[00:43:31] Oh, my God do not get me going. I I’m just, you know, for those of us been operating in the, in the licensed legal market, it is just very disconcerting because I got to hear these talking points. It’s like, oh, it’s creating access. Or it’s more affordable for the patients that can’t afford the legal market.
[00:43:49] I’m like, yeah. Well, come expend your effort on trying to make it more affordable in the legal market. Like that’s what success looks. Like God would play the long game because we’ve been playing the long game for [00:44:00] decades. We can’t put all that hard work at risk because you need to make a buck to keep your business alive.
[00:44:07] Bryan Fields: Before we do predictions, gas, all of our guests. If you could sum up your experience into a main takeaway or lesson learned to pass onto the next generation,
[00:44:16] Ben Larson: what would it be? Oh man, that’s a good question. I always encourage people. And you can do this with a com well, you have to do this with a company, but I encourage people to do it for themselves.
[00:44:27] And that’s truly to define your foundation in, in business. We call it a brand foundation. So like, what is your mission? Like what is, what is the thing that’s going to motivate you and motivate the people around you to keep coming back. And that vision is not, you know, revenue driven. It’s not inspiring.
[00:44:44] It is inspiring, but not for most people. It’s not. It’s not what gets you through the hard times. You need to like, define what will get you through the hard times that you’re going to keep fighting for no matter what. And then like, what’s your big, hairy, audacious goal? Like, what are you going to, like, how are you going to blow people away and truly create an [00:45:00] impact, you know, put that dent in the universe and like, you know, just change how things are done.
[00:45:06] Like have a vision, like take all the information out there. We have the opportunity to create this industry, to create the future it’s in your hands. Like you really can create anything. Like beverages was hardly a thing when we launched the company, but we knew that we would get refrigerators into every dispensary.
[00:45:23] We knew it would be a category and we just had to fight like hell to make it happen. You know, create your habits. Like what are you going to do every day? That, regardless of whether you remember what your vision is or your, your Beehag like, what habits can you create every day that are going to lead you to success?
[00:45:38] Like, how are you going to get it done? Like values? Right. I mentioned trust, like, have values. That actually means something like, you know, respect and honor and all this stuff, like all these, like, you know, just things that people pull off other people’s boards and I put it on and then put definitions behind and then never look at it.
[00:45:54] Like it’s all bullshit, like come out with things that will truly make a difference in define you as a, as a [00:46:00] person in a company. Right? So for us, it started with trust. That was our entire first year. Now we have three and the other two are our leadership and community. So every decision we make, every decision we make falls in line with building trust, being leaders in the space and building up the community.
[00:46:18] If we’re doing something outside the bounds of that, then. And then, then there’s a bunch of other details I could get into there, but like you do that for yourself and for your company, think it makes actually life a lot easier because it makes making decisions easier. And then lo and behold, you know, three years later, all of a sudden you have a company that has a really deep culture and you stand for something and it’s unique.
[00:46:41] And so like again, company or for yourself do that. And it’ll, it’ll help you kind of get to where you need to go. Beautiful.
[00:46:49] Bryan Fields: All right. It’s prediction. According to the Brightfield group, the THC infused beverage category will account for $1 billion in us sales by 2025. [00:47:00] The hard seltzer category is estimated to be closer to 30 billion by 2025.
[00:47:06] Then what advancements changes or breakthrough needs to happen to have the infused beverage numbers closer to the
[00:47:13] Ben Larson: hard seltzer cross state commerce. Beverage in general is a volume. And so everything that you see in the mainstream markets is, is based on volume, whether it’s manufacturing, distribution, retail, like think of how much shelf space a beverage gets in a grocery store, we are afforded any of those and we’re still making it happen.
[00:47:34] Right. And so the first one would be cost a commerce simply because manufacturing in general is highly specialized in beverage. Like in Oakland, in the mainstream market, there is a beverage co-packer down the street. All they do is nitro cold brew in cans for a bunch of other brands. It’s not like it’s one brand that produces this for themselves.
[00:47:54] They’ve built their entire business off doing that for other brands in cannabis folks like space station and [00:48:00] Tinley and whomever else, they, they have to do everything. They have to code switch from coffee to wine, to beer, four ounce cans, eight ounce cans, 750 milliliter bottles. And like, that’s just not done in the mainstream world.
[00:48:12] It’s it’s just too much. It’s too. Building those deficiencies will allow things to get to scale and get them out into people’s purview. And so I don’t think we’re going to get cross state broads, broad sweeping cross state commerce. You know, as a result of like a federal legalization effort, we will see it go like from state to state or region.
[00:48:30] Based on kind of like the negotiations we see going right now, like Oregon, Mike was the first one to propose it. And I think it makes sense. And, you know, so we’re, we’re focused on making sure that we’re active in all these hubs that we perceive to pop up. I mean, you know, I don’t think I’ll give away any secrets by saying, you know, like, think about, you know, Midwest east coast, west coast, like those are the things that will kind of like start to, to build up.
[00:48:57] That might be tipping our hat to a little bit to kind of our [00:49:00] strategy, you know, other than that consumption lounges and this where I’m looking at New York, I mean like you guys like the nightlife capital of the world, like it’s going to happen there and the conversation already happened. And the reason being is because discovery is an important part of beverage sharing as an important part of beverage and experimenting and, and a consumption lounge that is designed properly will allow that to happen.
[00:49:20] And, you know, I think we’ve been trying to. Evolve consumption lounges out of like an initial effort here in California. And it’s just, it’s very there was a lot of friction, but I think New York has an opportunity to build it from the ground up the way that they know how to do it. And I’m, I’m excited for that.
[00:49:36] Bryan Fields: Tell him before you’d go. Ben, do you think we’ll have bars having both alcohol and infused beverages?
[00:49:43] Ben Larson: I think that’s going to be a long time. That’s a tough chasm to cross. I think we might get there after I see a low dose beverage in a liquor store, convenience store, and frankly, it’s tough. Well, you know, you talked about competition in the past or, you know, I love the fact that I [00:50:00] can put a nice base layer of an infusion in me and then go out and consume alcohol and only have two or three drinks and be totally.
[00:50:07] Because that was not my practice, you know, coming out of college. I’ll I’ll tell you that much. Yeah. So it’s but you know, yeah. One can hope one can all back in the, the election year, I was making a name for myself for making terrible predictions in the right direction, luckily. And so I’m just gonna like, go back to that practice would be like, we’re never going to see it.
[00:50:24] And then I’d be pleasantly surprised, you know, in 2031 now. Callan your
[00:50:29] Bryan Fields: thoughts on the advancements to get the categories closer together. And I mean, it has to be interstate commerce and like
[00:50:35] Ben Larson: the hub and spoke model, because I mean, one of the most challenging things about the beverage market is the cost of a camp.
[00:50:42] You know what I mean?
[00:50:42] Bryan Fields: And that cost is only so high because of the inefficiencies in the manufacturing process, because. It’s the economy of scales when it comes
[00:50:50] Ben Larson: to beverages, right? Like
[00:50:52] Bryan Fields: Coca-Cola, doesn’t have a factory in every state. They can Coca-Cola right. Like, that’s just not how that works. It’s not how they make money.
[00:50:58] You know, they have a [00:51:00] bottling plant, they have
[00:51:01] Ben Larson: manufacturers all of the Coca Cola for say. The east
[00:51:06] Bryan Fields: coast or the Southeast or whatever. So I think it’s gotta be interstate commerce to facilitate like the
[00:51:12] Ben Larson: traditional hub and spoke model from a supply chain perspective. So
[00:51:15] Bryan Fields: it’s the obvious answer, right? I think it’s the only thing that really
[00:51:19] Ben Larson: helps drive costs down personally.
[00:51:21] Yeah. I think another component that you could throw in there is like DSD, just like a direct distribution into like into this in the retailers. Especially in California and likely soon to be New York, like space limited. Right. And no one has room for pallets in the back of their dispensary. And so if you were able to create a hub and spoke model, like smoking, like Todd was mentioning then you could have like, you know, beverage.
[00:51:50] Going around to a bunch of dispensaries going in facing the shelves. Like you see this in a grocery store. I don’t know if anyone’s accidentally walked up to someone like facing like an alcohol shelf and then I’d be like, oh, sorry. Like, [00:52:00] I don’t actually work here. I’m just the beverage guy. And I’m like, oh, okay.
[00:52:03] It’s like, we need that in cannabis. Because like, people don’t want to store pallets of like 10 different types of. In, in their back room because they don’t have room. And the argument again, that you always hear is like, oh, why would I do that? If baby carts are only this small and only take up this much space, like, that’s the constant argument that we’re fighting for.
[00:52:20] So if we, we break down these barriers again, from my manufacturing, all the way to the customer is how it has to happen. So like, you know, distribution, manufacturing at scale, like that’s the first key step, but immediately after that, we’ll move to kind of breaking down those barriers to the region.
[00:52:36] Bryan Fields: I wonder if some of the scientific advancements from a research standpoint can play a big difference.
[00:52:40] If people find out they can be good for sleep, they can be good for social effects. They can be good for recovery, but you can also it’s replacement for alcohol, which for me, as soon as the marketing slogan of no more hangover, that was it for me, where, where I can take that and replace that forever, because like that was like the worst feeling in the entire world.
[00:52:57] And then I wonder to myself, like, sure, I had a great time, but [00:53:00] like, I feel absolutely miserable for the next four days. And having an infused beverage would help me replace that. How the two categories get closer together. You’re right. From a distribution standpoint, we need economies of scale. Also. They don’t make 30 racks right back in college days, you can grab like a 30 pack of bud light.
[00:53:15] You’re not grabbing a 30 pack of like 10 or 11. I mean, I couldn’t, you’ll be broke
[00:53:25] that weekend people, when they, when they go into the dispensers and they make that, that individual product selection, a lot of them, they do compare the cannabinoids, right. So they can get a hundred milligrams. In an edible where a bag of animals versus a couple different tans. They’re more likely to grab that.
[00:53:42] So maybe over time they advanced with the go, but I definitely see those numbers getting closer together as we get farther out. But obviously we’ve got tons of hurdles and tons of obstacles to kind of get there. Yeah.
[00:53:53] Ben Larson: I mean, the, the interesting aspect, because you are comparing it across categories, right?
[00:53:57] And so you have these products that are. [00:54:00] Seven 50 on the shelf where I can tell you that the active ingredient might be 10 cents. And so all those efficiencies that we’re talking about, building out the manufacturing and distribution scale, that’s, what’s going to drive down that unit cost. And then you can have multi-packs that are digestible from a, from a purchasing standpoint.
[00:54:20] Of course, there’s always regulations that we have to deal with. Like Canada. They can only have like 10 milligrams. In a single like, package. Right. And so it was like, there will be no such thing as like a six pack, I guess, unless it’s like a milligram and a half is my math. Right. That was pretty close. So yeah, it’s like the most, you’re like doing a mil, a milligram and a half, like in, in each can, like, you’re not going to have a multipack coming out of Canada unless you change the regulations.
[00:54:48] Bryan Fields: So Ben, for those who want to get in touch, they want to learn more. Where can
[00:54:51] Ben Larson: they reach you? Website is Virtusa that’s V as in Victor, E R T O S a.com. And then I guess on the socials I’m [00:55:00] Mr. Ben Larson. So
[00:55:01] Bryan Fields: I’m the podcast.
[00:55:03] Ben Larson: And the podcast. Yeah. Tune in subscribe, rate, review, you know, all that kind of stuff.
[00:55:08] MJ today, you know, we cover the news on a weekly basis and you don’t have to listen to my voice every week, which is a benefit. So
[00:55:16] Bryan Fields: thanks so much for taking the time then.
[00:55:18] Ben Larson: Absolutely. Brian Kellen. It’s it’s been awesome talking to you guys. I look forward to chatting again.
