August 22, 2025 • 53 mins
Former NCIA CEO Aaron Smith shares his insights after 20 years leading cannabis policy reform, reflecting on the evolution from medical advocacy to today's complex marketplace and the challenges of federal reform.
• The cannabis industry has seen remarkable progress over two decades, with support for reform growing from just two members of Congress to majorities in both chambers
• Current regulatory structures represent a compromise, not the alcohol-style regulation originally envisioned by advocates
• Complacency poses the biggest threat to cannabis reform, with a $40+ billion industry spending only about $4 million annually on federal lobbying
• Multiple competing trade associations dilute advocacy impact, though coordination is improving
• Banning hemp-derived cannabinoids doesn't advance marijuana legalization and may actually hinder progress
• Congressional dysfunction stems from primary election systems that reward partisan extremes over compromise
• The beverage segment represents one of the most promising opportunities for cannabis normalization
• Even struggling businesses should find ways to contribute to advocacy efforts
"Don't give up hope. If you're in this industry, I know it's super challenging, it's super frustrating, depressing at times. Take a breath, step back, see the progress we've made and realize the inputs that went into that progress. We have the resources to do a lot - find a way to invest in advocacy in a way that makes sense for you."
--
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Aaron Smith (00:00):
people have invested their life savings and
millions of dollars into thecurrent system, but the current
system is not working and it'sjust imperative that we really
see that long view andunderstand that for the whole
industry to be prosperous, weneed to expand the marketplace,
and that means opening upchannels for cannabis consumers.
Cannabis consumers.
Ben Larson (00:26):
Hey everybody, welcome to episode 102, 102 of
High Spirits.
I'm Ben Larson and I'm back inaction with my co-host, anna Rae
Grabstein.
We're recording Tuesday, august19th 2025.
(00:49):
We have an incredible show withyou today.
We got a hot take interviewingAaron Smith, the co-founder and
CEO of NCIA for the last 15years, as he transitions into
his next chapter of his life.
So we'll get to that in just abit, but first, anna Rae, how
are you doing?
I love that episode with Rama.
You really crushed that one.
AnnaRae Grabstein (01:05):
Oh thanks.
Yeah, we missed you last week,Ben.
We always miss you, but I dohave fun just going on it.
I kind of like to hear myselftalk.
Is that a bad thing?
Ben Larson (01:14):
No, no, you're great at talking, far better than
myself.
AnnaRae Grabstein (01:20):
This week has been good.
My son is back to school, whichI don't know for other parents
out there.
The summer is fairlydysregulating and I'm excited to
get back to a normal schedule,and I have also been indulging
in some pretty hilarious Netflixcontent.
Late at night I've beenwatching the Hunting Wives with
(01:41):
a lot of the rest of America Ithink it's like apparently the
number two show right now, soprobably a lot of you are also
listening and it's aboutrepublican kind of housewives in
a small town in texas it'sfictional who uh, like to shoot
guns, drink and have sex witheach other.
Ben Larson (02:00):
Okay, the housewives it's a real this.
This came from a Kara Swisherrecommendation, I presume.
AnnaRae Grabstein (02:09):
She talked about it and I got very excited
and had to tune in and it doesnot disappoint Really, really
entertaining.
Ben Larson (02:18):
Amazing, amazing.
Well, I need I need a littlemindless content in my life.
I was sucked into a black holelast week.
Pretty much the entire week Ihad my team, the Pertosa team,
in town.
We do it once every year.
Would like to do it more, but Idon't know if I could survive
more.
It's a full team, intensive.
(02:39):
There's a lot of bonding andjust learning and diving into
all things that make us great,and so it was fun to celebrate
that.
We celebrated our seven-yearanniversary, which, as a startup
practitioner of the past, youknow that was kind of a big
moment for me, just to kind oflike look around and see what we
really built, to feel thepressure of reaching that
(03:02):
initial time horizon of earlystage investors.
Early stage investors alwaysset their thesis to seven to 10
year exit windows, and sopressure's on.
Yeah, it was a great week.
I got this awesome jacket thatmy team made for everyone, and
people listening can't see it,but the ones watching the video
(03:22):
can, and it's legit I gotta sayI I was invited to your seventh
anniversary party on thursdaynight.
AnnaRae Grabstein (03:30):
I didn't come hang out all week with your
team, but the party was greatand you guys really do bring it.
When it comes to swag.
The vertosa team is amazing.
There were custom nikes, youguys high top with the vertosa
colors.
There was um embroidery goingon like a professional
seamstress of some kind.
(03:50):
That was there embroideringpeople's names onto bandanas and
jackets and really cool jackets.
There was just a lot of hotstyle going on, so yeah, I mean
you, you feel how you look.
Ben Larson (04:02):
I think someone famous probably said that.
AnnaRae Grabstein (04:05):
In a wind tour, possibly Possibly, yeah.
Ben Larson (04:08):
She's my new bestie, or at least my muse.
Yeah, the shoes I like sneakers.
I have more sneakers or shoesthan my wife, and it's a thing.
I need more closet space.
But we started this thing a fewyears ago where we do Tosa
shoes, and so this year wasofficially the Tosa 2s, although
(04:28):
we realized this last week thatwe had launched a Tosa 0, like
three years prior.
So it's now a thing and it'skind of fun.
I'm looking forward Like who dowe let design the Tosa 3s next
year?
AnnaRae Grabstein (04:39):
Yeah, and I let a couple people on your team
know my shoe size, because I Ido expect a pair of myself.
Well, you're practically partof the team.
Enough about all.
Let's jump into a quick littlenews update so that we can then
get aaron on, because he's goingto be a great guest with a lot
of things he is also the news inmy book is the news.
We'll kick us off with somenews then uh, well news.
Ben Larson (05:00):
I.
I'm kind of excited that it'sbeen a little bit slower.
You, you know we're in themiddle of August recess when it
comes to the Hill, but thatdoesn't mean that it's stopped
everywhere.
Texas is still Texas-ing, andwe have now entered our second
special session where the hempban is essentially the headline
news, and so it's working itsway through the Senate right now
(05:22):
, and we're going to haveprobably the same fight that we
had the last two times, so we'llsee where that goes.
AnnaRae Grabstein (05:28):
I will say I think this Texas second special
session is just a reminder ofhow much cannabis and hemp
policy is interconnected tobroader policy debates and
conflicts.
And ultimately, you know, texasstarted a conversation about
redistricting in order to getmore Republican seats and that
(05:51):
caused an exodus of Democraticelected officials out of the
state to end the ability ofanything to happen in the state,
which then resulted in warrantsand bomb threats and all sorts
of crazy stuff, but they'reapparently back but also the
inability to make a decision onthe proposed hemp ban.
(06:13):
So you know, we we get veryvacuous in in our minds,
sometimes on the issues that aremost important to us, and
sometimes it's something else,like gerrymandering, that gets
in the way of all the timepolicy.
Ben Larson (06:29):
All the time, like all the time, like cannabis,
rescheduling, farm bill, likeyou name it.
We're always like at the mercycritical to us, it's a hyper
critical topic, but it's verylow on on the list of priorities
priorities.
AnnaRae Grabstein (06:43):
Well, okay, other things high on my list I'm
paying attention to.
New York cannabis retailers weredelivered some pretty
devastating news over the pastcouple of weeks that the Office
of Cannabis Management, which istheir regulatory body, was
revising the way that they werelooking at a 500 foot minimum
(07:04):
distance between dispensariesand schools and came out and
said that over 100 dispensarylicensees would be out of
compliance who they hadpreviously licensed based on
this new interpretation of theway that they were going to
measure and, as a result, thisweek a group of those retailers
that are affected have filed alawsuit against the OCM about
(07:28):
this reinterpretation and thecase will go to court on August
29th.
There are already bills thatare being proposed to align
cannabis shop distancing withliquor rules, which are 200 feet
, or to grandfather grandfatherstores, into the old standard.
That was the original way thatthe OCM was measuring, but
(07:50):
either way it's.
These poor New York retailershave just been dealt like bad
news after bad news and had sucha struggle to get open, and I
just would love to see somemarket stability there for all
these businesses.
Ben Larson (08:04):
Yeah, once again, just regulators having a major
disconnect between the realitiesof trying to run businesses and
, like it or not, you know,we're a country built on
capitalism, so let's, let's trynot to kill businesses, as we're
trying to pretend that we'resupporting them.
AnnaRae Grabstein (08:19):
Well, luckily there is some silver lining.
We got a new state in the adultuse regulated cannabis market
space From Roll for Delaware.
Welcome to the show Delaware.
Ben Larson (08:32):
Delaware.
AnnaRae Grabstein (08:35):
It's a very small state but there are a lot
of corporate entities that are.
Ben Larson (08:41):
We're going to get lit up with bad comments on that
.
We're going to find out how bigDelaware is.
AnnaRae Grabstein (08:46):
It's very important and I'm very excited
about Delaware, so welcome tothe party Delaware.
This is a major milestone andyeah, and then I think lastly
and worth mentioning is thatthere are conversations going on
all over the country aboutpackaging and marketing to
children and how the industryshould deal with this issue, and
(09:10):
it's showing its head indifferent ways.
In Florida, it's coming fromregulators who are thinking
about new rules on intoxicatinghemp products.
In California, it's regulatorsthat are actually issuing
recalls on products that are inmarket that they say are
appealing to children.
I'm sure there are lots ofother examples, but this issue
(09:33):
is floating to the surface andis gaining more and more
traction as we get more matureinto these different markets.
Ben Larson (09:41):
You know I know this probably is going to be far too
logical for politics, butwouldn't it be nice if we just
said hey, that filter that youuse for alcohol, maybe you
should use for cannabis.
And if you don't like it, maybefix it for both, because I'm
not saying alcohol is perfect,but like stop treating cannabis
like and I said this last weekor two weeks ago stop treating
(10:05):
cannabis like it's plutonium.
Right, let's have somereasonable regulations put in
place, and it's not that hard ofa solve if you actually have
functional regulating bodies.
AnnaRae Grabstein (10:14):
Yeah, I agree , because I am not going to sit
here and say that we shouldmarket to children at all, and
nor should we create packagingthat appeals to children, but at
this time, like you, go to theat all, and nor should we create
packaging that appeals tochildren, but at this time, like
you, go to the beer aisle andthere's simpson characters on
cans and circus themed ipas, and, uh, my son loves to pick out
(10:36):
beer with me and he also knowsnot to drink it, and so I let
him pick out the beer.
I don't let him drink the beer,and that's also okay, I think.
So I hear you.
Ben Larson (10:47):
Yeah, yeah, that's a perfect segue into our guest,
so do you want to bring him on?
AnnaRae Grabstein (10:52):
Sure, today we are joined by someone who's
been at the very center ofcannabis policy reform for the
past two decades.
He is the co-founder and formerCEO of the National Cannabis
Industry Association, where, forover 15 years, he built the
country's largest and mostinfluential Cannabis Trade
Association.
Ncia gave the industry a voicein Washington, launched
(11:16):
cornerstone events and helpedsecure legislative progress that
moved cannabis out of theshadows and into the mainstream.
Now he's taken a new role aspolitical director at Unite
America, which we're excited tohear more about today, while
still staying connected to thecannabis community, serving on
the NCAA board of directors.
So, aaron, thank you so muchfor being here.
(11:38):
After more than 15 years at thehelm, this feels like the
ultimate exit interview, sowe're excited to get your
feedback and hear from you today.
Aaron Smith (11:45):
Yeah, thanks for having me.
I'm really excited to be herewith you and although I feel
like I'm kind of aging myselfhere, talking about 15 years, 20
years but it's been a wild ride.
Ben Larson (11:56):
Aaron, I remember coming into the cannabis space
back in 2015.
And NCI was so clearly alreadythere and like the meeting place
for all things policy, but notjust policy.
Also the business community.
Pre-covid.
We were having these massiveevents around the country, and I
(12:19):
remember how honored I was tobe able to host one of the
quarterly caucuses in NorthernCalifornia, which seemed really
huge to me at the time, butthese were meetings of the
different ecosystems around thenation and we were able to hold
it in Northern California at theGateway office, and what I
(12:40):
revered as kind of the placewhere all the licensed companies
, everyone kind of gathered totry to push the industry forward
, fast forward.
Almost a decade.
You know, getting to servealongside you and the NCIA board
has really, truly been anamazing gift, also very
revealing on seeing how thesausage is made and just how
(13:03):
complicated the issues havebecome, and so I'm excited to
cover all of that with you.
But where I'd love to start isjust a reflection on what has
been achieved over the last twodecades.
I'll stop saying decades.
That probably doesn't feelgreat.
It's really easy for us to, asoperators, get dragged down into
(13:25):
how slow and lethargiceverything feels, but maybe
that's not what you walk awaywith when you reflect on the
last 15 to 20 years.
Aaron Smith (13:35):
Yeah, absolutely.
I remember those events atGateway as well and I've been
honored to work with you on theboard and look forward to seeing
what you develop after I stepaway at the organization.
But you're absolutely right, asan operator I really understand
that.
It's easy to get caught up inday-to-day.
It's easy to follow thefast-moving progress that's
(14:00):
happening at the state or locallevel.
But when you look at federallaw, yes, it's happening at the
state or local level.
Or you know, but when you lookat federal law, yes, it's very,
very it's a very long game.
But you know, as I reflect onthe last 15, 20 years, it's
we've been incredible progress.
I mean even since the last 10years, and you know when you
talk about the 2015,.
(14:21):
But if you go back 20 years,when I first started doing this
work with the Marijuana PolicyProject, even the California
delegation of Democrats inCongress were largely opposed,
not just to adult use but tomedical cannabis, and my job at
that time was lining up patientsto chase members of Congress
(14:44):
around the state and you know,show up at their town halls and
such and tell their story around.
You know medical cannabis, howthat was helping them through
their lives, and just trying to.
It seemed like such an uphillbattle we had.
I think we had two members ofCongress that would actually
(15:04):
publicly express support foradult use and you know, you fast
forward.
Today we have almost the entireDemocratic delegation in the
Congress I think they're, youknow, say, but maybe one and a
lot of Republicans supportingthis.
We probably have a majority inthe House for support for reform
, a majority in the House forsupport for reform, and it's
(15:27):
just.
You know, the challenge aheadof us now is keeping the foot on
the gas as an industry, butalso just the challenges that
every interest group and everyadvocacy group faces, which is
that Congress is somewhatdysfunctional and we need to
overcome that.
AnnaRae Grabstein (15:40):
But the fact that we're at a place where both
, you know, the president andalmost every member of Congress
has expressed some support forsome kind of reform is
absolutely incredible slowthings move, but what you're
(16:08):
talking about is that there hasbeen a massive shift in people's
minds and in Washington it'sjust we haven't seen it
translate into policy reformquite yet.
I do believe it's coming and I'msure people that are fighting
for it are remaining hopeful.
When I think about when I metyou, we were both around the Bay
Area.
I was a young entrepreneur.
I just started my firstcannabis business in Oakland.
(16:30):
It was probably 2009 or 2010,somewhere around there and I
thought of myself as anentrepreneur and not an activist
or an advocate, and prettyquickly I realized that to be a
cannabis entrepreneur meant thatI also needed to be an advocate
and activist, and I think itwas people like you that helped
(16:53):
people that were coming to thespace with an entrepreneurial
slant to see that from you.
About what that journey was allabout, of creating coalitions
between entrepreneurs andpatients and activists and
lawmakers, how you were able tocreate the bridges to get people
(17:14):
to work together and see thatwe all needed each other at that
time in order to createopportunity.
Aaron Smith (17:20):
Yeah, I mean, I think I remember those days that
I think you were probably maybewhat I would consider the
second wave of cannabis industryentrants, which were business
people that decided to join the,you know, to make something.
Passion for the plant, probablynot a lot of you know as much
business acumen, and so you know, at the beginning it was that
this, this landscape on theadvocacy side consisted of the
(17:53):
marijuana policy project normaland americans for safe access as
the kind of three primarygroups asa being more medical
and these were groups that werefunded by philanthropists rather
than industry interests.
And there started to be a kindof a rift around that 2009, 10,
(18:15):
11 timeframe where we sawbusiness, actual capital
investment, flowing into thisindustry.
Places like Colorado andWashington were opening
for-profit stores which hadn'texisted in California yet and
really just kind of changed thewhole paradigm where we did get
this kind of influx of interestfrom what at the time seemed
(18:37):
like well serious businesspeople, but there wasn't this
connection to the advocacymovement, no-transcript.
(19:05):
But our members neededimmediate benefit, so creating
events, creating memberdiscounts, all those sorts of
things I mean.
And frankly, I was sittingaround with the co-founders of
this organization at the timeand we were thinking like let's
Google what trade associationsare?
We didn't.
What do other tradeassociations do?
I didn't know.
You know we were cannabisadvocates and kind of modeled.
(19:29):
You know, we looked at, welooked at the beer and wine
wholesalers as other kind ofcomparable groups and modeled
NCIA as sort of just a miniversion of that and then taking
some of the real, you know, theadvocates that were involved in
the space long before NCIA andthrough events and other
networking opportunities,connecting them to entrepreneurs
(19:50):
, so to kind of share thatknowledge, but also share it in
both ways so that those thatwere really super early entrants
of the market still had anopportunity to succeed from
learning from the largerecosystem seed, from learning
from the larger ecosystem, andit's all about just being
(20:10):
stronger together and raisingall boats, so to speak, for the
industry.
Ben Larson (20:14):
It's interesting that when you break it up into
phases, that kind of reallyresonates with me, because I
feel like I was a part of thatkind of second wave as well,
where you had this verynoticeable adjacency to the
advocates, to the medicalprograms.
We still had Prop 215 inCalifornia back in 2015.
(20:36):
I found, at least for me as anentrepreneur coming in and
understanding the importance ofhighlighting the roots and tying
that to my vision of like, howI wanted to represent that in
the community that was around mein the Bay Area.
If phase one was medical andadvocacy and phase two is these
(20:59):
new, capitalistic but stillemerging from the primordial
soup kind of uh, you knowenvironment, we're kind of
maturing into this very nowphase three, which maybe there's
three sub phases because of allthe waves that we we have
experienced, um, but it's verycapitalistic in nature and I I
look at how divided a lot of thevoices are in the space and I
(21:24):
think it's this, this perpetualdrive to try to represent
different subgroups that arelooking to survive from a, from
a capital perspective.
I'm curious of where you thinkwe are as far as still
understanding what we're alltrying to achieve from a, from a
larger picture Like is thatbecoming harder and harder to
(21:47):
get people to align on?
Aaron Smith (21:49):
Yeah, I mean absolutely.
I mean we, we we're up againstjust kind of standard uh, of
business practices, ofprotectionism, where you know
there's, there's, nobody wantsdisruption to their particular
model and that's been.
You know that was a bit ofchallenge.
But you know, I look back atthe as as I as I do look back
way into the past.
(22:09):
This was kind of the case whenwe were advancing adult use in
Colorado for the first time.
We had medical cannabisbusinesses saying no, let's not
rock the boat, let's just staywith this model that we have.
It's working.
Now, fast forward, we have thehemp industry, which is
certainly super disruptive tothe state-licensed marijuana
(22:32):
industry.
We have a multitude of statesthat are all operating in
different regulatoryenvironments, different schemes,
and some of them are doing agood job at enforcing their
regulations, others very much,not so much.
But I really think that thechallenge that NCIA has and that
this whole industry has isunderstanding that long vision
(22:55):
looking forward.
The industry that we're lookingat today is a compromise.
This is not the industry thatwe ever envisioned when we said
let's regulate.
You know, I've got it behind me.
It says regulation works.
We always said let's regulatethis like alcohol.
Well, we're not regulating.
Everybody knows we're notregulating like this, like
alcohol.
(23:16):
This is a compromise that wassort of an interim approach that
we were able to get through,you know, politically, and it
was, you know, expedientexpedient is the wrong word, but
simpler to, you know, to sellthis compromise to voters.
But in the future we as anindustry will do much better if
we can open up channels, likeyou know, something more similar
(23:37):
to alcohol, where, frankly,alcohol sold in the shelves of a
grocery store like Safeway, orwherever cannabis products
should be sold alongside thoseproducts.
And that would be I would get alot of arrows if I was still
speaking on behalf of NCIA,saying that from those who have
(23:57):
and I understand it, people know, people have invested their
life savings and, you know,millions of dollars into the
current system.
But the current system's notworking and it's just imperative
that we really see that longview and understand that to be
for the whole industry to beprosperous, we need to expand
the marketplace and that meansopening opening up channels for
(24:18):
for cannabis consumers place,and that means opening up
channels for cannabis consumers.
AnnaRae Grabstein (24:28):
I like that you just zeroed in on this
concept of policy compromise,because you've also said that
complacency is the biggestthreat to cannabis and hemp
today, and it occurs to me thatthis concept of compromise
inherently means that we need tocontinue to evolve and and that
if we are sitting resting onour laurels or accepting the
reality and becoming complacent,then then we aren't realizing
(24:51):
that there's opportunity to keepimproving things.
And I'd love to hear yourperspective, as you are exiting
the cannabis policy world, onsomething else of like giving us
all some advice about how wecan not be complacent and how we
can understand why it'simportant to invest in
(25:13):
government policy change inorder to create business success
.
Aaron Smith (25:17):
Yeah, I mean well at the federal level.
If you look, we're talkingabout how slow everything moves.
It's super frustrating to theindustry, it's super frustrating
to every American.
If you look at, congress hasn'tpassed hardly any legislation
over the last 20 years.
There's a few big bills thathave gone through Certainly
nothing.
(25:38):
No social issues like cannabishave actually advanced, and
that's because of somestructural challenges that we
can get into later.
I think just how the incentivesto work together to get anything
done are kind of completelybackwards in Congress today.
But it's also because of justhuge priority.
(26:02):
You know different, you knowconflicting priorities.
I mean we have war in theMiddle East, war in Ukraine.
We have, you know, there's agun violence problem in this
country.
There's just all of theseproblems.
Right that somebody came intoCongress.
Everybody who's in Congress isprobably has a pet issue or two
that they're really passionateabout, and cannabis is probably
(26:23):
not that issue.
There are thousands oflobbyists in DC that are working
the halls of Congress every dayon hundreds and hundreds of
issues and we're just a verysmall.
We have probably a couple dozenin the cannabis space now of
those several.
You know thousand lobbyists,and but that you know.
(26:53):
That is the challenge that weface the industry, through
either PACs or individually, bytalking to your members of
Congress and by supportingorganizations whether it be NCIA
or other organizations, frankly, that are doing that lobbying.
Because we only got to where weare today because of immense
resources that were poured intogroups that, before I was alive,
(27:17):
even you know Normal MPP ASA,all these groups that would,
before I was alive, even youknow normal mpp asa, all these
groups that got us to where wewere before ncia even existed,
spent, you know, hundreds ofmillions of dollars collectively
over the over the decades, andit's going to take that to to
get past this.
There's no.
There's also just no.
There's so many othercompleting interests.
There's nobody that's going tofund cannabis reform other than
(27:40):
the cannabis industry.
At this point, I don't.
You know, we can't expectsomebody else to think, oh well,
let's just pay for cannabislobbyists when they've got their
.
You know it's not their petissue, there's a million issues,
and so it's just that the whenI say that complacency is what I
think the biggest threat.
I, I.
It is something I really havebecome quite concerned over
(28:01):
because I always hear well,first I used to hear big pharma
is lobbying against us, whichisn't really true.
Big alcohol is lobbying againstus.
That's also not true.
In fact, big alcohol now ismaybe more aligned with us than
ever.
Or you know, then the boogeymanis the hemp industry.
Or you know, then the boogeymanis the hemp industry.
And really, the bigger issue isthat the marijuana industry is
(28:23):
collectively spending somethinglike $4 million a year in
lobbying, and this is a $40billion plus industry.
That's illegal, and most ofthat $4 billion came from the
top three business.
You know Cresco, trulieve,these, you know the top three
MSOs in the in the industry.
(28:48):
And so it's it's imperativethat businesses carve out some
budget for reform, even if it'syou're talking a thousand
dollars a year, somethingminimal, nominal, because that
that's the only way we're goingto see any any path toward
victory.
Ben Larson (28:57):
Those numbers are startling because we've talked
about True Leave before on theshow and we know that last year
alone they put $70 million intothe Florida effort, and so it
kind of goes back to this placeof what you were saying.
It's like we're on this greatertrajectory at the federal level,
(29:19):
which is much bigger in scopeand much longer, and we're in
this interim phase.
But the challenge that we faceis that in the life of a
business right, I think peoplehave just become hyper focused
on the reality that they'reforced to live today because
it's been so slow, and so Igenerally subscribe to the
(29:40):
concept of just get involved.
But it is hard for me tocontinue to push that narrative
when I know there areorganizations that I don't even
know.
If it's complacency, it iscomplacency from an aspect of
the long view, but in some waysit's survival of what's here in
(30:01):
front of us today, and so how dowe get beyond that?
Can we get beyond that?
And maybe your transition'shopefully not indicative of this
quandary that we're in.
How do we convince people tostop fighting for the status quo
when it's proven to not be whatwe anticipated or what we
(30:23):
expected when we said legalizethe plant?
Aaron Smith (30:26):
Yeah, I mean, I think you know it is survival
and I know that you know maybeit comes off as a little jaded
to say or cynical that it'scomplacency, because I get that.
You know you've got businessesthat are, you know, maybe not
sure they're going to be opennext month and so it's hard to
invest in policy reform that weknow isn't going to happen next
(30:48):
month and maybe even not nextyear.
But if we don't make that somekind of nominal investment in
that, then we can guaranteefailure.
And I think that you know whatI would say to those that are
kind of feeling like they'reteetering at the edge of
survival is find a way tocontribute what you can, even if
it's a few hundred dollars ayear or something.
There's always a way you canchange the, you know.
(31:11):
Change out the brand of coffeein your break room, take, you
know, stay in a little bit lessexpensive hotel on your business
trips.
Find a way to budget for reformand then deploy that budget in
any way that you know makessense to you, whether it be
directly contributing tocandidates or, you know, giving
(31:32):
to trade associations, hopefullyboth, but that's you know it
has to happen because we arethis is an illegal industry and
that I think that's somethingthat has been lost in this third
or fourth wave of investors andoperators that have come into
the space.
This is kind of taking forgranted that this industry is
just going to just keep growingand that policy reform is just
(31:54):
going to keep ticking away away,and I think that there was a
huge wake-up call, probably in2021, when we failed to get safe
banking across the finish line,despite having a democratic
trifecta in Washington, andthat's when we really saw the
downturn in the industry and sothe investment and, frankly, if
(32:16):
you're in this space and notable to invest something like
nominally, like $1,000 a year,in reform, you really just
shouldn't be in the space.
There are a lot of easier placesto, you know, invest your time
and money and energy thanCanada's trying to keep, you
(32:41):
know, move away from the statusquo is.
I think that these, you know,businesses, particularly retail,
have invested a lot in thestatus quo need to be able to
step back and see that they, youknow, by ultimately expanding
the market to something that'smore akin to alcohol, that will,
in the long run, bring muchmore opportunity for them than
the small narrow market they'reserving, which is, you know,
however many people that arewilling to walk into a you know,
(33:05):
a dispensary that's locked downlike a prison, versus how many
people are happy to walk intolike a convenience store type of
environment or liquor storetype of environment.
AnnaRae Grabstein (33:16):
Yeah, Bringing up the conflict with
dispensaries and the concept ofopening channels and more
traditional retail, I think yeah.
When some policies inherentlywill create losers and winners,
depending on the outcome.
And if a business is a massivedispensary chain and that is
(33:51):
where all of their investmentsare, it's very hard for them to
stand with a policy agenda thatwould degrade their
opportunities in the market andthen, as a result, what we've
seen is this bifurcation oftrade associations.
You were really the firstnational trade association that
encompassed all businesses kindof holistically, and now we have
(34:15):
all of these other tradeassociations.
We have multiple on statelevels and then in the federal
level there's competingassociations and in some ways I
think that you could make anargument that it strengthens the
narrative.
There's maybe more peopletalking about the issues, but it
also sows confusion amongstlawmakers and the public and the
(34:40):
people that don't live thisevery day who are like well, why
is that cannabis companyfighting against open access at
retail?
That makes no sense, but itactually does make sense for
that company if you know a lotabout them.
And I'm curious about thisconcept of just diluting the
collective impact by having toomany different voices and how
(35:04):
you reconcile and now thatyou're exiting NCAA, like speak
frankly, like tell us if youthink it's, if it's bad that we
have all these tradeassociations.
If it's good, what do you?
What do you really think aboutall these competing trade
associations in Washington?
Aaron Smith (35:22):
I mean, I'm clearly biased on this fact, but this
was something I honestly wasreally surprised that we had
such an explosion of competitionin the national association
space so early.
It's something I saw like, okay, this is going to be coming
maybe in 10 years, but really it.
You know, I thought this wouldbe a problem we'd have after
(35:44):
cannabis was legal or after wegot the first piece of cannabis
legislation over the finish linein DC, not so so long before.
I think that that you know, butit's inevitable.
So I don't, I don't.
I do think that it's.
It's a challenge that'sunnecessary but inevitable.
And what happened was when westarted NCIA, it was hard to
(36:08):
find lobbyists that would takeour business.
It was hard to find anybody inDC that was credible, that would
work for us.
Then, as the industry startedblowing up and you started
seeing lobbyists that wanted torepresent the industry more than
we could fund, there were morelobbyists than there was demand.
So they started creating demandby starting associations.
(36:29):
So the associations that areout there that now serve the
MSOs primarily were started bylobbyists that wanted clients,
and so we've seen that in otherindustries too.
It's an inevitability, I youknow.
Like I said, I didn't think itwould happen so soon.
I think that the only and I'mhopeful about the future around
(36:52):
this because we are seeing morecommunication between the groups
.
For the most part, ncia and theboard chair, adam Rosenberg,
has been bringing together someof these groups just to at least
facilitate conversations aboutwhat they agree on, rather than
just constantly sniping at eachother.
(37:12):
We're at least seeing somebetter coordination, and at
least maybe communication andcoordination is yet to come.
I'd say so.
That gives me hope.
But there, you know, it's oneof these things that I think is
inevitable in the market,because there's politics.
Politics is an industry too,and it's a big, big industry and
(37:33):
you have lobbyists andconsultants and all of these
other you know actors out therethat see an opportunity and, you
know, jump on it just like theywould in any other space access
(37:56):
to the plant right and and thehaving to work past this interim
phase of this highlyover-regulated system where
people don't have access.
Ben Larson (38:00):
I mean, I'm sitting in, we're sitting in california
or you know.
Still half the state doesn'thave access to legal cannabis.
The ncia and yourself kind ofcame out with this controversial
statement I think it was latelast year that really kind of
identified that banningcannabinoids, whether hemp or
(38:24):
cannabis, is not the path, thatcreating these new access points
is important for theprogression of this conversation
and that is kind of going alongthe lines of this whole like
kind of one plant narrative.
Right, but from a capitalistperspective that's really hard,
especially as we talk about theemergence of all these competing
(38:45):
national groups.
How do we get these othernational groups on board?
And I know that you just kindof identify that.
You know MSOs are a veryparticular type of business
model that arguably benefit fromlimited license states.
But again, that's not what thefuture holds and so I'd like to
(39:08):
understand your perspective onare we getting closer?
Because we saw a lot of theMSOs launch these hemp efforts
and you know it's verytransparent to say it's like, oh
, is that just a hedge?
But I don't know.
Maybe they're coming along,maybe they're starting to see
the opportunity and maybe in thenot too distant future there's
an opportunity to flip or atleast blend that strategy.
(39:31):
But that's not clear because ofthe organizations that they
support and are a part of yeah,I think.
Aaron Smith (39:38):
I think that there's an opportunity at the
state level for the hempindustry and the marijuana
industry to come together,develop policy that that you
know, compromise policy.
That could be good for bothsides of the industry.
You know we see these.
You know low dose beveragecarve outs.
I think we see these.
You know low dose beveragecarve outs I think is a good
thing.
Um, you know, I think we couldexpand that to beyond beverages.
(39:59):
In fact, uh, and that's stateby state and every state's a
little different Some of thesestates don't have a marijuana
industry and that's where it'ssuper important that the hemp
products be available.
The federal level where NCIAplays primarily, products be
available.
The federal level where nciaplays primarily the reason that
you know we oppose.
Well, there's several reasonsto oppose cannabinoid bans, but
(40:20):
one is that if we all agree thatcannabinoids, that thc, should
be legal and regulated like likealcohol or like an adult
product, then the path towarddoing that does not run through
banning hemp.
There's just that banning hempTHC does not expedite any effort
to legalize marijuana derivedTHC.
(40:42):
It's actually quite theopposite.
Everyone I've spoken withagrees with that, including
those that oppose our position.
You know some might not agreethat cannabis legalization is
that important, but if that andthat's you know, if you're
having that kind of a differenceof opinion, then you know maybe
we agree to disagree, but forthose groups which I think all
(41:02):
of the trade groups are on thesame page that ultimately
legalization is better for theindustry.
Broadly, we need to understandthat strategically banning hemp
first is not the right way toget there and that the
compromise might be that thereare these other.
You know from a businessperspective that there is the.
(41:22):
You know now this competing,competing product that is out
there that wasn't there before.
But at the same time 280E goesaway, because if we can legalize
cannabis, then 280E no longerapplies and then the hemp
products and marijuana productsbecome one.
It's just cannabinoid products.
A lot of the hemp manufacturerswould rather just be in the
(41:43):
marijuana space than they wouldif it was legal federally.
So, yes, that creates morecompetition, but it creates more
opportunity.
Competition, but it createsmore opportunity.
As you know, 280e reform aloneis something like three billion
dollars back into the industryannually collectively in tax
relief.
Like that alone is a is reasonenough to me to do anything we
(42:05):
can to achieve federal reformand and good federal reforms
that project sam and the and the, the prohibitionists that are
pushing.
They're pushing for hempprohibition for a reason because
they know that allowing theseproducts to be out there is
actually a pathway to expandingthe cannabinoid market and
(42:28):
regulating the cannabinoidmarket federally, which is what
they don't want and it's what wewant.
So we should not be on theirside of this argument.
And I think I'm hopeful becauseit seems more and more folks
out there are coming along tothis realization.
I mean the other, not speakingfor the other trade associations
(42:49):
, but they seem more receptive,or at least they're considering
their position right now,probably because the MSOs so
many of them are now in thespace.
Ben Larson (43:00):
So I do think we'll get there.
Yeah, it's something Anna Raeand I've talked about I don't
know if on the show, butdefinitely behind the scenes
where my prerogative is like getthe products in the people's
hands, like the rest will follow, like the supply chains will
figure themselves out because ofreal capitalism.
You know, like when, when youactually create a consumer
category around something, evenif it's through a beverage,
(43:23):
carve out it's not about thebeverage, it's about getting thc
in the hands of people andnormalizing it and giving them
access and then making themrealize that the world doesn't
fall apart and actually maybeit's in a better place than
where, than where we started.
Aaron Smith (43:37):
Yeah, I mean the, the what's happening on the
beverage front.
Not that I'm not pandering toyou guys at all, but it is
probably the most exciting thingI've seen, you know, in this,
in this whole evolution of ofthe, the industry, because
that's it's, it's a, you know,as we see alcohol use decline,
which is a wonderful thing forthe country's public health,
(43:58):
we're seeing this opportunityboth from a business side the
alcohol industry looking to getinto THC to backfill some of
their losses but then thatcreates a situation where people
who never would have thought ofthemselves as marijuana
consumers are exposed tolow-dose products that make them
feel good and are a lot lessharmful than alcohol.
(44:21):
So it's a win-win-win win forpublic health, win for the
industry and win for the economy.
AnnaRae Grabstein (44:28):
Well, so, as we're getting closer to the end
of the hour, I want to talk alittle bit about what's next for
you and your decision to leaveNCAA.
You clearly have dedicated ahuge amount of your life and
your heart and your passion tothis work, and it's been a
challenge for everybody who'sbeen in the space as long as we
all have.
And I just want to get realLike are you burnt out?
(44:52):
Are you sick of this all?
Are you?
Are you just ready to turn yourback and focus on something
else?
Give, give us, give us insightinto where your head is now.
Aaron Smith (45:01):
Yeah, I mean I can't say that it's that it's
been easy, that's for sure.
I I I guess what you know.
The opportunity that that's infront of me now is to apply the
skills that I've developed overthe last two decades working in
politics toward somefoundational problems that are
at the heart of frustrationsthat we have as an industry
(45:22):
about why federal policy reformseems to be stalled, and it's
not.
You know, this is like I saidat the beginning of this
conversation.
We're not in a situation wherethe cannabis industry is so
controversial that members ofCongress aren't willing to
support our legislation.
We're in a situation whereCongress isn't passing
(45:43):
legislation because they're notincentivized Democrats are not
incentivized to work forRepublicans and vice versa to
just pass common sense solutions, and so this is an example of
this.
When we talk about the SafeBanking Act, we have super
majority vote for that or we didin 2021, and we still have a
(46:04):
majority support in Congress,but it doesn't get over the
finish line because on theDemocratic side, you have
members that are posturing andpandering to their very far left
base, saying we're only goingto pass legislation if it
includes all of these socialjustice provisions that make it
the perfect bill for the farleft.
(46:24):
And then you have Republicanswho are turned off by that and
not going to get anywhere closeto those social justice
proposals and are also kind ofhaving to kowtow to the far
right, which is still in thereefer madness era, when the
majority 70% or so of Americanswant to see this plant legalized
, and that is what UnitedAmerica calls the primary
(46:47):
problem.
90% of seats in Congress areeffectively determined in
primaries, where voter turnoutis dramatically lower than in
the general election, and thereforms that I'm looking to help
enact would resolve that bybringing in more, making the
primary elections more inclusiveof independence and making the
(47:11):
general elections morecompetitive, so that when you
have a member of Congress,they're accountable to the
people, not to just a smallnumber of primary voters that
care about a very narrow set ofissues.
So I see this as not walkingaway from the fight that I've
started 20 years ago, but it'ssort of a natural evolution into
(47:34):
and also just having worked inthis field for so long.
Becoming frustrated withCongress and seeing how the
sausage is made made me realizethat there are other places I
could put my energy into thatwould help cannabis, but also a
myriad of other issues that Icare about outside of cannabis,
believe it or not.
Ben Larson (47:54):
So what I'm hearing is the opposite of burnout.
He was dealing with a hardproblem, found the root of that
hard problem is a bigger,hairier, harder problem and
decided I'm going to go solvefor that.
That's right, Godspeed, Aaron.
Okay, so you said somethingabout the populace 70% of
(48:16):
Americans being in support ofcannabis, and this idea popped
in my head, and I you know thisbetter than anyone, and so I'm
just curious if this has beendone before.
Nonprofits that have beeninfluential in the past that are
not in the cannabis industryfor me are like the American
cancer society, and I knowthere's all these talk about
(48:37):
where most of their funds comefrom and how they might be
biased, but the original intentwas like to give the populace a
voice and for people to puttheir money behind the movement.
Has cannabis tried that likeare?
Are we there?
Yet?
I it's.
I feel like we might almost bethere.
Where we have so many brandsand so many companies that have
followings, Can we startleveraging the power of the
(48:58):
populace to push our broaderinitiative forward?
Legalization, access, safeaccess Generally these backroom
conversations between theorganizations generally agree on
, but because of their verybusiness-oriented constituents,
it's hard for them to fullyadopt into this kind of more
(49:20):
altruistic path.
Aaron Smith (49:28):
Yeah, I do think that there's a huge opportunity
there that has so far beensomewhat underutilized.
You have great groups likeNormal.
Normal's the kind of goldstandard of a consumer-facing
organization.
I would love to see Normal, forexample and I've talked to them
about this, you know privately,but I would say here publicly
that Normal should look atpartnering with industry to
(49:49):
activate all of these consumersthat are coming in and out of
dispensaries to either takegrassroots political action,
calling members of Congress andsuch, but also contributing at
the point of sale and I knowthere have been similar efforts
around this but round up yoursale to the nearest dollar to
support this cause, kind of athing like we see at every
(50:10):
grocery store these days.
Because I think consumers doreally want to.
They prefer to go into aregulated market, get tested,
product labeled, product, havethe variety available to them
only available in a regulatedmarket, and it's also, I think,
would be in the interest of theindustry to kind of better
(50:31):
educate consumers of why they'repaying twice as much, you know,
for the product than they wouldif they were buying it from
their friend down the street.
Because of taxes,over-regulation, all of the
regulatory burden that thesebusinesses face, and I think
that is a huge undertaking and agreat way for consumer groups
(50:51):
like Normal and all the trade,all of those trade groups
mentioned before, to worktogether.
Yeah, I leave it to you, ben,to carry the torch and make that
happen.
In my absence, no pressure.
AnnaRae Grabstein (51:03):
There you go.
Torch passed Aaron.
It's been really cool toreminisce and think back on all
these different chapters and andI really appreciate the
leadership that you've providedthe industry.
So thank you so much and um,thanks for being a friendly face
and I hope that you don'tdisappear, um, in this new role.
Aaron Smith (51:24):
Not not planning on it, not going too far, and, uh,
it's been been great to toshare this time with you both as
well.
AnnaRae Grabstein (51:30):
Yeah, so it's time for our last call.
We'd like to turn the mic backto you, Aaron, for a final
message for our listeners advice, a call to action, really just
a closing thought.
So what's your last call?
Aaron Smith (51:42):
Yeah, I mean, I think, don't give up hope.
If you're in this industry, Iknow it's super challenging,
it's super frustrating,depressing at times.
Do you know, as we discussed,take a breath, step back, see
the progress we've made andrealize the inputs that went
into that progress.
We actually, as an industry, wehave far more resources
(52:04):
available than we did, say, 20years ago when we got the first
medical laws passed, or 15 yearsago when we saw adult use
passing through the states forthe first time.
So we have the resources, evenas small and embattled as the
(52:24):
industry, it seems right now todo a lot and just take a breath,
find a way to invest inadvocacy in a way that makes
sense for you, whether it becontributing to NCIA or another
group, contributing to membersof Congress directly that
support our issue and if we alldo that together, even in a
small way, it collectively canmake a huge impact.
Ben Larson (52:45):
Wow, amazing.
Aaron, thank you so much.
It's such an honor to be ableto do this interview with you.
Thank you A long time coming,but just had such a momentous
part of your journey, and so wewish you the best of luck with
Unite America.
Please unite us, and it's justbeen such a pleasure working
(53:06):
with you, so thank you foreverything that you've done for
the space.
Aaron Smith (53:09):
Likewise.
Thank you both.
Ben Larson (53:11):
All right, everyone.
What'd you think?
Pretty amazing to have aaronsmith on as he enters this next
journey 15 years with the nciampp before that, now unite
america.
Let us know what you think.
Don't forget to subscribe likewrite a review, leave us a
rating, do all the things, showus some.
(53:31):
Just as much as we love ourteams at Vertosa and Wolfmeyer,
our producer, eric Rossetti,thank you, thank you, thank you.
As always, folks stay curious,stay informed and, most
importantly, keep your spiritshigh Until next time.
That's the show.
people have invested their life savings and
millions of dollars into thecurrent system, but the current
system is not working and it'sjust imperative that we really
see that long view andunderstand that for the whole
industry to be prosperous, weneed to expand the marketplace,
and that means opening upchannels for cannabis consumers.
Cannabis consumers.
Ben Larson (00:26):
Hey everybody, welcome to episode 102, 102 of
High Spirits.
I'm Ben Larson and I'm back inaction with my co-host, anna Rae
Grabstein.
We're recording Tuesday, august19th 2025.
(00:49):
We have an incredible show withyou today.
We got a hot take interviewingAaron Smith, the co-founder and
CEO of NCIA for the last 15years, as he transitions into
his next chapter of his life.
So we'll get to that in just abit, but first, anna Rae, how
are you doing?
I love that episode with Rama.
You really crushed that one.
AnnaRae Grabstein (01:05):
Oh thanks.
Yeah, we missed you last week,Ben.
We always miss you, but I dohave fun just going on it.
I kind of like to hear myselftalk.
Is that a bad thing?
Ben Larson (01:14):
No, no, you're great at talking, far better than
myself.
AnnaRae Grabstein (01:20):
This week has been good.
My son is back to school, whichI don't know for other parents
out there.
The summer is fairlydysregulating and I'm excited to
get back to a normal schedule,and I have also been indulging
in some pretty hilarious Netflixcontent.
Late at night I've beenwatching the Hunting Wives with
(01:41):
a lot of the rest of America Ithink it's like apparently the
number two show right now, soprobably a lot of you are also
listening and it's aboutrepublican kind of housewives in
a small town in texas it'sfictional who uh, like to shoot
guns, drink and have sex witheach other.
Ben Larson (02:00):
Okay, the housewives it's a real this.
This came from a Kara Swisherrecommendation, I presume.
AnnaRae Grabstein (02:09):
She talked about it and I got very excited
and had to tune in and it doesnot disappoint Really, really
entertaining.
Ben Larson (02:18):
Amazing, amazing.
Well, I need I need a littlemindless content in my life.
I was sucked into a black holelast week.
Pretty much the entire week Ihad my team, the Pertosa team,
in town.
We do it once every year.
Would like to do it more, but Idon't know if I could survive
more.
It's a full team, intensive.
(02:39):
There's a lot of bonding andjust learning and diving into
all things that make us great,and so it was fun to celebrate
that.
We celebrated our seven-yearanniversary, which, as a startup
practitioner of the past, youknow that was kind of a big
moment for me, just to kind oflike look around and see what we
really built, to feel thepressure of reaching that
(03:02):
initial time horizon of earlystage investors.
Early stage investors alwaysset their thesis to seven to 10
year exit windows, and sopressure's on.
Yeah, it was a great week.
I got this awesome jacket thatmy team made for everyone, and
people listening can't see it,but the ones watching the video
(03:22):
can, and it's legit I gotta sayI I was invited to your seventh
anniversary party on thursdaynight.
AnnaRae Grabstein (03:30):
I didn't come hang out all week with your
team, but the party was greatand you guys really do bring it.
When it comes to swag.
The vertosa team is amazing.
There were custom nikes, youguys high top with the vertosa
colors.
There was um embroidery goingon like a professional
seamstress of some kind.
(03:50):
That was there embroideringpeople's names onto bandanas and
jackets and really cool jackets.
There was just a lot of hotstyle going on, so yeah, I mean
you, you feel how you look.
Ben Larson (04:02):
I think someone famous probably said that.
AnnaRae Grabstein (04:05):
In a wind tour, possibly Possibly, yeah.
Ben Larson (04:08):
She's my new bestie, or at least my muse.
Yeah, the shoes I like sneakers.
I have more sneakers or shoesthan my wife, and it's a thing.
I need more closet space.
But we started this thing a fewyears ago where we do Tosa
shoes, and so this year wasofficially the Tosa 2s, although
(04:28):
we realized this last week thatwe had launched a Tosa 0, like
three years prior.
So it's now a thing and it'skind of fun.
I'm looking forward Like who dowe let design the Tosa 3s next
year?
AnnaRae Grabstein (04:39):
Yeah, and I let a couple people on your team
know my shoe size, because I Ido expect a pair of myself.
Well, you're practically partof the team.
Enough about all.
Let's jump into a quick littlenews update so that we can then
get aaron on, because he's goingto be a great guest with a lot
of things he is also the news inmy book is the news.
We'll kick us off with somenews then uh, well news.
Ben Larson (05:00):
I.
I'm kind of excited that it'sbeen a little bit slower.
You, you know we're in themiddle of August recess when it
comes to the Hill, but thatdoesn't mean that it's stopped
everywhere.
Texas is still Texas-ing, andwe have now entered our second
special session where the hempban is essentially the headline
news, and so it's working itsway through the Senate right now
(05:22):
, and we're going to haveprobably the same fight that we
had the last two times, so we'llsee where that goes.
AnnaRae Grabstein (05:28):
I will say I think this Texas second special
session is just a reminder ofhow much cannabis and hemp
policy is interconnected tobroader policy debates and
conflicts.
And ultimately, you know, texasstarted a conversation about
redistricting in order to getmore Republican seats and that
(05:51):
caused an exodus of Democraticelected officials out of the
state to end the ability ofanything to happen in the state,
which then resulted in warrantsand bomb threats and all sorts
of crazy stuff, but they'reapparently back but also the
inability to make a decision onthe proposed hemp ban.
(06:13):
So you know, we we get veryvacuous in in our minds,
sometimes on the issues that aremost important to us, and
sometimes it's something else,like gerrymandering, that gets
in the way of all the timepolicy.
Ben Larson (06:29):
All the time, like all the time, like cannabis,
rescheduling, farm bill, likeyou name it.
We're always like at the mercycritical to us, it's a hyper
critical topic, but it's verylow on on the list of priorities
priorities.
AnnaRae Grabstein (06:43):
Well, okay, other things high on my list I'm
paying attention to.
New York cannabis retailers weredelivered some pretty
devastating news over the pastcouple of weeks that the Office
of Cannabis Management, which istheir regulatory body, was
revising the way that they werelooking at a 500 foot minimum
(07:04):
distance between dispensariesand schools and came out and
said that over 100 dispensarylicensees would be out of
compliance who they hadpreviously licensed based on
this new interpretation of theway that they were going to
measure and, as a result, thisweek a group of those retailers
that are affected have filed alawsuit against the OCM about
(07:28):
this reinterpretation and thecase will go to court on August
29th.
There are already bills thatare being proposed to align
cannabis shop distancing withliquor rules, which are 200 feet
, or to grandfather grandfatherstores, into the old standard.
That was the original way thatthe OCM was measuring, but
(07:50):
either way it's.
These poor New York retailershave just been dealt like bad
news after bad news and had sucha struggle to get open, and I
just would love to see somemarket stability there for all
these businesses.
Ben Larson (08:04):
Yeah, once again, just regulators having a major
disconnect between the realitiesof trying to run businesses and
, like it or not, you know,we're a country built on
capitalism, so let's, let's trynot to kill businesses, as we're
trying to pretend that we'resupporting them.
AnnaRae Grabstein (08:19):
Well, luckily there is some silver lining.
We got a new state in the adultuse regulated cannabis market
space From Roll for Delaware.
Welcome to the show Delaware.
Ben Larson (08:32):
Delaware.
AnnaRae Grabstein (08:35):
It's a very small state but there are a lot
of corporate entities that are.
Ben Larson (08:41):
We're going to get lit up with bad comments on that
.
We're going to find out how bigDelaware is.
AnnaRae Grabstein (08:46):
It's very important and I'm very excited
about Delaware, so welcome tothe party Delaware.
This is a major milestone andyeah, and then I think lastly
and worth mentioning is thatthere are conversations going on
all over the country aboutpackaging and marketing to
children and how the industryshould deal with this issue, and
(09:10):
it's showing its head indifferent ways.
In Florida, it's coming fromregulators who are thinking
about new rules on intoxicatinghemp products.
In California, it's regulatorsthat are actually issuing
recalls on products that are inmarket that they say are
appealing to children.
I'm sure there are lots ofother examples, but this issue
(09:33):
is floating to the surface andis gaining more and more
traction as we get more matureinto these different markets.
Ben Larson (09:41):
You know I know this probably is going to be far too
logical for politics, butwouldn't it be nice if we just
said hey, that filter that youuse for alcohol, maybe you
should use for cannabis.
And if you don't like it, maybefix it for both, because I'm
not saying alcohol is perfect,but like stop treating cannabis
like and I said this last weekor two weeks ago stop treating
(10:05):
cannabis like it's plutonium.
Right, let's have somereasonable regulations put in
place, and it's not that hard ofa solve if you actually have
functional regulating bodies.
AnnaRae Grabstein (10:14):
Yeah, I agree , because I am not going to sit
here and say that we shouldmarket to children at all, and
nor should we create packagingthat appeals to children, but at
this time, like you, go to theat all, and nor should we create
packaging that appeals tochildren, but at this time, like
you, go to the beer aisle andthere's simpson characters on
cans and circus themed ipas, and, uh, my son loves to pick out
(10:36):
beer with me and he also knowsnot to drink it, and so I let
him pick out the beer.
I don't let him drink the beer,and that's also okay, I think.
So I hear you.
Ben Larson (10:47):
Yeah, yeah, that's a perfect segue into our guest,
so do you want to bring him on?
AnnaRae Grabstein (10:52):
Sure, today we are joined by someone who's
been at the very center ofcannabis policy reform for the
past two decades.
He is the co-founder and formerCEO of the National Cannabis
Industry Association, where, forover 15 years, he built the
country's largest and mostinfluential Cannabis Trade
Association.
Ncia gave the industry a voicein Washington, launched
(11:16):
cornerstone events and helpedsecure legislative progress that
moved cannabis out of theshadows and into the mainstream.
Now he's taken a new role aspolitical director at Unite
America, which we're excited tohear more about today, while
still staying connected to thecannabis community, serving on
the NCAA board of directors.
So, aaron, thank you so muchfor being here.
(11:38):
After more than 15 years at thehelm, this feels like the
ultimate exit interview, sowe're excited to get your
feedback and hear from you today.
Aaron Smith (11:45):
Yeah, thanks for having me.
I'm really excited to be herewith you and although I feel
like I'm kind of aging myselfhere, talking about 15 years, 20
years but it's been a wild ride.
Ben Larson (11:56):
Aaron, I remember coming into the cannabis space
back in 2015.
And NCI was so clearly alreadythere and like the meeting place
for all things policy, but notjust policy.
Also the business community.
Pre-covid.
We were having these massiveevents around the country, and I
(12:19):
remember how honored I was tobe able to host one of the
quarterly caucuses in NorthernCalifornia, which seemed really
huge to me at the time, butthese were meetings of the
different ecosystems around thenation and we were able to hold
it in Northern California at theGateway office, and what I
(12:40):
revered as kind of the placewhere all the licensed companies
, everyone kind of gathered totry to push the industry forward
, fast forward.
Almost a decade.
You know, getting to servealongside you and the NCIA board
has really, truly been anamazing gift, also very
revealing on seeing how thesausage is made and just how
(13:03):
complicated the issues havebecome, and so I'm excited to
cover all of that with you.
But where I'd love to start isjust a reflection on what has
been achieved over the last twodecades.
I'll stop saying decades.
That probably doesn't feelgreat.
It's really easy for us to, asoperators, get dragged down into
(13:25):
how slow and lethargiceverything feels, but maybe
that's not what you walk awaywith when you reflect on the
last 15 to 20 years.
Aaron Smith (13:35):
Yeah, absolutely.
I remember those events atGateway as well and I've been
honored to work with you on theboard and look forward to seeing
what you develop after I stepaway at the organization.
But you're absolutely right, asan operator I really understand
that.
It's easy to get caught up inday-to-day.
It's easy to follow thefast-moving progress that's
(14:00):
happening at the state or locallevel.
But when you look at federallaw, yes, it's happening at the
state or local level.
Or you know, but when you lookat federal law, yes, it's very,
very it's a very long game.
But you know, as I reflect onthe last 15, 20 years, it's
we've been incredible progress.
I mean even since the last 10years, and you know when you
talk about the 2015,.
(14:21):
But if you go back 20 years,when I first started doing this
work with the Marijuana PolicyProject, even the California
delegation of Democrats inCongress were largely opposed,
not just to adult use but tomedical cannabis, and my job at
that time was lining up patientsto chase members of Congress
(14:44):
around the state and you know,show up at their town halls and
such and tell their story around.
You know medical cannabis, howthat was helping them through
their lives, and just trying to.
It seemed like such an uphillbattle we had.
I think we had two members ofCongress that would actually
(15:04):
publicly express support foradult use and you know, you fast
forward.
Today we have almost the entireDemocratic delegation in the
Congress I think they're, youknow, say, but maybe one and a
lot of Republicans supportingthis.
We probably have a majority inthe House for support for reform
, a majority in the House forsupport for reform, and it's
(15:27):
just.
You know, the challenge aheadof us now is keeping the foot on
the gas as an industry, butalso just the challenges that
every interest group and everyadvocacy group faces, which is
that Congress is somewhatdysfunctional and we need to
overcome that.
AnnaRae Grabstein (15:40):
But the fact that we're at a place where both
, you know, the president andalmost every member of Congress
has expressed some support forsome kind of reform is
absolutely incredible slowthings move, but what you're
(16:08):
talking about is that there hasbeen a massive shift in people's
minds and in Washington it'sjust we haven't seen it
translate into policy reformquite yet.
I do believe it's coming and I'msure people that are fighting
for it are remaining hopeful.
When I think about when I metyou, we were both around the Bay
Area.
I was a young entrepreneur.
I just started my firstcannabis business in Oakland.
(16:30):
It was probably 2009 or 2010,somewhere around there and I
thought of myself as anentrepreneur and not an activist
or an advocate, and prettyquickly I realized that to be a
cannabis entrepreneur meant thatI also needed to be an advocate
and activist, and I think itwas people like you that helped
(16:53):
people that were coming to thespace with an entrepreneurial
slant to see that from you.
About what that journey was allabout, of creating coalitions
between entrepreneurs andpatients and activists and
lawmakers, how you were able tocreate the bridges to get people
(17:14):
to work together and see thatwe all needed each other at that
time in order to createopportunity.
Aaron Smith (17:20):
Yeah, I mean, I think I remember those days that
I think you were probably maybewhat I would consider the
second wave of cannabis industryentrants, which were business
people that decided to join the,you know, to make something.
Passion for the plant, probablynot a lot of you know as much
business acumen, and so you know, at the beginning it was that
this, this landscape on theadvocacy side consisted of the
(17:53):
marijuana policy project normaland americans for safe access as
the kind of three primarygroups asa being more medical
and these were groups that werefunded by philanthropists rather
than industry interests.
And there started to be a kindof a rift around that 2009, 10,
(18:15):
11 timeframe where we sawbusiness, actual capital
investment, flowing into thisindustry.
Places like Colorado andWashington were opening
for-profit stores which hadn'texisted in California yet and
really just kind of changed thewhole paradigm where we did get
this kind of influx of interestfrom what at the time seemed
(18:37):
like well serious businesspeople, but there wasn't this
connection to the advocacymovement, no-transcript.
(19:05):
But our members neededimmediate benefit, so creating
events, creating memberdiscounts, all those sorts of
things I mean.
And frankly, I was sittingaround with the co-founders of
this organization at the timeand we were thinking like let's
Google what trade associationsare?
We didn't.
What do other tradeassociations do?
I didn't know.
You know we were cannabisadvocates and kind of modeled.
(19:29):
You know, we looked at, welooked at the beer and wine
wholesalers as other kind ofcomparable groups and modeled
NCIA as sort of just a miniversion of that and then taking
some of the real, you know, theadvocates that were involved in
the space long before NCIA andthrough events and other
networking opportunities,connecting them to entrepreneurs
(19:50):
, so to kind of share thatknowledge, but also share it in
both ways so that those thatwere really super early entrants
of the market still had anopportunity to succeed from
learning from the largerecosystem seed, from learning
from the larger ecosystem, andit's all about just being
(20:10):
stronger together and raisingall boats, so to speak, for the
industry.
Ben Larson (20:14):
It's interesting that when you break it up into
phases, that kind of reallyresonates with me, because I
feel like I was a part of thatkind of second wave as well,
where you had this verynoticeable adjacency to the
advocates, to the medicalprograms.
We still had Prop 215 inCalifornia back in 2015.
(20:36):
I found, at least for me as anentrepreneur coming in and
understanding the importance ofhighlighting the roots and tying
that to my vision of like, howI wanted to represent that in
the community that was around mein the Bay Area.
If phase one was medical andadvocacy and phase two is these
(20:59):
new, capitalistic but stillemerging from the primordial
soup kind of uh, you knowenvironment, we're kind of
maturing into this very nowphase three, which maybe there's
three sub phases because of allthe waves that we we have
experienced, um, but it's verycapitalistic in nature and I I
look at how divided a lot of thevoices are in the space and I
(21:24):
think it's this, this perpetualdrive to try to represent
different subgroups that arelooking to survive from a, from
a capital perspective.
I'm curious of where you thinkwe are as far as still
understanding what we're alltrying to achieve from a, from a
larger picture Like is thatbecoming harder and harder to
(21:47):
get people to align on?
Aaron Smith (21:49):
Yeah, I mean absolutely.
I mean we, we we're up againstjust kind of standard uh, of
business practices, ofprotectionism, where you know
there's, there's, nobody wantsdisruption to their particular
model and that's been.
You know that was a bit ofchallenge.
But you know, I look back atthe as as I as I do look back
way into the past.
(22:09):
This was kind of the case whenwe were advancing adult use in
Colorado for the first time.
We had medical cannabisbusinesses saying no, let's not
rock the boat, let's just staywith this model that we have.
It's working.
Now, fast forward, we have thehemp industry, which is
certainly super disruptive tothe state-licensed marijuana
(22:32):
industry.
We have a multitude of statesthat are all operating in
different regulatoryenvironments, different schemes,
and some of them are doing agood job at enforcing their
regulations, others very much,not so much.
But I really think that thechallenge that NCIA has and that
this whole industry has isunderstanding that long vision
(22:55):
looking forward.
The industry that we're lookingat today is a compromise.
This is not the industry thatwe ever envisioned when we said
let's regulate.
You know, I've got it behind me.
It says regulation works.
We always said let's regulatethis like alcohol.
Well, we're not regulating.
Everybody knows we're notregulating like this, like
alcohol.
(23:16):
This is a compromise that wassort of an interim approach that
we were able to get through,you know, politically, and it
was, you know, expedientexpedient is the wrong word, but
simpler to, you know, to sellthis compromise to voters.
But in the future we as anindustry will do much better if
we can open up channels, likeyou know, something more similar
(23:37):
to alcohol, where, frankly,alcohol sold in the shelves of a
grocery store like Safeway, orwherever cannabis products
should be sold alongside thoseproducts.
And that would be I would get alot of arrows if I was still
speaking on behalf of NCIA,saying that from those who have
(23:57):
and I understand it, people know, people have invested their
life savings and, you know,millions of dollars into the
current system.
But the current system's notworking and it's just imperative
that we really see that longview and understand that to be
for the whole industry to beprosperous, we need to expand
the marketplace and that meansopening opening up channels for
(24:18):
for cannabis consumers place,and that means opening up
channels for cannabis consumers.
AnnaRae Grabstein (24:28):
I like that you just zeroed in on this
concept of policy compromise,because you've also said that
complacency is the biggestthreat to cannabis and hemp
today, and it occurs to me thatthis concept of compromise
inherently means that we need tocontinue to evolve and and that
if we are sitting resting onour laurels or accepting the
reality and becoming complacent,then then we aren't realizing
(24:51):
that there's opportunity to keepimproving things.
And I'd love to hear yourperspective, as you are exiting
the cannabis policy world, onsomething else of like giving us
all some advice about how wecan not be complacent and how we
can understand why it'simportant to invest in
(25:13):
government policy change inorder to create business success
.
Aaron Smith (25:17):
Yeah, I mean well at the federal level.
If you look, we're talkingabout how slow everything moves.
It's super frustrating to theindustry, it's super frustrating
to every American.
If you look at, congress hasn'tpassed hardly any legislation
over the last 20 years.
There's a few big bills thathave gone through Certainly
nothing.
(25:38):
No social issues like cannabishave actually advanced, and
that's because of somestructural challenges that we
can get into later.
I think just how the incentivesto work together to get anything
done are kind of completelybackwards in Congress today.
But it's also because of justhuge priority.
(26:02):
You know different, you knowconflicting priorities.
I mean we have war in theMiddle East, war in Ukraine.
We have, you know, there's agun violence problem in this
country.
There's just all of theseproblems.
Right that somebody came intoCongress.
Everybody who's in Congress isprobably has a pet issue or two
that they're really passionateabout, and cannabis is probably
(26:23):
not that issue.
There are thousands oflobbyists in DC that are working
the halls of Congress every dayon hundreds and hundreds of
issues and we're just a verysmall.
We have probably a couple dozenin the cannabis space now of
those several.
You know thousand lobbyists,and but that you know.
(26:53):
That is the challenge that weface the industry, through
either PACs or individually, bytalking to your members of
Congress and by supportingorganizations whether it be NCIA
or other organizations, frankly, that are doing that lobbying.
Because we only got to where weare today because of immense
resources that were poured intogroups that, before I was alive,
(27:17):
even you know Normal MPP ASA,all these groups that would,
before I was alive, even youknow normal mpp asa, all these
groups that got us to where wewere before ncia even existed,
spent, you know, hundreds ofmillions of dollars collectively
over the over the decades, andit's going to take that to to
get past this.
There's no.
There's also just no.
There's so many othercompleting interests.
There's nobody that's going tofund cannabis reform other than
(27:40):
the cannabis industry.
At this point, I don't.
You know, we can't expectsomebody else to think, oh well,
let's just pay for cannabislobbyists when they've got their
.
You know it's not their petissue, there's a million issues,
and so it's just that the whenI say that complacency is what I
think the biggest threat.
I, I.
It is something I really havebecome quite concerned over
(28:01):
because I always hear well,first I used to hear big pharma
is lobbying against us, whichisn't really true.
Big alcohol is lobbying againstus.
That's also not true.
In fact, big alcohol now ismaybe more aligned with us than
ever.
Or you know, then the boogeymanis the hemp industry.
Or you know, then the boogeymanis the hemp industry.
And really, the bigger issue isthat the marijuana industry is
(28:23):
collectively spending somethinglike $4 million a year in
lobbying, and this is a $40billion plus industry.
That's illegal, and most ofthat $4 billion came from the
top three business.
You know Cresco, trulieve,these, you know the top three
MSOs in the in the industry.
(28:48):
And so it's it's imperativethat businesses carve out some
budget for reform, even if it'syou're talking a thousand
dollars a year, somethingminimal, nominal, because that
that's the only way we're goingto see any any path toward
victory.
Ben Larson (28:57):
Those numbers are startling because we've talked
about True Leave before on theshow and we know that last year
alone they put $70 million intothe Florida effort, and so it
kind of goes back to this placeof what you were saying.
It's like we're on this greatertrajectory at the federal level,
(29:19):
which is much bigger in scopeand much longer, and we're in
this interim phase.
But the challenge that we faceis that in the life of a
business right, I think peoplehave just become hyper focused
on the reality that they'reforced to live today because
it's been so slow, and so Igenerally subscribe to the
(29:40):
concept of just get involved.
But it is hard for me tocontinue to push that narrative
when I know there areorganizations that I don't even
know.
If it's complacency, it iscomplacency from an aspect of
the long view, but in some waysit's survival of what's here in
(30:01):
front of us today, and so how dowe get beyond that?
Can we get beyond that?
And maybe your transition'shopefully not indicative of this
quandary that we're in.
How do we convince people tostop fighting for the status quo
when it's proven to not be whatwe anticipated or what we
(30:23):
expected when we said legalizethe plant?
Aaron Smith (30:26):
Yeah, I mean, I think you know it is survival
and I know that you know maybeit comes off as a little jaded
to say or cynical that it'scomplacency, because I get that.
You know you've got businessesthat are, you know, maybe not
sure they're going to be opennext month and so it's hard to
invest in policy reform that weknow isn't going to happen next
(30:48):
month and maybe even not nextyear.
But if we don't make that somekind of nominal investment in
that, then we can guaranteefailure.
And I think that you know whatI would say to those that are
kind of feeling like they'reteetering at the edge of
survival is find a way tocontribute what you can, even if
it's a few hundred dollars ayear or something.
There's always a way you canchange the, you know.
(31:11):
Change out the brand of coffeein your break room, take, you
know, stay in a little bit lessexpensive hotel on your business
trips.
Find a way to budget for reformand then deploy that budget in
any way that you know makessense to you, whether it be
directly contributing tocandidates or, you know, giving
(31:32):
to trade associations, hopefullyboth, but that's you know it
has to happen because we arethis is an illegal industry and
that I think that's somethingthat has been lost in this third
or fourth wave of investors andoperators that have come into
the space.
This is kind of taking forgranted that this industry is
just going to just keep growingand that policy reform is just
(31:54):
going to keep ticking away away,and I think that there was a
huge wake-up call, probably in2021, when we failed to get safe
banking across the finish line,despite having a democratic
trifecta in Washington, andthat's when we really saw the
downturn in the industry and sothe investment and, frankly, if
(32:16):
you're in this space and notable to invest something like
nominally, like $1,000 a year,in reform, you really just
shouldn't be in the space.
There are a lot of easier placesto, you know, invest your time
and money and energy thanCanada's trying to keep, you
(32:41):
know, move away from the statusquo is.
I think that these, you know,businesses, particularly retail,
have invested a lot in thestatus quo need to be able to
step back and see that they, youknow, by ultimately expanding
the market to something that'smore akin to alcohol, that will,
in the long run, bring muchmore opportunity for them than
the small narrow market they'reserving, which is, you know,
however many people that arewilling to walk into a you know,
(33:05):
a dispensary that's locked downlike a prison, versus how many
people are happy to walk intolike a convenience store type of
environment or liquor storetype of environment.
AnnaRae Grabstein (33:16):
Yeah, Bringing up the conflict with
dispensaries and the concept ofopening channels and more
traditional retail, I think yeah.
When some policies inherentlywill create losers and winners,
depending on the outcome.
And if a business is a massivedispensary chain and that is
(33:51):
where all of their investmentsare, it's very hard for them to
stand with a policy agenda thatwould degrade their
opportunities in the market andthen, as a result, what we've
seen is this bifurcation oftrade associations.
You were really the firstnational trade association that
encompassed all businesses kindof holistically, and now we have
(34:15):
all of these other tradeassociations.
We have multiple on statelevels and then in the federal
level there's competingassociations and in some ways I
think that you could make anargument that it strengthens the
narrative.
There's maybe more peopletalking about the issues, but it
also sows confusion amongstlawmakers and the public and the
(34:40):
people that don't live thisevery day who are like well, why
is that cannabis companyfighting against open access at
retail?
That makes no sense, but itactually does make sense for
that company if you know a lotabout them.
And I'm curious about thisconcept of just diluting the
collective impact by having toomany different voices and how
(35:04):
you reconcile and now thatyou're exiting NCAA, like speak
frankly, like tell us if youthink it's, if it's bad that we
have all these tradeassociations.
If it's good, what do you?
What do you really think aboutall these competing trade
associations in Washington?
Aaron Smith (35:22):
I mean, I'm clearly biased on this fact, but this
was something I honestly wasreally surprised that we had
such an explosion of competitionin the national association
space so early.
It's something I saw like, okay, this is going to be coming
maybe in 10 years, but really it.
You know, I thought this wouldbe a problem we'd have after
(35:44):
cannabis was legal or after wegot the first piece of cannabis
legislation over the finish linein DC, not so so long before.
I think that that you know, butit's inevitable.
So I don't, I don't.
I do think that it's.
It's a challenge that'sunnecessary but inevitable.
And what happened was when westarted NCIA, it was hard to
(36:08):
find lobbyists that would takeour business.
It was hard to find anybody inDC that was credible, that would
work for us.
Then, as the industry startedblowing up and you started
seeing lobbyists that wanted torepresent the industry more than
we could fund, there were morelobbyists than there was demand.
So they started creating demandby starting associations.
(36:29):
So the associations that areout there that now serve the
MSOs primarily were started bylobbyists that wanted clients,
and so we've seen that in otherindustries too.
It's an inevitability, I youknow.
Like I said, I didn't think itwould happen so soon.
I think that the only and I'mhopeful about the future around
(36:52):
this because we are seeing morecommunication between the groups
.
For the most part, ncia and theboard chair, adam Rosenberg,
has been bringing together someof these groups just to at least
facilitate conversations aboutwhat they agree on, rather than
just constantly sniping at eachother.
(37:12):
We're at least seeing somebetter coordination, and at
least maybe communication andcoordination is yet to come.
I'd say so.
That gives me hope.
But there, you know, it's oneof these things that I think is
inevitable in the market,because there's politics.
Politics is an industry too,and it's a big, big industry and
(37:33):
you have lobbyists andconsultants and all of these
other you know actors out therethat see an opportunity and, you
know, jump on it just like theywould in any other space access
(37:56):
to the plant right and and thehaving to work past this interim
phase of this highlyover-regulated system where
people don't have access.
Ben Larson (38:00):
I mean, I'm sitting in, we're sitting in california
or you know.
Still half the state doesn'thave access to legal cannabis.
The ncia and yourself kind ofcame out with this controversial
statement I think it was latelast year that really kind of
identified that banningcannabinoids, whether hemp or
(38:24):
cannabis, is not the path, thatcreating these new access points
is important for theprogression of this conversation
and that is kind of going alongthe lines of this whole like
kind of one plant narrative.
Right, but from a capitalistperspective that's really hard,
especially as we talk about theemergence of all these competing
(38:45):
national groups.
How do we get these othernational groups on board?
And I know that you just kindof identify that.
You know MSOs are a veryparticular type of business
model that arguably benefit fromlimited license states.
But again, that's not what thefuture holds and so I'd like to
(39:08):
understand your perspective onare we getting closer?
Because we saw a lot of theMSOs launch these hemp efforts
and you know it's verytransparent to say it's like, oh
, is that just a hedge?
But I don't know.
Maybe they're coming along,maybe they're starting to see
the opportunity and maybe in thenot too distant future there's
an opportunity to flip or atleast blend that strategy.
(39:31):
But that's not clear because ofthe organizations that they
support and are a part of yeah,I think.
Aaron Smith (39:38):
I think that there's an opportunity at the
state level for the hempindustry and the marijuana
industry to come together,develop policy that that you
know, compromise policy.
That could be good for bothsides of the industry.
You know we see these.
You know low dose beveragecarve outs.
I think we see these.
You know low dose beveragecarve outs I think is a good
thing.
Um, you know, I think we couldexpand that to beyond beverages.
(39:59):
In fact, uh, and that's stateby state and every state's a
little different Some of thesestates don't have a marijuana
industry and that's where it'ssuper important that the hemp
products be available.
The federal level where NCIAplays primarily, products be
available.
The federal level where nciaplays primarily the reason that
you know we oppose.
Well, there's several reasonsto oppose cannabinoid bans, but
(40:20):
one is that if we all agree thatcannabinoids, that thc, should
be legal and regulated like likealcohol or like an adult
product, then the path towarddoing that does not run through
banning hemp.
There's just that banning hempTHC does not expedite any effort
to legalize marijuana derivedTHC.
(40:42):
It's actually quite theopposite.
Everyone I've spoken withagrees with that, including
those that oppose our position.
You know some might not agreethat cannabis legalization is
that important, but if that andthat's you know, if you're
having that kind of a differenceof opinion, then you know maybe
we agree to disagree, but forthose groups which I think all
(41:02):
of the trade groups are on thesame page that ultimately
legalization is better for theindustry.
Broadly, we need to understandthat strategically banning hemp
first is not the right way toget there and that the
compromise might be that thereare these other.
You know from a businessperspective that there is the.
(41:22):
You know now this competing,competing product that is out
there that wasn't there before.
But at the same time 280E goesaway, because if we can legalize
cannabis, then 280E no longerapplies and then the hemp
products and marijuana productsbecome one.
It's just cannabinoid products.
A lot of the hemp manufacturerswould rather just be in the
(41:43):
marijuana space than they wouldif it was legal federally.
So, yes, that creates morecompetition, but it creates more
opportunity.
Competition, but it createsmore opportunity.
As you know, 280e reform aloneis something like three billion
dollars back into the industryannually collectively in tax
relief.
Like that alone is a is reasonenough to me to do anything we
(42:05):
can to achieve federal reformand and good federal reforms
that project sam and the and the, the prohibitionists that are
pushing.
They're pushing for hempprohibition for a reason because
they know that allowing theseproducts to be out there is
actually a pathway to expandingthe cannabinoid market and
(42:28):
regulating the cannabinoidmarket federally, which is what
they don't want and it's what wewant.
So we should not be on theirside of this argument.
And I think I'm hopeful becauseit seems more and more folks
out there are coming along tothis realization.
I mean the other, not speakingfor the other trade associations
(42:49):
, but they seem more receptive,or at least they're considering
their position right now,probably because the MSOs so
many of them are now in thespace.
Ben Larson (43:00):
So I do think we'll get there.
Yeah, it's something Anna Raeand I've talked about I don't
know if on the show, butdefinitely behind the scenes
where my prerogative is like getthe products in the people's
hands, like the rest will follow, like the supply chains will
figure themselves out because ofreal capitalism.
You know, like when, when youactually create a consumer
category around something, evenif it's through a beverage,
(43:23):
carve out it's not about thebeverage, it's about getting thc
in the hands of people andnormalizing it and giving them
access and then making themrealize that the world doesn't
fall apart and actually maybeit's in a better place than
where, than where we started.
Aaron Smith (43:37):
Yeah, I mean the, the what's happening on the
beverage front.
Not that I'm not pandering toyou guys at all, but it is
probably the most exciting thingI've seen, you know, in this,
in this whole evolution of ofthe, the industry, because
that's it's, it's a, you know,as we see alcohol use decline,
which is a wonderful thing forthe country's public health,
(43:58):
we're seeing this opportunityboth from a business side the
alcohol industry looking to getinto THC to backfill some of
their losses but then thatcreates a situation where people
who never would have thought ofthemselves as marijuana
consumers are exposed tolow-dose products that make them
feel good and are a lot lessharmful than alcohol.
(44:21):
So it's a win-win-win win forpublic health, win for the
industry and win for the economy.
AnnaRae Grabstein (44:28):
Well, so, as we're getting closer to the end
of the hour, I want to talk alittle bit about what's next for
you and your decision to leaveNCAA.
You clearly have dedicated ahuge amount of your life and
your heart and your passion tothis work, and it's been a
challenge for everybody who'sbeen in the space as long as we
all have.
And I just want to get realLike are you burnt out?
(44:52):
Are you sick of this all?
Are you?
Are you just ready to turn yourback and focus on something
else?
Give, give us, give us insightinto where your head is now.
Aaron Smith (45:01):
Yeah, I mean I can't say that it's that it's
been easy, that's for sure.
I I I guess what you know.
The opportunity that that's infront of me now is to apply the
skills that I've developed overthe last two decades working in
politics toward somefoundational problems that are
at the heart of frustrationsthat we have as an industry
(45:22):
about why federal policy reformseems to be stalled, and it's
not.
You know, this is like I saidat the beginning of this
conversation.
We're not in a situation wherethe cannabis industry is so
controversial that members ofCongress aren't willing to
support our legislation.
We're in a situation whereCongress isn't passing
(45:43):
legislation because they're notincentivized Democrats are not
incentivized to work forRepublicans and vice versa to
just pass common sense solutions, and so this is an example of
this.
When we talk about the SafeBanking Act, we have super
majority vote for that or we didin 2021, and we still have a
(46:04):
majority support in Congress,but it doesn't get over the
finish line because on theDemocratic side, you have
members that are posturing andpandering to their very far left
base, saying we're only goingto pass legislation if it
includes all of these socialjustice provisions that make it
the perfect bill for the farleft.
(46:24):
And then you have Republicanswho are turned off by that and
not going to get anywhere closeto those social justice
proposals and are also kind ofhaving to kowtow to the far
right, which is still in thereefer madness era, when the
majority 70% or so of Americanswant to see this plant legalized
, and that is what UnitedAmerica calls the primary
(46:47):
problem.
90% of seats in Congress areeffectively determined in
primaries, where voter turnoutis dramatically lower than in
the general election, and thereforms that I'm looking to help
enact would resolve that bybringing in more, making the
primary elections more inclusiveof independence and making the
(47:11):
general elections morecompetitive, so that when you
have a member of Congress,they're accountable to the
people, not to just a smallnumber of primary voters that
care about a very narrow set ofissues.
So I see this as not walkingaway from the fight that I've
started 20 years ago, but it'ssort of a natural evolution into
(47:34):
and also just having worked inthis field for so long.
Becoming frustrated withCongress and seeing how the
sausage is made made me realizethat there are other places I
could put my energy into thatwould help cannabis, but also a
myriad of other issues that Icare about outside of cannabis,
believe it or not.
Ben Larson (47:54):
So what I'm hearing is the opposite of burnout.
He was dealing with a hardproblem, found the root of that
hard problem is a bigger,hairier, harder problem and
decided I'm going to go solvefor that.
That's right, Godspeed, Aaron.
Okay, so you said somethingabout the populace 70% of
(48:16):
Americans being in support ofcannabis, and this idea popped
in my head, and I you know thisbetter than anyone, and so I'm
just curious if this has beendone before.
Nonprofits that have beeninfluential in the past that are
not in the cannabis industryfor me are like the American
cancer society, and I knowthere's all these talk about
(48:37):
where most of their funds comefrom and how they might be
biased, but the original intentwas like to give the populace a
voice and for people to puttheir money behind the movement.
Has cannabis tried that likeare?
Are we there?
Yet?
I it's.
I feel like we might almost bethere.
Where we have so many brandsand so many companies that have
followings, Can we startleveraging the power of the
(48:58):
populace to push our broaderinitiative forward?
Legalization, access, safeaccess Generally these backroom
conversations between theorganizations generally agree on
, but because of their verybusiness-oriented constituents,
it's hard for them to fullyadopt into this kind of more
(49:20):
altruistic path.
Aaron Smith (49:28):
Yeah, I do think that there's a huge opportunity
there that has so far beensomewhat underutilized.
You have great groups likeNormal.
Normal's the kind of goldstandard of a consumer-facing
organization.
I would love to see Normal, forexample and I've talked to them
about this, you know privately,but I would say here publicly
that Normal should look atpartnering with industry to
(49:49):
activate all of these consumersthat are coming in and out of
dispensaries to either takegrassroots political action,
calling members of Congress andsuch, but also contributing at
the point of sale and I knowthere have been similar efforts
around this but round up yoursale to the nearest dollar to
support this cause, kind of athing like we see at every
(50:10):
grocery store these days.
Because I think consumers doreally want to.
They prefer to go into aregulated market, get tested,
product labeled, product, havethe variety available to them
only available in a regulatedmarket, and it's also, I think,
would be in the interest of theindustry to kind of better
(50:31):
educate consumers of why they'repaying twice as much, you know,
for the product than they wouldif they were buying it from
their friend down the street.
Because of taxes,over-regulation, all of the
regulatory burden that thesebusinesses face, and I think
that is a huge undertaking and agreat way for consumer groups
(50:51):
like Normal and all the trade,all of those trade groups
mentioned before, to worktogether.
Yeah, I leave it to you, ben,to carry the torch and make that
happen.
In my absence, no pressure.
AnnaRae Grabstein (51:03):
There you go.
Torch passed Aaron.
It's been really cool toreminisce and think back on all
these different chapters and andI really appreciate the
leadership that you've providedthe industry.
So thank you so much and um,thanks for being a friendly face
and I hope that you don'tdisappear, um, in this new role.
Aaron Smith (51:24):
Not not planning on it, not going too far, and, uh,
it's been been great to toshare this time with you both as
well.
AnnaRae Grabstein (51:30):
Yeah, so it's time for our last call.
We'd like to turn the mic backto you, Aaron, for a final
message for our listeners advice, a call to action, really just
a closing thought.
So what's your last call?
Aaron Smith (51:42):
Yeah, I mean, I think, don't give up hope.
If you're in this industry, Iknow it's super challenging,
it's super frustrating,depressing at times.
Do you know, as we discussed,take a breath, step back, see
the progress we've made andrealize the inputs that went
into that progress.
We actually, as an industry, wehave far more resources
(52:04):
available than we did, say, 20years ago when we got the first
medical laws passed, or 15 yearsago when we saw adult use
passing through the states forthe first time.
So we have the resources, evenas small and embattled as the
(52:24):
industry, it seems right now todo a lot and just take a breath,
find a way to invest inadvocacy in a way that makes
sense for you, whether it becontributing to NCIA or another
group, contributing to membersof Congress directly that
support our issue and if we alldo that together, even in a
small way, it collectively canmake a huge impact.
Ben Larson (52:45):
Wow, amazing.
Aaron, thank you so much.
It's such an honor to be ableto do this interview with you.
Thank you A long time coming,but just had such a momentous
part of your journey, and so wewish you the best of luck with
Unite America.
Please unite us, and it's justbeen such a pleasure working
(53:06):
with you, so thank you foreverything that you've done for
the space.
Aaron Smith (53:09):
Likewise.
Thank you both.
Ben Larson (53:11):
All right, everyone.
What'd you think?
Pretty amazing to have aaronsmith on as he enters this next
journey 15 years with the nciampp before that, now unite
america.
Let us know what you think.
Don't forget to subscribe likewrite a review, leave us a
rating, do all the things, showus some.
(53:31):
Just as much as we love ourteams at Vertosa and Wolfmeyer,
our producer, eric Rossetti,thank you, thank you, thank you.
As always, folks stay curious,stay informed and, most
importantly, keep your spiritshigh Until next time.
That's the show.
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