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How does a tweet become a community of Cannabis minded individuals seeking to help grow and advance diversity?
Today, Bryan and Kellan speak with Martine Francis Pierre, a growth and content marketing strategist who became the founder of Cannalution with one tweet.
Martine Francis Pierre is here to disrupt the industry in a meaningful way.
Featured in today’s episode:
- How Martine is creating a community of shared resources
- Identifying the needs and wants of a community building around that
- Helping people of color break through into the cannabis industry
- Representation for the people who are not being represented in Cannabis
- Support Black and Brown Entrepreneurs
[00:00:00] Bryan Fields: This is the dime, dive into the cannabis and hemp industry through trends, insights, predictions, and tangents. What’s up guys. Welcome back to the episode of the dime as always. I’ve got my right hand, man. I wouldn’t sitting here with me and this week we’ve got a very special guest Martine Pierre Martine.
[00:00:20] Thanks for taking the time. How are you doing today?
[00:00:24] Martine Pierre: I’m joined as a GM, but.
[00:00:30] Kellan Finney: In the wild, just watching the weeds change, starting to change out here in Colorado. It’s like summer sober here comes fall, but it’s beautiful,
[00:00:39] Bryan Fields: really negative style introductions. So we’ll have to turn that around and bring it in today. So my team for our listeners, I think it’d be great for them to get a little backstory about.
[00:00:51] Martine Pierre: My name is Martine. I am a patient descent. My family is from Haiti and Dominican Republic from Miami. I have my MBA. I am a marketer [00:01:00] by trade. I’ve been in the digital marketing realm since I would say about 2012. I’m old G here. So I actually was going to be a lawyer. I was going to go to law school. I graduated with my bachelor’s in philosophy and I got an internship with DHS and I said, oh my God, I hate lawyers because I worked with them and I was like, they’re miserable.
[00:01:24] I don’t want this. So I took like a year off. I traveled a little bit. Actually I quit my job and I went to alcohol. Like I had a mad, crazy, I had like a mad, crazy break down when I was like 26. I was like, you know what, forget this job. And I quit. And I went straight to Africa. It was literally like a one-way ticket.
[00:01:43] And I went to Egypt and I was like, you know what, I’m going to go have fun somewhere else. That’s very, very hard. And like figure out my life. So by the time I came back in my MBA program, I graduated in my MBA program. And then I got my start in a yachting firm. [00:02:00] So I was working with a yachting firm in Fort Lauderdale, my favorite family over there and love them.
[00:02:06] Shout out to y’all that’s my para Heiner things in life. Mind you like? So, cause that was done, their social media marketing, and that was when their digital marketing in general. So I would go on trips then I will be able to go to my favorite place that I went to was probably Grenada. I was doing a campaign with the Grenada Torres.
[00:02:29] For their yacht show. Cause most places have like yacht shows. People will work in a yacht industry. Like they literally live the life. They have the easiest six-figure job ever, because all they do is go to cocktail parties and chase people for jobs. And it was really dealt for the time being and basketball or to 20 to 2020, I’m saying.
[00:02:51] I literally like, which is how most people I meet. I haven’t squeaked go viral because of my experience [00:03:00] working in the cannabis industry as marketer. Like I got a gig while I was working in the industry because I wanted to get my foot into the cannabis. I always want it to be in the cannabis space.
[00:03:09] Didn’t know how to get there. So I had a friend of mine introduced me to the bags out and post a mess up, needed somebody to do their social media marketing. And I didn’t get tired of Milan. I’m like, know what? Let me just charge Bina just so I can get the gig and really understand and learn what’s going on in this.
[00:03:25] So when I started to get my third, now I’m like, wait a minute. There’s no women. I’m like, well, you know, black people like what’s going on here. And I started doing more research online. And I felt like I kept falling into this rabbit hole of information about cannabis and cannabis businesses. Cause there’s like, no, if you go on, if you will, will, then you go on YouTube.
[00:03:48] You will literally have a overload of information when it comes to the cannabis industry, because there’s so much outdated information on the internet right now. So I told [00:04:00] myself as I was like, I want to help more black men and women get into the cannabis space. So I just tweeted it out. I was like, yo, like, Hey, I want to create a slack community and shared resources.
[00:04:11] And the information that I learned about cannabis during my time to help. I’m thinking only two or three people aren’t going to respond. And I said over 4,000 retweets, I had 2000 responses, many of those responses who were from people inside of the cannabis industry already and saying, Hey, how can we help you with this initiative to move forward?
[00:04:35] So, you know, we started with a tweet and now we’re here. Literally 10 months later, we have an MVP. We have a wait list of almost 4,000 people, which to me is in Spain because that’s pretty much how it blew up in angel list. They blew up because they built their community before they built the platform.
[00:04:56] So the cool thing about having this wait list was I was able to [00:05:00] do surveys. So I built my Emmy around my. And the people who were telling me what they needed and what they wanted and what they did not. And that’s how we ended up building the NVP. So we here now, you know, we want to tell us some points, Hey, but we’re just here to make that introductions to the world.
[00:05:20] And another really dope thing that I realized was I wasn’t just getting messages from people here, black and brown people here in the United. I was getting messages from people from South Africa, people from Germany, I was getting messages from black and brown people in London, in the UK. I was getting messages from people in the Soto.
[00:05:40] I was nearly getting messages from people at Columbia, meaning this is not just United States issue. It’s a global issue that black and brown people are having a hard time getting space. So that right there just validated the entire concept and validated this company.
[00:05:57] Bryan Fields: I think it’s an incredible story.
[00:05:58] And I love when you [00:06:00] focus on building the community first and building the product around the community with their needs, based on the data, I think that’s so valuable. And before we kind of dive into there, I want to come back to that first thought process, right? Stand out between things, start to go viral things, get addict, and she’ll kind of quickly, right?
[00:06:16] You’re like, what is that? Is there, is there a part of you that’s going through this wondering, like, am I diving into cannabis right now? Take us through the thought process when you’re kind of deliberating whether or not I’m going to do cannabis. So I’m just kind of passing.
[00:06:27] Martine Pierre: Oh my God. So let me say, I would have to, right.
[00:06:29] So after the tweet went viral, I started having, I literally had people in my opinions like, Hey, we’ll help you build this. Like, what do you need us to do? I had so many people in my DM and like, I was overwhelmed. That’s why I was like, oh my God, I still have to keep up this momentum. This is my chance. So I created the landing page.
[00:06:48] I’m a marketer. I created the landing page and I’m like, Hey, don’t DM me no more. Cause I ain’t going to read it. You want to join the [00:07:00] platform don’t Hinson for the list. So that’s how I started building my wait list. And then I would keep people. And then, so right after that, my brother I’ve met this. My co-founder.
[00:07:12] I actually met her at the conference. It was called the boss conference in 2019, my brother, unbeknownst. She was a speaker. She, the funding expert and she’s helped women raise over 4 million. I did not know her at the time, but my brother kept telling me for weeks like, Hey, I have a client. I want you to meet.
[00:07:30] She lives here. I think you guys would mesh well. She’s had the same vision that you ended up being. Who was at the conference. So as soon as that went viral, I a, her and I was like I think I’m ready to now to build this cannabis company that I’ve been talking about 7 20, 19. I literally act. And I was like, yo, like what’s up with the funding.
[00:07:52] It’s almost a million dollars to get this. And it is just so crazy the evolution of what I wanted [00:08:00] in the cannabis industry, because I want it to be the hot bar. I went the dispensary and, you know, growing and all that other stuff. But as I started learning, I’m like, oh, it’s not, there’s no money
[00:08:08] Bryan Fields: in this.
[00:08:09] The gain is expensive. Dame is so expensive. And I think people sometimes forget just how, how expensive it is. And I, and I love your approach. It seems like the stars started to align and you just kind of took the path and I’d give you a ton of props for kind of going with it because it’s a challenging moment.
[00:08:24] Sometimes people see that opportunity and they’re like, now’s not the right time, but you dove right in. And I’m excited to kind of dive into it so bad. So Nate
[00:08:32] Martine Pierre: and Ellucian, so I was sitting down with her and she’s like, what do you want to do? And so she was like, all right, let’s do a brain dump. So I literally did a brain dump with her.
[00:08:42] And mind you I’ve always wanted to. I’m always had an idea of light, tandem and shit, but it was going to be a website. Never did it, but you know, when I sat down, I was like, you know, this is a, these are the things I want to do. So I did an entire brain dump and I mean, I brain dumped everything in my mind since 2016.
[00:08:57] Cause that’s when I really wanted to get into the. [00:09:00] After that she looked back at me and she was like, since I think you have a billion dollar idea here, and I was like, wait a minute, say it again.
[00:09:10] And so she’s like, what would you want to call this? And I was like, I feel like this is a revolution. So Jen Aleutian, like we’re here to revolutionize the industry because the way I tell her, no, I’m not here to pioneer this industry. I always tell people that I’m not here to pioneer, I’m here to disrupt, which is a big key difference.
[00:09:30] This Russian means like you coming up and then shaking the whole table. And I come in to shake the table. And to me there’s a fundamental difference being an app because. I cannot be at the mercy of Facebook, Facebook deletes cannabis companies every single day. I mean, truly, literally just have their Instagram.
[00:09:51] They’re deleting people back and forth. And I was like, you know what? We can’t be at the mercy of Facebook. We got to have an app. Like we have to own our ID. We have [00:10:00] to own our data. We have to be the ones that own this platform 100%, because that’s going to be the only way that we make a difference and an impact on a global scale.
[00:10:11] Bryan Fields: So sneak peak, tell us like what what’s in the inside, kind of how it works, what it looks like. I know it’s not really step. Maybe just kind of like a little peek behind.
[00:10:21] Martine Pierre: No. Absolutely. So basically the way that I ran it, it was as a digital age HBC meal. So we’re paying homage to HBCU historical black colleges, because I think it’s really important to make that distinction and I, and as much allies as we have, I really wanted people to understand like, Hey though, I’m building this in an HBC manner.
[00:10:42] That does not mean that I realize are not invited to the. I forgot look out, but just know this is the problem that I’m solving and I’m representing these people because they are not represented right now. You can still come in apart. It’s enough room for all of us. So the app [00:11:00] is basically an HBC UW-Stout digital type of app.
[00:11:03] So what you can think of. Okay. Peak masterclass, but candidates. That’s the best explanation that I can give you think masterclass with cannabis. But the best feature that we have is that we have a voice feature. We are currently building where it will be different auditoriums and people can go into these auditoriums and we will have live sessions because to me, it’s one thing to, I have an MBA.
[00:11:29] I think the way that teaching goes on right now is. I think universities are going to die. People are going to be tired of paying hundreds of thousands of dollars every single year to get a piece of paper and go out into the job. That’s going to pay them $15 an hour. They’re going to want to take the easy route.
[00:11:46] So the way we built 10 Ellucian was one to make it affordable. You have to build a brand, right? You have to have mass people on here to keep the price low, because I started looking at the price ranges and minds like [00:12:00] somebody other than. I’m looking at Oaksterdam, I’m looking at high time, but I’m looking at her and I’m looking at all of these different cannabis companies that are also media companies, but I’m like, okay, how are we going to do this?
[00:12:12] We’re going to do this by gaining media, but media content that is educational. And it’s in a storytelling manner because I think having someone who’s an expert, I have my MBA and I will be 100% honest, majority of the things that I learned on the street, I still utilize. In marketing versus the things that I learned in school, because a lot of the things that you learn in school get outdated.
[00:12:37] So it’s a yearly subscription business model. You’ll be able to pay for it on a yearly. And that’s only the premium side because we also have the premium side where you’ll be able to enter. With people live. So if you really think about it, it’s kind of like a cannabis with cannabis education, but [00:13:00] also a mess because we have an entire premium content force that goes from financial literacy, talking about stocks because not everybody should be a business owner.
[00:13:08] Like. I don’t think everybody’s gonna be a business owner and some people don’t go that damn well, they don’t need to be, especially in canvas. So, you know, I still feel like it will still shouldn’t be left out in this industry because I think you can build generational wealth for black families. And we know how big the wealth gap is.
[00:13:27] So we also want to show people like, Hey, you can be buying stocks right now. And in 10 years possibly be a million. Because you’re constantly putting this money into these cannabis stocks right now. They’re dirt cheap. They are dirt cheap. So it’s all about teaching people like, Hey, there’s so many different ways that you can get into the industry and it doesn’t have to be the dispensary.
[00:13:52] I’m trying to get people out of that mindset that you need to own a dispensary or the grower’s license in order for you to make money. And the reality [00:14:00] is your ancillary business might be. Before this, these MSLs, cause let’s keep it 100. Most of them are going to be bought out by
[00:14:08] Kellan Finney: your barrier to entry is lot smaller too.
[00:14:10] As an ancillary company, that’s not touching the plant. You get to play real business gains versus the amount of red tape. And, and other regulations you have to deal with from an operator perspective is it’s insane.
[00:14:20] Bryan Fields: It’s crazy, right? Like the whole, the whole concept too. And like as, as the industry kind of unfold, more and more people are like, you’re saying, you know, are very interested in being cannabis.
[00:14:29] And the first thing everyone always says, at least to. Oh, Brian, I want to own a dispensary or O’Brien like, I’ve grown weed in college. Like, can you get me growing up? And it’s like, that’s great dude. But like, it’s very different and I’m sorry, I don’t think you’re going to put that as like a resume builder.
[00:14:43] We knew that, and there are so many other opportunities to get involved in this space, right? It is not that one. I love that you focused on education because I couldn’t agree more first from an outside industry standpoint, I’m with you a hundred percent, right? Universities, that whole standpoint, very, very different.
[00:14:58] My MBA was a very different [00:15:00] style MBA. It was completely online and it was taught different style and not by traditional teachers because I’m with you. I hate, I hate the traditional standpoint of sitting. It annoys me to no end plus I’m a contrarian. I like to always push on the other sides of it. I don’t really like to hear that
[00:15:18] Martine Pierre: it’s
[00:15:19] Bryan Fields: actionable. It’s actionable, right? You’re teaching actions ways to actually implement these concepts, not like, Hey, like this is the way we taught it in 1933, we know the world has changed and we know you have a calculator now.
[00:15:33] Martine Pierre: That’s why we did the yearly subscription too, because the reality is cannabis is going to be changing every single day. It’s changing every single day now. And over the next few years, it’s going to continue to change and you’re going to need new information. You’re not going to get that new information from a course that somebody did five years ago, and this.
[00:15:55] When I look at how so many different educators are teaching about this, I [00:16:00] feel like it needs to be taught differently. People want to connect with other people. People relate to stories. People relate to founders who have a story to tell. And I think it’s so important for people to hear from people who are already in the industry.
[00:16:15] Why do I want someone to teach me who has zero experience and what I am trying to do? So that’s why, when I thought about how we’re going to create the content, I was like, I do not want to do the traditional style of academia because
[00:16:33] Bryan Fields: yeah. And those SAS models, man, those multiples of those SAS, SAS companies sell far.
[00:16:37] It’s hard not to bring that up because those multiples are white to beautiful. So Carolyn, I want to bring in from your standpoint, cause we always, always, always talk about education, right? Martina has taken a massive undertaking by simplifying this into an app and trying to educate that because the masses they need so much.
[00:16:53] So from an educational standard, Where would you even start? I mean,
[00:16:58] Kellan Finney: when I first got in the industry, it was such a [00:17:00] challenge from like a scientific perspective because there was this blackout of scientific research in the U S right. So you didn’t really have any like primary literature to go off of.
[00:17:09] And then like the other side of that coin was I could then go to industry. Right. And I’m literally sitting on Instagram or some of these blogs where I’m just like trying to figure out who is actually telling the truth or who’s making things up. Right. So there’s no like peer vetted information out there, which was a nightmare.
[00:17:27] So then at the end of the day, I was just like, all right, well, I’ll just go try this and see what happens. Right. And like, that’s just so counterproductive in terms of trying to run an economically viable business. Right. You’re just like, oh, I’ll just go waste a bunch of money and see if this guy that.
[00:17:41] Befriended on Instagram was actually telling the truth or doc, right? So like this type of product is needed. Not only in retail, not only in cultivation now, but it’s in every single aspect of the entire supply chain. Right. I mean, you can all have like the quote unquote really, really good growers are people who [00:18:00] went and worked for someone who’d been doing it for 20, 30 years.
[00:18:02] Right. And so like the same goes with, with the, the, the extraction portion of it. And the marketing portion is brand new. Right. 20 years ago. Probably not significant cannabis marketing going on. Right. No packaging or branding or anything like that. And so like that is a completely new, fresh plate that people are trying to figure out what to put on and what, what tastes good and what works.
[00:18:26] Right. And so I think that at the end of the day, like the education is absolutely the most important aspect. And I mean, the universities can’t touch it right now because it’s technically federally illegal. And so you’ve created this situation. It’s really challenging for operators to find qualified individuals.
[00:18:45] And then once they do find someone who’s passionate and intelligent, okay. Now you’re going to face this steep hill where they’re going. It’s going to have to go figure it out on their own. I think there’s not this like baseline of like courses and all these other things. And I think we were [00:19:00] talking about, on another episode, we were talking about like CPAs, right?
[00:19:03] And like how they have to go get accredited and they take classes like you guys are both have your MBA. You had to go take a class and get like a stamp on a piece of paper that says, like, I checked these boxes, but doesn’t exist for the cannabis industry. And I mean, perfect examples, like bud tenders at a retail level.
[00:19:17] Right. You could go to four different dispensaries and talked to four different bud tenders. You could get four different stories about a strain and the different turpines and, and how that’s going to interact with your body. And it’s like, none of them were doctors and they’re all just kind of going off of anecdotal evidence.
[00:19:31] And so being able to standardize the information transfer across. These different sectors in the supply chain is going to just be one of the most important things. I think for the industry to a curve, the cultural stigma be helped solidify and standardize the process across the country and across the world.
[00:19:50] Really. So I think it’s, it’s an unbelievable idea. I do think it is a billion dollar idea.
[00:19:56] Martine Pierre: Thank you. But beyond that, like another thing, like [00:20:00] a key point that I also tell people about can allusion to it. So we, we finally got like our first brand partner. That was another way that I validated my idea too, because I started getting all these Ms.
[00:20:11] Founders like big Ms. Old founders. I’m talking about the top tier one coming into my DMS, like, Hey, what are you working on?
[00:20:20] Validated and we scored a brand partnership like that, which we have four more potential brand partnerships pending, and we haven’t even launched. So that tells you how Game-changing this can be as long as we have the right people who are on our team, we have the right people who are our allies, of course, because the thing that I wanted to enter, what I told these MSO executives was, look, you guys have all the resources and the money, and I’m sorry to say this.
[00:20:51] Just like everybody else. Social equity for a lot of people is not working it, is leaving a lot of people out. So you guys are the [00:21:00] change that needs to be. In order for things to really be changed. You guys are the ones who can make things different because you have the resources, you have the funding to do it.
[00:21:12] So another thing that we’re doing at illusion is everybody who goes through our, you become a subscriber, you become a member. We want to eventually during phase two, take on people who are in the legacy market and build that bridge for them between the MSOE, because that’s not even built cheap partnerships.
[00:21:30] To me, MSL should be going to people. When I tell you like the coolest thing about going viral was that had so many people sending me free stuff.
[00:21:41] I had like guy who sent me this amazing infuse hot sauce. He had a limited pepper sauce. And then he had another like Chile, he thought that he makes use and he’s in Orlando. And I was like, these are the type of people that MSLs should be. [00:22:00] These are the type of people you guys should be creating brands.
[00:22:04] Because they can take the company to a whole another level because you can take his recipe, you know, as your, the razzle-dazzle to make sure that it’s legal for the MDA and create a partnership that’s going to change somebody’s life. And also put some points in both people’s pockets. Let’s keep it 100
[00:22:20] Bryan Fields: consumers, right?
[00:22:23] Martine Pierre: These are the people that we should be serving. These are the. They bring so much to the table. They bring fresh idea, the new things that you just never really thought about. So one of the things that I told these MSLs was like, I was like, Hey, you guys can not only provide your resources because I don’t want to just take a check from you.
[00:22:42] You guys can come in and you guys to mentor ourselves, you guys can come in and say, We probably invested into this stuff because it’s going to be some of those people. And, and the thing about building a community is, is that community finds community. So can you imagine how many co-founders [00:23:00] can be created within the app?
[00:23:02] End up getting funding and then becomes another unicorn. It’s a domino effect But it has to start somewhere. So just having the support of people in the industry, having the support of people who wanted this, like I said, like my, my customers found me. I didn’t find them. And that was like the easiest thing ever for me, because I did not have to do the work.
[00:23:25] And then they built the product. Because they told me what they wanted. A lot of companies don’t listen to their consumers. Your consumers can literally be telling you, here’s what I think you should change. And a lot of companies won’t even look at that. Like, how are you going to evolve? And the way that I look at the industry we’re moving from.
[00:23:46] Because when I, even, when I look at some of the weed, like, I don’t know what is a sativa. Sometimes I can’t tell the difference in time. And most people, they do not care about that. They just want to know how high they’re going to get, but we’re going to be moving [00:24:00] away from that really grower style type of language for products into a more customer centric type of market for cannabis, because most customers are not savvy.
[00:24:11] They don’t know what’s hurting. I didn’t know until this year, like, you know, I’m still learning myself. There’s a lot of things that people don’t know when it comes to the science of cannabis. You don’t even know that they have an endocannabinoid system. The
[00:24:27] Bryan Fields: learning curve is so much, especially here from like an east coast standpoint.
[00:24:30] I mean, we are so far behind just from an educational standpoint. And I want to go back to one of the things you said, because I think it’s so, so powerful. The app creating the safe Haven between the legacy operators and like the MSO is there is such an important vehicle that’s not discussed enough because the people that help keep this industry going when it is illegal, like some of them are still hesitant to come back out.
[00:24:52] Right? Like, they’re not sure if things are going to become an issue, if they’re going to get raided. I mean, some of the stories we’ve been told, it makes sense why they’re not [00:25:00] trusting of the situation now because their entire life they’ve been kind of more of into not trusting situations around. Having that kind of like seat Haven where they can feel like protected enough, where they can feel trust, which is the most important part.
[00:25:14] I think in building relationships is that trust aspect and helping them kind of connect with zipper operators because. Why would these MSOE not gobble up these, these individuals who have all this experience or else they have to go find some classically trained chef and be like, Hey, you have to cook with this ingredient.
[00:25:31] Now I know this other guy has done it for 25 years, but we can’t get him to leave
[00:25:34] Martine Pierre: his house. It’s dumb. Like, why would you go backwards? I don’t believe in reinventing the wheel. Everything that’s already here has already been done. Like, you know, I don’t believe in being vented. Well, why would I go. And hire somebody who has no experience in doing this.
[00:25:50] When you literally have people who are in the legacy market, that you can be talking to creating different partnerships with, like let’s really consider how much [00:26:00] the cannabis industry is going to be worth. I mean, I’ve heard people saying that it might be worth a trillion dollars. There’s enough money to go around.
[00:26:07] There’s enough, this crazy
[00:26:08] Bryan Fields: it’s crazy money. So let’s, let’s kind of dive into like, I know no single day is ever the same in the cannabis industry and especially with the route you’re taking. So if you had to give us kind of like a sneak peek of what an average day is like for you, Martine, can you kind of share what that would be?
[00:26:26] Martine Pierre: I’m normally up between like four 30 in the morning and five meditate. I do my whole journaling being definitely got it. Cause I keep your mind right during the pandemic, like, I mean the pandemic all day, you know, I do my normal meditation, my gratitude, all that good stuff. Then I hit the gym moment more.
[00:26:50] You join.
[00:26:57] I definitely like hybrids. I’m a high bid [00:27:00] girl. Loved the dream. There’s the, I’m definitely a hybrid girl, but I like, I like having my point in the morning before I go to the gym, it gives me the extra force
[00:27:11] and then I come home and then I get right to work by 10. I don’t like starting work before 10, my yachting, that meat into that because. Who wants to work before 10:00 AM. I’m not even out of bed by seven. And she said that and I was like, oh my God, that’s not what my company be. I don’t want my people’s work in that damn earth.
[00:27:37] And you know, even when I think about cannabis, people are acting like, do you want to have a headquarters? Do you want to do this? And I’m like, Campbell only meets eight times a year. Why can’t we be? Tandler like, we’re digital, we’re virtual. Why in the extra money?
[00:27:53] Bryan Fields: So take us through like the role with Ellucian.
[00:27:55] Like what, what what’s, you’re going through now? Like, what are your priorities? Like how does, [00:28:00]
[00:28:00] Martine Pierre: so right now, like my biggest priority is definitely raising the rest of these funds so that we can fully launch the. In a meaningful way. Like I said, I’m a marketer, so, and I’m not trying to about the perfect product because I know it will never be perfect.
[00:28:16] Right. But I want to make sure that I found that one shot, you know, cause people are like when they hyped up about something and the crazy thing is it’s been a year since we went viral. Right. Been a year since we went by. We’re still keeping up the momentum and it’s like, I can’t put out some minor and people are like, this is what she had is waiting for a year,
[00:28:42] but the momentum and I felt like I had to create strategic partnerships with people who are already in the. Because these are the people who are giving me intros. These are the people who are telling me like, Hey, you know, I think you should really talk to this person because I think they’ll be really good to do this for you.
[00:28:57] Or I think you should really talk to this person. And [00:29:00] because I’m big on ownership, I’m all about making sure that people have equity. I made sure like the, one of the first things, when I sat down with my managing partner, I was like, We have to take out at least 15 to 20% of equity for employees, because I think happy employees are what makes companies run well, and I want the company to run well.
[00:29:20] So I want to make sure that we’ll have an insensitive to make sure it runs well. So definitely want to make sure that employees are going to have equity within the company. And they’re going to have some type of ownership too. I definitely want to make sure that people are going to be comfortable working with.
[00:29:35] It’s all about me also reading a lot. I’ve been reading so much about leadership. This is my first rodeo. Like, I don’t know nothing about being a startup founder. You know what I’m saying? So I’m just sitting here absorbing as much information that I can, so that one, I meant to be prepared to take on the actions of a company.
[00:29:56] That’s going to be a billion dollar company. Right. But also [00:30:00] to be able to deal with the pressures of everyday. Because at the end of the day, I’m still human. Shareholders, don’t give a damn better, get up girl and do what you gotta do. So I had to prepare myself and so this entire time I’m in the gym, I’m working now.
[00:30:15] I’m getting my body. Right. I’m getting my mind. Right. And yeah, so I can come and disrupt.
[00:30:21] Bryan Fields: So let’s continue on that. Linus of marketing
[00:30:27] Martine Pierre: from my boss and yachting. So
[00:30:31] Bryan Fields: all the listeners just cause I didn’t give any context, I just went for it. Can you give the listeners like where, where that is and how that applies to you?
[00:30:37] So
[00:30:38] Martine Pierre: my boss, I love her so much. My boss is literally like one of those 55 of people and she know that I wanted to do be in the cannabis industry. And like one day she was sitting in bed in the kitchen because I was. That’s how cool it was. I was literally working at my boss’s house. I’ve never worked inside of a regular office.
[00:30:56] So I’m inside of the kitchen, you know, eating the puffy Duravit as usual. [00:31:00] And she come to me, she asked me to say, because I guess she thought something I CNN in about student loans. How are you ever going to pay your student loans? I was like, I’m going to be a millionaire one day. I was like, I’m going to pay it in one lump sum because I’m not going to say, oh, Sam is not going to make me not have sleep at night for low student loans because they can take the piece of paper right back in that case, I was like, I’m just going to pay them one lump sum.
[00:31:24] And that’s when she started laughing and talking to me, she was like, she’s like, you know, you’re like the liners of nodding because you know, you’re so young, you’re fresh and like, Kinda like the line. And then I went and I bought the domain and then went and bought the domain for as a marketing domain for line Linus the cannabis.
[00:31:47] But I was like, you know what? I like collecting domain. So I’m going to keep doing this.
[00:31:51] Bryan Fields: There’s nothing better than collecting domains in the night. This is perfect. I’m just going to sit on this for a while.
[00:31:56] Martine Pierre: Listen, I’m about to have, get up on my renew. I got[00:32:00]
[00:32:06] an idea. That’s the first thing I say, but somebody’s not going to get me domain because it did become, they going to be tired of me $5,000 business domain instead of the 12. So let me go and get it right now. And that’s literally what I did. I mean, like, cause I kept posting about joints and mimosas and I seen so many girls kept saying, oh my God, can I join me?
[00:32:31] Cause like every Sunday, me and my sister like smoked joints and like drink mimosas. That’s what we do
[00:32:40] in mimosas.com. And I’m like,
[00:32:45] Bryan Fields: sign me up. Hopefully that’ll be gender.
[00:32:51] Maybe not a mimosa, but definitely the joint in the morning.
[00:32:57] Have you ever,[00:33:00]
[00:33:01] Martine Pierre: you ever had a watermelon mimosa or no? I could do
[00:33:06] Bryan Fields: the pineapple one, the watermelon I’d be very interested in trying
[00:33:09] Martine Pierre: a good watermelon cause I’m a brunch person. There’s like such a good watermelon mimosas that people make and they make it like with fresh water, men and juice.
[00:33:19] Bryan Fields: Yeah, that sounds great. I love this story about the, the domains.
[00:33:22] I can’t tell you how many times, and I hope it’s less than 10. Just thinking out loud where I go out. I have conversations with friends and I wake up the next morning and it’d be like, where’s all these receipts from GoDaddy about like, what did, what did I do? And it’s like, oh no. So I did take those steps on that conversation.
[00:33:39] Like I said, I would because you’re right. Like in those moments when you’re having those conversations and you’re like, I’m not forgetting about this one and you just stack it up in the. And their ideas for another
[00:33:47] Martine Pierre: exactly. Cause you may not have the points now, but the coins might come later. So you’re like, all right, I’m going to tap back into this one day and you
[00:33:55] Bryan Fields: can sell that concept here, investors, like I’ve got 47 other ideas ready to go.[00:34:00]
[00:34:00] Are you ready to hear
[00:34:01] Martine Pierre: them? And it’s funny because like, I was one of those people, like I’m always, and my boyfriend always laughs at me because he’s like, like sometimes I get into this space where I will literally sit in front of my room. Like my, my boyfriend, my sister’s boyfriend told me. He was like, I think you can do time because she was like, I know you can do.
[00:34:20] I think he can do time because the way you sit inside of your room, you never come out. Not even. And we’ll, you can definitely do some time. Literally. I literally be like in the solitary confinement, a little mastermind, because I don’t know. I have sometimes when I’m really excited about something, I will.
[00:34:41] Over it for at least a week. And then I sit in my room, like a little evil genius, like Kanye until like I get out of my system. Like I gotta write down. Then I kind of do the research and then I got to make sure that I connect the research to the Google doc. And then I got shared with whoever I think I know could make me make this work.
[00:34:59] That’s [00:35:00] just how I am not always been like.
[00:35:04] Bryan Fields: I love it. I respect the process too. Very, very similar in that style. And you got to go for it, right? And like everyone has their own and you gotta go from there. So the slightly switched gears, I was listening to a podcast with, to hear Johnson, cannabis, diversity report, who will definitely be on our podcast.
[00:35:19] Coming up, shout out that here you dropped a really valuable tidbit, but I want to kind of bring up and get you to expand on your. You discussed burner and cookies and the importance of building personal brand around the company. Can you kind of dive into that?
[00:35:33] Martine Pierre: Absolutely. So I feel like the most successful entrepreneurs of our time.
[00:35:39] Also have personal brands. If you look at Elon Musk, if you look at Steve jobs, if you look at all these, I mean, mine is kind of like always there, but if you look at majority of the people who are really successful, they have a personal brand. And the reality is, unfortunately, even [00:36:00] though most people don’t want, like, I don’t want to be the face of Andalusian.
[00:36:02] I always told people that back, but I am the. Whether I want to be, or not because people are familiar with me. So even as I bring on my COO, my CFO and my CTO and all these other people, and they’re going to interact with them too, but they’re always going to revert back to me because they know Ken Aleutian through Martine.
[00:36:23] They know what I’m doing because of Martine. So I think when you’re building, when you look at cookies, cookies is not necessarily popular because it’s something that is. I would say, you know, it’s not popular because it’s something that’s oh my God. Out of the world, it’s probably because their person that created his popular, he has an amazing personal brand.
[00:36:42] And then beyond building that personal brand, he built an amazing company brand. Everywhere you go, when you see that little C you know what it is, You so building out. That’s why I always tell a lot of people. I spent like my first angel [00:37:00] investor, my mommy, my mom gave me $15,000 and I also had about $50,000 saved of my accounts.
[00:37:07] And I was like, mom, like, I think marijuana is crap, but girl. I think I’m on something. I need a little bit of coins and, you know, that’s just the type of trust that my mom had with me. And she understood my vision when I told her and I sat down and I explained mom’s patient. So I’ve made to her and preop.
[00:37:27] I was like, mom, this is what I want to do. This is what can happen. And this is what I want to do in the future, because in the future, like one of my biggest things is to go back to Haiti and help rebuild. I would love to have him. I think he had been Haiti. What about us to one develop our, GD our economy because let’s keep in 100 word articles.
[00:37:51] Too. It would allow us to help create better infrastructure because when these earthquakes happen, it’s more because the [00:38:00] infrastructure is weak, it’s old, it needs to be rebuilt. And then when you think about him on the environmental level, it can revitalize. In this country. So there’s so many opportunities on a global scale to create generational wealth in cannabis, not just in the United States globally.
[00:38:20] And hopefully one day I can take that back home to my mother’s ancestors land and make sure that these people have means because I put this in place. And we literally, the most amazing thing that I learned about Haiti is that all of the agricultural processes are by women. Women are farming. Women are doing the marketing and women are doing the selling.
[00:38:41] So you have someone going into Haiti. Who’s teaching these women how to grow him, sell him and market him. You’re creating generational wealth for their family for year. And then imagine when exporting and importing, the United States opens up and it also opens up around [00:39:00] the world. Now, Haiti has not. To be importing and exporting.
[00:39:05] I think there’s so much that we can do in this space. And I’m just super excited to just, you know, I need the coins. Of course can’t do it more, but I’m just excited because there’s so many things that I want to do, but yes, building a personal brand in my opinion is super important. When you’re building out a company and building out your company’s brand.
[00:39:27] When you die, you don’t want to meet, like you don’t, you don’t want your company to die with you. So you have to build a strong company brand. Like I spent over $10,000 on my brain for my UX. I did not fuck around with my friends. Like adding up to me about the branding. I was like, everything else, even the goddamn technology.
[00:39:49] Cause you can always speak, but that brand, that logo, they already know. And that’s really important because you have to need that imprint on people’s [00:40:00] minds
[00:40:01] Bryan Fields: and the schwag aspect, right? Like the merchandise B the ability for burner to push that stuff. That’s all so smart. And it’s one of those words, like it’s not a new play, right?
[00:40:10] Like other industries do it. Other other founders are doing, and it’s, it’s a good strategic move. Now, when people are building those. One thing we talked about on this podcast, do brands travel right with the state, the state issues, things like that. People aren’t so familiar with these brands, but cookies, for sure.
[00:40:26] It’s really starting to travel. And it’s one of those where when people see it, they’re like I got to try that product, but some people aren’t even really sure why they’re like, oh, it’s because I got to try it. So Kellen to come back to you. So any of the brands that you can think of this on the scale that are on cookies level
[00:40:41] Kellan Finney: select, I think, but I mean, select was the brand that was acquired for a billion dollars, right?
[00:40:46] Like. The slack brand. And so the only one I could technically probably compare, but at the end of the day, I think that cookies has more of a deeper and [00:41:00] more respect from like the actual candidates community than select us in my personal opinion. I mean, I’m talking to a lot of people from every different state and in every operator in the.
[00:41:14] In the industry and the cannabis industry has a lot of respect for burner has a lot of respect for cookies and they know them. Right. And then select, you kind of get a wishy washy response if you will, from a lot of these operators. And so, yeah, that would be the only other brand I could even think of.
[00:41:30] Right. But like, you talked to a lot of people and like I’m in Colorado and the dispensary I typically go to does not carry. Right. And so cure leaf is not actively pushing their brand in, in Colorado versus, and they have a lot more moving parts if you will. I think it’s really, really smart or burner’s journey doing and turning in terms of just focusing on the brand.
[00:41:51] They don’t do a lot of cultivation themselves. They have a certain procurement team, so they have a quality that, that their partners need to meet, but it frees up resources [00:42:00] for them to do exactly what they’re doing right now versus. Sure leaf has a bazillion different things going on and select is just one of, I think, a dozen different brands they’re currently trying to support across the country.
[00:42:11] And so because of that, there’s so many different needy partments within clearly, if you can see that they’re not just focusing on pushing out one brand, but. That’s the only one maybe wild, right. Actually wild would be the other brand. Now that I’m
[00:42:24] Bryan Fields: thinking about it, they don’t have a face. Like, I think that’s
[00:42:29] Kellan Finney: for sure.
[00:42:30] Hands down the best companies across the country, in my opinion,
[00:42:34] Bryan Fields: I wouldn’t dispute that, but I think it’s the thing. That’s right. And I think Martine, like we were saying, like, you recognize that you have to be the face of it because people are going to associate you with it. So kind of owning that moment, whether or not you want.
[00:42:46] I think it’s really, really special. It isn’t easy, but it is if you can do it right. It is so, so valuable for your company. And I’m excited to kind of see you kind of continue on that path and take those steps.
[00:42:57] Martine Pierre: No, absolutely. I just told myself, I was like, you know what, I’m just [00:43:00] going to be like, beyond. I don’t respond to nothing.
[00:43:02] I don’t get them nothing. I don’t make no comments. We still don’t know what happened in the elevator with the lounge and day. So, you know, that’s,
[00:43:17] when y’all want to talk about cannabis, we want to talk about cannabis. I think a lot of people hate putting their personal brand out there. It is your personal life, but it’s up to you. How much of your personal life you choose to give people? And Beyonce is able, and that’s another thing I told myself, I want to be on to take type of marketing.
[00:43:40] You know, I want the prize album, you drop on them and they just still go crazy type of thing because you can’t. Word of mouth is always going to be the best form of marketing. You cannot buy the type of influence that beyond they have. Beyonce can literally drop something today [00:44:00] and it’s gone and 20 seconds.
[00:44:02] So if you’re able to create a strong brand and a strong personal brand on top of what you already have, the way your company can’t win. Building a strong brand is going to be what separates a lot of cannabis companies moving forward because customers are going to be more familiar. And of course the quality cause I’m sorry, there’s a lot of weed that’s problem that that’s not good.
[00:44:29] Bryan Fields: I think I read one time about Beyonce and I think what she uses, she uses like all three ego and she’d separates herself from Beyonce and she did. She she’s playing Beyonce. Right? So like in those moments where it is hard for her, she understands that she has to play that role. And I think that’s an incredible way of separating the situations because it has to be so, so hard for her.
[00:44:49] Obviously she can’t live like a everyday normal life, SWAT bounds, light the ShopRites, like go get a couple of groceries. That’s not going to happen for
[00:44:55] Martine Pierre: her. No, absolutely. And I’m so grateful that I can, it can happen to [00:45:00] me. I hope so that it can stay, continue to be that way.
[00:45:04] Bryan Fields: Cool. So let’s, let’s slightly switch beers.
[00:45:08] Since you’ve been into the cannabis industry, what is the biggest misconception you’ve exposed?
[00:45:14] Martine Pierre: See the biggest misconception is that it’s easy. That first of all, being is a nightmare. I literally did not put anything Cana in my name of, for the incorporation papers in order for us to get things like banking is a nightmare.
[00:45:29] Like I feel like people think that when you come into this industry, you just go and smoke weed all day with your coworkers and you’re not going to do any work. And like enjoy life. And it’s nowhere near that. Like this industry is 10 times harder than any other industry you’ve ever been with because you not only have the banks against you, you also got the federal government against you and they can come into your spot whenever they feel like it and do what they believe, because technically [00:46:00] we still federally illegal at this moment.
[00:46:03] I think a lot of people don’t think about of the simple fact that weed is illegal at the federal level even though, yes, it is legal in multiple states and it is becoming better, more and more Americans are saying, Hey, we should legalize this thing. But the, the politics of weed, the politics is weed is crazy
[00:46:25] Bryan Fields: stigma, too.
[00:46:26] Right? The stigma of it is too is like, it’s so hard. You can tell people the industry and the app you’re working on, and sometimes you catch somebody in a certain location and their responses. You’re doing what you’re working for. What? Okay. Or are you telling me work
[00:46:41] Kellan Finney: in cannabis? And I get this all the time and they’re like, oh, so how’s grown wheat going.
[00:46:45] And I’m like, I don’t know how to grow weed. You know what I mean? I’m like, I don’t know what to tell you. And they’re like, oh, you don’t just grow weed if you work in the weed
[00:46:53] Bryan Fields: industry to that person. Totally. Right. And the stigma too, of my smoking all day, like. [00:47:00] At a liquor store. People ask you, Hey, did you drink Jack Daniels all day?
[00:47:04] Like, I don’t think people are like 10, if they did. Like, it’s none of their business and
[00:47:09] Martine Pierre: it’s wild to me because I’m like, no, like your generation, we’re going to play loons.
[00:47:22] Come on. We know he was out here tripping on some stuff. Let’s not forget.
[00:47:29] Bryan Fields: It’s one of those. When they make those statements, I feel like what they really want us to be like, you know what? Come in, sit on the couch, let’s talk about it. Tell us everything that’s going on. Right? Like you, I understand. It’s been tough for you.
[00:47:40] You missed the , but like let’s talk about something. All right. Before we do predictions, we ask all of our guests one question. If you could sum up your experience into a main takeaway or lesson learned to pass onto the next generation, what would.
[00:47:57] Martine Pierre: Don’t wait, move go. [00:48:00] Because a lot of times, so many people, if, and then timing is also very important.
[00:48:05] If I would have done Ken Aleutian back in 2016, when I had the idea, even though it was just the website and it was nowhere near as complicated, what we’re doing now. It wouldn’t have been the same as right now. I think what really like made my tweet go viral was because there was so much long gone with the George Floyd being.
[00:48:26] And there was a lot of protest, so a lot of work and, you know, the black community was holding a lot of organization accountable. You need to fix the things that are going on and here is what we’re we need you to do. So I felt like a lot of it was, I wouldn’t even say luck. I would say the perfect timing.
[00:48:46] Sometimes you have to really think about the timing that you’re going to do something, but do it like don’t hesitate. If I hadn’t hesitated that day, when my tweet went viral and I did not take [00:49:00] action and kept that momentum, we would not be sitting here having this company.
[00:49:04] Bryan Fields: A hundred percent agree, and luck can only take you so far and you have to be at the opportunity in order to achieve some four blocks.
[00:49:11] So I think it’s perfectly said, so prediction time, this one is definitely going to be a fun one for Kellan. It is 2025 Martine, which marketing technique is the most popular that in 2021 was completely underutilized. It’s 20, 25, right? What is the best marketing technique out there? And in comparison of it, like, what is it currently
[00:49:37] Martine Pierre: doing right now?
[00:49:38] I think the best marketing in 2025 is going to be cannabis experiences. I think that once we really have things legal, like the activations are going to be crazy, but can cause think about live events, right? Like when we can get back to going into like, People underestimate, like how much [00:50:00] our live events have having a face-to-face conversation with someone versus being on a phone or on social media are two completely different things.
[00:50:07] I always feel like it’s so much easier for me to convince someone when they have a face to the voice. So I think live events and cannabis, tourism, like I feel like companies are going to be pumping helicopter. Into cannabis, tourism and pumping hella cash could think about the hotels. Hotels are going to get a little, they’re going to be like, oh, we’re fortunately friendly now.
[00:50:28] So, you know, the industry are going to be looking like, Hey, can we go ahead and put this in here? And we’ll pay you this here, it’s going to happen. So as things continue to go, I think we’re going to see a lot more advertising in peculiar paces, like hotels. Who knows. Like, I really feel like cannabis, tourism.
[00:50:48] Like I always tell them like, if you’re going to open up something, oh. And up before 20 friendly hotel or something, because the amount of time that I have gone out of town and [00:51:00] smoke in my hotel, it made me mad. So I know so many people would pay. To be in these type of places. So I think that a bit marketing is going to be like the next big thing.
[00:51:15] Maybe before 2025, we’ll see
[00:51:18] Bryan Fields: a little bed breakfast and blend for you. That could be a, might’ve edit that out and go buy that domain before we.
[00:51:27] Kellan Finney: My prediction is this, I think that in 2025 it’s like what, three and a half years away, three years and three months I think there’ll be a more robust, scientific understanding of the effects of different strains. And so I think right now, a lot of the marketing surrounding. Consumer experience based on like specific strains or chemical profiles, doesn’t have a really solid foundation to kind of stand on if you will.
[00:51:52] And so I think that moving forward by that time, that will be a more robust, scientific understanding. I think a lot of big [00:52:00] brands will be able to kind of revisit that topic in terms of trying to market some of their products for specific effect and to factor and consumer experiences, if you will. So that’s
[00:52:11] Bryan Fields: my.
[00:52:13] I’m going to take kind of the theme of the episode and go with the influencer approach. I think in 2025, if Beyonce can be smoking, whatever she’s smoking and people ask her and she’s like, oh, that’s my, that’s my Beyonce, like lunch roll. And people are going to just gobble that up. And everyone who wants to be Beyonce is going to buy those products.
[00:52:33] I mean, do you already see Jay Z kind of doing that with the monogram? I mean, it is beautiful what he’s done and I think. Influencers can really own that product placement in their kind of ecosystem space. I think people are going to flock to them. You see all these influencers to come out with their own products and all they’ve really done is just kind of brand their style on top of a white label product.
[00:52:52] And why would cannabis be any different than that? And you can kind of just envision the future of people posting on Instagram, just a [00:53:00] natural photo of themselves. And with it is like the bluntness.
[00:53:04] Martine Pierre: I think Beyonce has something up her sleeve though, because remember he chief opening up she talked about her usage of CBD during tour.
[00:53:10] And she said, she’s going to have, I think something in something in him, she’s going to have a hip farm in a honey farm because, you know, queen bee, that’s very, that’s her thing. So she’s eventually going to do a, him in a honey farm, but I’m Siri, because I would love to know if she going to have branded products underneath the parent company with her.
[00:53:30] I’m not tall.
[00:53:30] Bryan Fields: Right? It’ll sell like crazy. I mean, she could go with the infused honey. That’d be pretty sick. I mean, that’s an easy one for her, right? Like,
[00:53:39] Martine Pierre: like you, that apps. And
[00:53:42] Bryan Fields: I mean, it’ll be, she probably has like 50 people just stealing ideas and she’s like, Greenlight that no, no, no, that one we need to wait.
[00:53:49] This one’s amazing. Let’s get this one going. I need to try this one, ask the for her,
[00:53:53] Martine Pierre: but it would make sense for the parents, something to pick that up because I mean, I haven’t looked at their deck and like, they talk about rock nation and their partnership with . [00:54:00] So I don’t feel like I know a lot of people don’t pay it.
[00:54:04] I pay attention to the parent company a lot. I pay attention to their influence. They may not be one of the biggest MSLs, but when it comes to cultural influence, like you don’t get bigger than.
[00:54:17] Bryan Fields: No. And the product category they created with like the $50 pre-roll is just people
[00:54:23] Martine Pierre: are buying it. I
[00:54:24] Bryan Fields: have to try that.
[00:54:25] Like, that’s one of those where like, I’ll be just upset with the price, but like, I’ll have to try it one time to see, right. Like I need to see what that’s like. And I’m curious to hear, like, I haven’t seen any people’s reactions to it. I haven’t seen any negative ones, but I’d expect to see more prominently.
[00:54:38] People are sometimes a little more vocal when they have negative sentiment.
[00:54:42] Martine Pierre: But that’s how the industry is going to end up being in the future too. Right? It’s like people are either going to be because that’s how consumers are either. They’re going to be buying the Walgreens of weed or they’re going to be buying the Gucci of weed
[00:54:58] in the middle. You’re not [00:55:00] going to sell unfortunately. And that’s where a brand comes in. Even if it’s in the middle. You got the brand,
[00:55:12] I mean, less people, 100, like, and that’s what, that’s what makes burners. So that’s what makes this company so amazing because even if me, his weed was not the best, you still have the brand. He won’t even know they don’t care. They just want to tell you they smoked. You know, it’s going to be gravy within the next couple of years to see where things go.
[00:55:34] I just really want to see what, like, are we going to be like Amsterdam? And then like Jamaica, like all these places to make an app for Jamaica to become the Amsterdam of the Caribbean. Come on you guys are like the face of weed. When we think of weed, like why are you guys not capitalizing on cannabis, tourism?
[00:55:56] I think the Caribbean is going to really, [00:56:00] really take cannabis tourism to another level. That’s
[00:56:04] Bryan Fields: it’s a great point. Well, we appreciate your time today. So of all of our listeners that want to get in touch, you know, where.
[00:56:09] Martine Pierre: You guys can definitely reach me where I’m most active, which is winter. It’s my first name, Martine Pierre.
[00:56:16] You also can definitely reach me on Instagram, which is my name, Martine practice Pierre. And of course, if you would like to sign up for the waitlist, you can go to Canada. That
[00:56:28] Bryan Fields: will plug all those in the show notes. Thank you so much for your time. Thank
[00:56:32] Martine Pierre: you guys.
