The cannabis industry is no different than any other when it comes to the importance of – and its reliance on – business partnerships. And just like any other industry, it’s seen its share of breakups, too. Bruce Linton’s firing last year at Canopy was a cautionary one for company founders. Now, the bloodletting at Aurora Cannabis has claimed co-founder Terry Booth. What can cannabis entrepreneurs learn to prevent similar outcomes?
Opinions
2020 Cannabis Industry Outlook
The New Year marks a noteworthy turning point in our country, economically, politically, and culturally. The decade ahead will likely include transformation and accelerate innovation within the cannabis industry, in continuation of previous years’ trends and with continued advancement towards legalization in some states and adoption of new rules in others. From where I sit […]
Cannabis Prohibition in the Roaring 2020s
One hundred years ago on January 17, the United States federal government instituted a ban on alcohol, issuing in a 13-year era known as the “Prohibition Period.” Largely considered a political failure, 1920-1933 saw increases in organized crime, federal prison populations, and drug usage. This time period also saw the ban of another kind of […]
An Open Letter: The Cannabis Industry’s Tylenol Moment, A Solution Is Complicated and a Wrong Turn Could Be Fatal
An Open Letter To The Cannabis Industry: This is Our Tylenol Moment. The Solution Is Neither Simple Nor Pleasant. A Wrong Turn Could be Fatal. But What We Have To Do Is Obvious: Stop Selling Vaping Products. CBE Press has been an advocate of the nascent Cannabis Industry since our launch back in June of […]
Women Leaders in Cannabis Face a Turning Point—What We Do Next Matters
One of the reasons I love working in the cannabis industry is its diversity. So many of the entrepreneurs and leaders of these fast-moving companies are people of color and women. Their prominent roles have occurred at a higher rate than in other industries. In fact, approximately 37% of executives in the cannabis industry are […]
How Many More Crises Will It Take For The Cannabis Industry To Realize That It Has An Irrational Structure To Run An Effective Public Affairs Campaign?
I need to revise something I wrote in an article that CBE published on August 7, 2019: “The Cannabis Industry Needs to Rethink the Entire Approach to its Lobbying and Public Affairs Efforts. Now.” The first point I asserted was: “If the cannabis industry was a business, the CEO and the Board would fire whoever […]
Who Is Going To Own “Medical Marijuana? Or: Those Who Define The Issue Win The Issue
In December 2018, Tilray (which Bloomberg described in their news coverage as a “Canadian pot firm”) announced a global partnership with a division of Swiss drug giant Novartis AG to develop and distribute its “medical marijuana” in legal jurisdictions around the world using the Novartis Sandoz brand. At the time, Bloomberg quoted Tilray CEO Brendan Kennedy as saying the […]
As the Car Industry is to Detroit … As Finance is to NY … And As Jazz is to New Orleans … Cannabis is to — Would You Believe? — Washington, DC. The Implications Are Enormous But Are You Heeding The Lessons?
Washington, DC, began establishing itself as the center of gravity for the U.S. cannabis industry in 1968. It had nothing to do with cannabis. It had everything to do with legendary entrepreneur Bill McGowan. For $50,000, he acquired controlling interest in – and became CEO of — a tiny no-revenues company based in Peoria that he thought could […]
No, Cannabis Does Not Do All Things For All People
By Joanne Zieger For most of my life I have had a complicated relationship with pain. You see, I’ve been an athlete for more than four decades, and for three of those I was considered “elite”. I raced as a professional triathlete for 12 years, and during that time, I placed 4th in the Sydney […]
It’s Far’s Far Too Soon To Think About Celebrating The Legitimacy of Cannabis Because The War On Pot Is Still Raging
By Doug Poretz The kneejerk reaction to a discussion about the cannabis industry is to be jubilant. After all, we see high growth among a wide segment of players from growers to lighting companies, a virtual tsunami of all sorts of deals and capital events at very high valuations, more states legalizing it for medical and/or […]
