Marijuana Business Magazine October 2019

How does customer service inform the products you offer? We get feedback from our customers constantly on products. They’ll tell us, “Hey, we’d like to have this kind of flavor,” and we put that into R&D. Our product line has blown up. Even since I started here, I think we probably have easily another 150 products on our shelves these days, directly from consumer feedback on what they want and would like to have available. Why hasn’t The Green Solution yet expanded into states outside of Colorado? Originally, the approach was doing a franchise, so we’d be able to cookie-cutter those out and give franchise owners the guidance they’d need. But then (we) realized, to hold our brand standards and the level we hold all our current outlets to, we really wanted to be the owners of those. That’s what the focus is now. What are some of the pros and cons of being vertically integrated? We’re completely vertically integrated. We grow our own product indoors and outdoors, and we’ve got four grows total: three indoors and one outdoor facility. It’s fantastic knowing exactly what your growing process is and how you treat it. Being vertically integrated, the biggest pro is you control the supply chain throughout. So every step of the way meets our standards. We know exactly how we want it to be, and we make sure that it gets delivered to our customers, to deliver on their expectations. What’s nice about that is by the time it gets to the retail floor, we know we’re delivering on those expectations. This interview has been edited for length and clarity. John Schroyer is senior reporter for Marijuana Business Magazine. You can reach him at johns@mjbizdaily.com.