Mara Gordon is exactly what I thought of her, ambitious, someone with a smile on her face leading into her deeply intellectual side and then there is the plant. She sees cannabis as a medical product that has real healing. I would call it agility in the broader scope. Health and wellness needs a place to go within the cannabis dialect. It’s not only recreational cannabis that drives the market. There is real healing taking place here from real medical doctors who are not afraid to buck the tide and create real change away from traditional methods of healing.
I want to share with you someone who has some really fantastic ideas that have taken our collective energy to a higher place in the universe of healing. This is a person who sees a much broader picture in the term “medical cannabis.” Thus, without further delay, may I please introduce you to Mara Gordon.
1st Lady Of The West Coast Is The First Black Woman To Have Her Own Exclusive Strain Line #Flotwckush was created 2016, #DecemberNightsOg created 2018, #BlackGirlMagicOg created 2017. DAWNIELLE WASHINGTON
After writing a couple articles about the legal cannabis business in San Francisco, I was contacted by 1st Lady Of The West Coast. She is (for obvious reasons) not disclosing her name. But that should not preclude me from touting her Old School successes. She had the guts to contact me, that in itself is amazing. I respect her need for privacy and even I don’t know her first, nor her last name. Nor would I ask twice, it’s just not done. ‘Nuff said. So when I was given this honor to tell her story, there wasn’t any hesitation. I needed to do right by the universe, the cannabis family would be proud. And 1st Lady Of The West Coast would have fulfilled her goals. And what would that be? Being the fantastic person she is. I’m honored to be her friend. Thank you for allowing me the honor.
My Cluttered Desk, With my Ghost Vape and Canlock WARREN BOBROW: IPHONE X
The magic of the inter-webs never ceases to amaze me. I had a marvelous discussion with Josh from Ghost Vapes. He took time out of his day to connect via Skype (Thank you!), and to walk me through the operation of my Ghost Vapes MV-1. From the pitch that I received regarding this “Leica Camera” of the luxury cannabis vaporizer market. Why? Because it’s solid in the hand and quite ergonomically capable. It fits against the natural shape of my hand and if I only had a neck-strap, it would fit right in the middle of my chest, rather comfortably I might add! Looking more like a camera spotting scope or a pair of luxury binoculars, than a cannabis vaporizer. Stealthy!
I sat with Kim Rael for a few minutes at the Seed to Sale Show, held up in Boston, a couple days ago. I could immediately see the potential of her company, in between talking about everything else but her company. And then I forgot to give Kim my business card. That’s not like me, sorry Kim! At any rate, I was conversing with Tom Weihmayr of the Toronto Drink Factory about flavors, the potential for flavor driven products like cannabis in beverages and the like. A flash of inspiration put a light bulb into my head, and it led me back into my recent chat with Kim Rael. Why not take this thing called cannabis and spread the philosophy and medicinal benefits around the globe? Why not indeed? Which brings me back to the conversation that enjoyed with Kim. She’s whip smart, that’s immediately obvious, and I saw her mind working, always thinking of the next sentence carefully before putting the words into the air. Kim is a studied business-minded visionary. A deeply pragmatic, highly talented business woman who is a force for change. Becoming CEO of a major corporation in the cannabis field is not usually the role that someone aspires to, especially when it’s so risk filled. After all, there are certain regulations in every state, and of course the Federal Government as a bureaucracy to contend with. And of course the ‘stigma’ which is, quite simply the 900 pound gorilla in the room. That gorilla comes in many formats, be it regulatory, or more simply, the law of the land, or even a disapproving family member. It takes guts to be a success in the cannabis world and Kim Rael is, for all intents and purposes making a massive dent in the veneer of the traditional business model. She is living the experience of a metric-driven entrepreneur, but the successes are far more vital when you are using someone else’s money. Sure it’s cannabis, and this CEO role, running the top of the house is no less important than a Forbes Fifty list member in traditional business. Because traditional business is about to be overtaken by intellectual superiority and women like Kim Rael, who is going to be very well known. I have every anticipation that Azuca and Inventive CBD will become household names before long. They offer the finest culinary products,that are unlike anything else on the market. Culinarians should be equally charmed with Chef Ron Silver involved in the Culinary equation. Certainly, he is someone who knows his way around flavor, quality, and most importantly, class. These full flavored products that certainly, ‘Raise the Bar’ in the form of fun, intriguing flavors, and the simplicity of execution. I’m honored to share Kim’s story, and her entrepreneurial style, based in real, old-fashioned business-sense. The kind that you find in rational thinkers, and in working entrepreneurs. Real hard workers.
With Valentine’s Day fast approaching, the historically perpetual image of a sweet drink in every glass is as flawed as the original recipes that they emanate from. It’s not necessary to make every Valentine’s Day themed cocktail sweet! This should be a head’s up to the theory that Valentine’s Day always a day to overwhelm your sweet tooth!
There are several ways to entice the drinker into wanting to take their palate to a higher place with Valentine’s Day Cocktails. First of all, the glassware should be exciting. A new coupe’ glass, or an elegant Champagne flute, or if your drink centers around the masculine in image, perhaps an extra heavy Old-Fashioned glass to cradle some extra old rum in relaxation? And there is nothing wrong with upping the game with exotic bitters as a flourish, just before serving. I love the varieties of bitters on the market today. They make my job, very easy.
I love intriguing new products that are both crafty and also intellectually produced. Enter the “Poke A Bowl”, because the entire way that you’ve been cleaning the sticky resin and ash from your glass pipes is wrong. Wrong? Yes, that smelly brown stuff that clogs up the business part of your pipe or bong stem is just gross, especially when it gets on your fingers. You’ll know it all day! Creagen Dow has a solution. He knows intimately how to clean your gummed up cannabis pipe or glued up bong stem with simplicity and verve. It is a very sharp metallic non-stick post mounted to what appears to be an ashtray hailing from the 1940’s. You know the kind that has a gleaming metal, machine age formed and polished clam-shell lid, ostensibly to keep the smell in from all those nasty cigarettes. But this isn’t designed for cigarettes. It’s created to clean your ash spot. One of the other side-effects of smoking high end craft cannabis and accumulating this sticky resin, which is a byproduct of the natural plant oil, is the scent. It can be overpowering. So, if you could conceivably contain the odoriferous scent in a container that has not only an ingenious lid, but an interior made of high heat repelling silicone, then quite possibly you have a really great cannabis idea. That kind that comes to you when you’re stoned! That’s at least what I thought, and I enjoy these flashes of brilliance, it’s behind all my books. It’s simple and succinct, the Poke A Bowl system. I wanted Creagen to succeed immediately because of the simplicity of his invention, and because he tossed in a couple of really nicely made glass bowls in the package with the above mentioned clam shell, plus a very handy travel model also made of durable plastic. Hand held and unobtrusive, it eliminates the need to seek a small stick from a nearby tree, which always breaks off, rendering your pipe useless forever. This is a fine invention that should appeal to most cannabis friendly people. I’d love to see an adaptation on an elegant stand, like the early cigarette ashtray stands of the Jazz Era. That would be an intellectual re-use of a classic metaphor. Yes, a new product idea is born! Without further adieu, please eMeet, Creagen Dow.
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I’ve never actually met Steve Trenk in person, but our circles probably are much closer than we might think. I too grew up in New Jersey, in a small town named, Morris Township. Not too far, as the crow fly’s from where Steve spent his formative years. It’s ironic somehow that we both have endured the brunt of ‘jersey’ jokes. They are quite familiar to me, and it appears to Steve as well. Isn’t “Jersey in England”, is my usual reply to this crude, and closed-minded anachronism aimed at those who think they know New Jersey, but end up in their irrational description somewhere near the Meadowlands, or the vast salt flats leading nowhere, and piling up near a garbage dump. It’s probably from watching TV shows such as the Soprano’s or having their plane re-routed to Newark Airport, or maybe they got lost at rush hour by the Lincoln Tunnel. That’s too bad, because New Jersey is an incredibly diverse and in the context of beauty, an unusually unexploited place. Most Americans don’t know the real New Jersey, and that’s how I like it. At any rate, reading through Steve’s answers to my questions, brought me to a place of understanding of his own personal path to success. While mine took me to the culinary arts, a fresh pasta corporation, and the wine business. Steve used his brains to make something different. He took a path towards success and he made something really marvelous of himself. Steve Trenk, as you will discover works in the legal cannabis industry, which is exploding in popularity with this new found acceptance and de-stigmatization. The amount of brain power that powers its way through the intricacies of the legal cannabis industry is far, far removed the past, when we sold a few joints to our cannabis family at a Grateful Dead concert to stay, on the bus. Cannabis has evolved greatly and is pushing forwards into the Post-Modern Era. It’s “High” time to get on that bus again with these self-guiding, upper-intellectual industry leaders such as Steve Trenk. Located firmly at the helm in their own unique place in the cannabis universe. An experience of their own making, and therefore responsible for their own success, and the success of their investors. Thank you.
I received the honor of writing a Cannabis-Centric Valentine’s Day gift guide from my kind editors at Forbes- after my pitch, of course! The overall topic was certainly not your usual fare. The best diamond, best bottle of Single Malt Scotch, best Swiss-chocolates, nor the best online rose retailer interested me. I wanted something that most people have never thought about. And even fewer have tried. The Cannagar!
HiFi Farms (Detail)WARREN BOBROW: IPHONE X
A Cannagar is much more granular that just another dozen roses. So in the room that I have to entice you to either get on a plane and fly to the places where these, ‘hand-held’ works of art can be acquired, you should then start dreaming of next year. Because a Luxury Cannagar is one of those things in life that a cannabis smoker lusts after. He/she may have tasted the finest herbs that money can buy and rightfully so. They are successful cannabis-heads and they take deep pride in their educated, good taste regarding their passion for rare cultivars. These, of course come at an extreme cost. But as the old saying goes, you get what you pay for. In the case of a Cannagar, it is a combination of the finest flowers, grown with love on the top quality farms, woven into a tangle of concentrates, waxes, rosins, shatters, oils, kief, or a combination of all or none! There is extraordinary soul that goes into the manufacture of a Cannagar. It makes shelling out over a hundred dollars or much, much more, for one even more deeply enticing and just the perfect gift for Valentine’s Day.
