Hi there, and welcome to The Dealers Diary - my musings on the cannabis industry, California, and building Halara.
If you missed past emails, I recommend checking out the Dealers page where you can see the past emails I sent.
In today's entry: Alex caught me slacking | two weeks of counting carts in New York | why Seattle keeps calling
The Dealers Desk
Hey Dealers,
I got an email last week that I've been thinking about since.
Alex is one of us Dealers out in Central California (represent), and wrote in to tell me I forgot to put the bops in the last issue.
My bad yall!
I was in the state of New York helping out with our expansions there and I ran out of time, and totally forgot the section, I fucking love that Alex and a few others of y’all noticed. Alex sent a few to fill the hole, which was really nice! And got me hooked on a few good ones
Well played, Alex.
These five are at the bottom of this one, not mine. I've had the Porter Robinson on since Saturday.
Honestly this is the thing I want more of. I write this on a Wednesday night from whatever hotel I'm in, and most weeks I genuinely cannot tell what's landing and what's just me talking to myself. Somebody writing in to say "you skipped a section" is the best feedback I get. So if you've got a song, or you think a strain we put out is mid, just reply to this.
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I just did two weeks in New York, the city and then upstate, and I spent a good chunk of it hand-counting our inventory.
this was me last week
Not fun, but it was the only way to get a number I actually believed. We have been out of stock in New York literally half the time. Half! And the state is still blowing up for us, July was our best month there ever. Which is wild given we haven't had product on the shelf for most of it
The replacement order finally got accepted Monday, so New York is full again as of this week.
To our Dealers out in New York.I have fingers crossed for y’all that New York stays stocked from here. You can hold me to it
I'm writing this one from Washington, where I've been in stores all week. It looks like we're going to grow our Seattle presence a ton, a bunch of new shops are talking about picking us up, which is lovely to see after a slow couple of months out here.
Onwards and upwards,
-Malcolm
What We're Seeing
Two states, same month, exactly opposite problems. New York wanted product we didn't have. Washington has plenty of product and needed somebody to go stand in the stores and talk about it, which is what I've been doing all week. On a spreadsheet those two look identical, they're both just a flat number where a bigger one should be, and for months I read them as the same problem. They're not, and the fixes have nothing to do with each other. The other thing I keep noticing out here is that the shops picking us up aren't doing it off my pitch. They're doing it off what they've watched us do at the store down the road, which is humbling. It's also free.
Dealers Choice
Nick got this on Instagram this week. We print his story on the back of the package, the whole thing about why he started making these, and in two years nobody has ever mentioned it to us, so this one got me.
Two years of that thing sitting on the back of the box and somebody finally read it. Music to my ears, honestly.
Quick Hits
New York just ran its biggest bust ever, which is good news for the shops you actually shop at: OCM and Greece PD seized more than $17 million in illicit product on Monday, including gummies labeled 300mg against a 10mg legal cap, and candy bars labeled 10,000mg. 674 unlicensed shops padlocked statewide so far. I have complicated feelings about enforcement in general, but a fake edible at those numbers is going to hurt somebody eventually. The details.
Liquor stores are now lobbying Congress on hemp THC drinks: a coalition of alcohol retailers wants a federal framework for low-dose hemp beverages, after the Senate added language delaying a planned ban. Worth watching if you're a retailer, because those drinks compete for the same shelf and the same customer as everything we make, with a fraction of the testing. Marijuana Moment has it.
Weekly Munchies
Blueberry muffins this week. We have a strain named after them too, which I only noticed after.
Refer a Friend
If you're in New York and your shop's been dry, forward this to whoever runs the vape case there. Tell them we're back in.
Know a budtender who'd dig this? Forward it. They subscribe, you get a Dealers hat.
Halara · Emerald Triangle, CA
P.S - Alex's Weekly Bops
P.S. Some are "alt mainstream" but that on a sunny summer day they're bangers, and having listened to all five I think that’s right.
I will be back next week with more, I promise.
