For nearly half a century readers have relied on High Times to provide truthful information about cannabis. Paul Henderson joins Dan Humiston on the BioTrack Cannabis Dispensary Spotlight Series to talk about their plans to expand their iconic brand through licensing and franchising. He discussed High Times Dispensaries and how they are providing their loyal followers an opportunity to own a piece of the company. Produced by PodCONX https://podconx.com/guests/paul-henderson
For nearly half a century readers have relied on High Times to provide truthful information about cannabis. Paul Henderson joins Dan Humiston on the BioTrack Cannabis Dispensary Spotlight Series to talk about their plans to expand their iconic brand through licensing and franchising. He discussed High Times Dispensaries and how they are providing their loyal followers an opportunity to own a piece of the company.
https://podconx.com/guests/paul-henderson
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Paul Henderson: [00:01:06] So, you know, we're focusing on larger metro areas.So that's Los Angeles, San Francisco, San Jose, Las Vegas, And those are, you know, that'll keep us busy for a little while. We have a couple of binding allies in place that I can't exactly say which ones yet or the exact locations, but that's Los Angeles and Las Vegas to start.
Dan Humiston: [00:01:35] From MJ MJBulls Media, it's the Raising Cannabis Capital show.
Dan Humiston: [00:01:43] I'm Dan Humiston.
Dan Humiston: [00:01:44] And on today's show, we're continuing the Cannabis Dispensary Spotlight series with another Cannabis retail pioneer. Stay tuned for exciting insight into the techniques that this entrepreneur is using to expand and succeed.
Dan Humiston: [00:02:08] Today in Raising Cannabis Capital, we are continuing this month's Cannabis Dispensary Spotlight series with Paul Henderson, the president of High Times. Paul, welcome to the show.
Paul Henderson: [00:02:17] Thank you. Thank you so much. Great to be here.
Dan Humiston: [00:02:20] High Times is the most iconic Cannabis brand. No other Cannabis has name recognition, even close. It's well-deserved. I think it's 45 years that you guys have at one point. The only voice in this Cannabis world and you know, it's like I said, it's very well deserved. And now it's time, I guess, for Paul. It's going to take on that brand loyalty and a high times Cannabis dispensary change. It seems like a natural extension.
Paul Henderson: [00:02:51] Yeah, it really is. Forty five years has been an incredible run. I'm new to the company and so I've been taking a look back through history at some of the magazines and stories that have been covered. It's just been fascinating to see that for a long time. I was the only voice know the counterculture and kind of the push for legalization is to see ourselves here right now. It's it's pretty incredible. And you know, what we've done over those forty five years is connect consumers with brands and through the media, through events, through some licensing. So when we talk about retail and dispensaries, it's really a natural extension to what we do. We're connecting the consumers with brands. Now it's just in our retail environment. So this is a major shift for us. You know, moving into the plant touching arena, there's no question about it. But it really is a perfect extension for what we've always done.
Dan Humiston: [00:03:41] Now, for sure. And if like if I was, you know, walking down a street and there was two dispensaries on the street and one of them said high times, I would feel like I already knew what I was getting when I walked in. It's such a valuable asset. And it's this great that you're finally starting to take advantage of the strength of that asset. Tell us about the locations.
Paul Henderson: [00:03:57] We are working on a handful of different locations right now. Our first moves will actually be acquisitions.
Paul Henderson: [00:04:06] You know, we're focusing on our larger metro areas Los Angeles, San Francisco, San Jose, a Los Vegas, Denver. That'll keep us busy for a little while. We have a couple of finding allies in place.
Paul Henderson: [00:04:21] That's Los Angeles and Las Vegas to start.
Dan Humiston: [00:04:24] Wow. Like I said, you walk down the street, you see high times and you like. I know. I know this brand. I know this brand. And what I think is really cool is that gives you a platform to brand a lot of other goods that you will find within the dispensary. There's so many opportunities there, and I suspect that's probably next year.
Paul Henderson: [00:04:43] We're working on really increasing the visibility around merchandise and everything from glass there to rolling papers.
Paul Henderson: [00:04:51] But the high times name, you know, just things that we'll do for ourselves that we've always kind of done it at once, but we'll have that thing in store. But we're also going to kick up a large licensing business where we're working with some very large licensees, where you'll end up seeing high times, merchandise, clothing in places like Hot Topic in the mall. We see the brand, you know, moving way beyond just the Cannabis consumer and much more kind of mainstream outlets. And in fact, we are even working on opening up a merchandise only store on other Chuny in Venice, California. And so no Cannabis sells there, but just t shirts and cops and jackets and all that. So think that's very cool.
Dan Humiston: [00:05:33] Somebody from the Midwest to go out to California on vacation and they come back with high times, T-shirt and, you know.
Paul Henderson: [00:05:40] Yeah, even there, I think we're going to do, you know, high times Venice, where it's only you can only find that merchandise in that store. Right. So a little bit kind of like Hard Rock Cafe, if you will. Yeah. Or really trying to take a few pages out of different playbooks. This isn't rocket science here, but we're really just trying to push the brand a little bit further than it's been before.
Dan Humiston: [00:05:58] It's exciting that you're moving forward with that. Now let's switch gears. Last year, I think it was last year, you guys took a different approach to raising money. I know to a lot of people is confusing. We talked about it on the show once, but it turned out to really be effective for you. Maybe can explain to our listeners what you guys did and you know, how you move forward with that.
Paul Henderson: [00:06:16] Yeah. I times received approval from the FCC to do a rig, a plus offering so-called mini IPO. It's really just the S.E.C. version of crowdsourcing. We saw the opportunity to really just go to our enthusiasts, our readers, our fans, and allowed them to invest into high times still as a private company for as little as ninety nine dollars. So it's eleven dollars a share. So nine shares could oh you could purchase right there on high times investor car with your credit card. Very simple process, at least from what we understand is the most successful reggae plus offering to date. We've raised just shy of 20 million dollars. People did think it was crazy. People thought it maybe was a little bit low brow. Created this incredible connection now with our stand now. Twenty three. Thousand people own shares and times we are in twenty twenty. Looking forward to a public listing on the ATC Q X exchange, when we do get listed, our fans will be the first ones to be rewarded.
Dan Humiston: [00:07:20] That's so cool. I mean, it's so much better than just being a reader. The magazine now you actually own a piece of the magazine and it's a small investment to say that I own a piece of high times kind of. It could be like a once in a lifetime opportunity. It's pretty cool.
Paul Henderson: [00:07:33] It's hard to have companies that are, you know, have been forty five years private, almost all of those years family owned, you know, and still be intact like this. Never taken capital before. You know, last year was the first time I was ever taken outside capital. That was directly from its face.
Dan Humiston: [00:07:54] I take a short break to let you listen to a quick preview of our next episode.
John Kaye: [00:07:59] We'll continue to grow our retail footprint here in B.C. and then we're going to be announcing some exciting partnerships that will take in the US and potentially into Ontario. Can't say too much more on that right now. We basically want to take this, but back it up for global export and sort of represent that B.C. culture wherever we take our best ourselves.
Dan Humiston: [00:08:27] Tune in on Sunday to hear the next episode of the Biotech Cannabis Dispensary Spotlight series with John K. from Burb Dispensary. Now let's get back to today's show.
Dan Humiston: [00:08:41] You know, I suspect a lot of cannabis dispensaries that are listening to the show may be thinking to themselves, this might be a good opportunity for us to partner up with high times in in the acquisition strategy or the licensing strategy. All those opportunities are available right now. There's really nothing is off the table as far as expansion goes.
Paul Henderson: [00:09:01] Yeah, that's exactly correct. But while we are looking at an acquisition of dispensaries in what I'm calling our corporate owned stores, we are also currently working on an entire franchising program. And so if you call it franchise or licensing, there are some nuances. But for the retail sunscreens, we really want to make sure we don't run afoul of franchising laws. And so we are spending a lot of time focusing on if you're an existing store and you don't want to sell your shop or you don't want to sell to high times, but you would love to be part of this network and receive all the benefit of the name and the marketing power.
Paul Henderson: [00:09:36] You know, we are kicking off this project where you'll be able to use our name and rebrand your store high times to look like every other corporate owned and franchised step.
Paul Henderson: [00:09:46] I haven't even really announced this yet, but the word has been getting out and we're probably talking to 30 different stores. Many of those are, you know, one owner or five shops type situations and they can see the writing on the wall and they love to align with us. And so we plan on coming out of the gate pretty strong with this.
Dan Humiston: [00:10:04] That's the game changer. If you can put together a national franchise, definitely be a game as the plan does.
Paul Henderson: [00:10:10] As you know, we don't we envision that not too distant future to be able to go to hard times, dot and look at the map. And, you know, some of the stores will be ours that we own and operate. But most of them will be franchises scattered across the US. While there are some store owners where they can convert their name.
Paul Henderson: [00:10:26] We also see just this incredible opportunity from places like Illinois and Merrill, like some of these newer states that somebody Wednesday license, but they just kind of are going to make up a name. But instead of just making up a name, they just go ahead and move straight into a franchise model and brand their store and open it from day one as high times. And so those are a lot of conversations we're having as well. We think that this will go pretty rapidly and we'll probably get to 100 stores. Could be less than twelve months.
Dan Humiston: [00:10:54] Yeah. And having that back office as a retailer, you have the back office that handles compliance and all the things that you don't want to deal with. It's well worth it. Whenever the cost is to be a franchisee, it's well worth the cost. And plus, you know, down the road, if there's if there is an opportunity to roll it up, there's a huge winner. Yeah.
Paul Henderson: [00:11:16] You know, we intend on having a shared services model where, you know, not just the marketing, which is traditional franchising to share the building across all all franchisees, but, you know, everything else from finance to compliance and all the things you just mentioned, H.R., where we can chicken from a centralized location and help our franchisees.
Dan Humiston: [00:11:37] We've been speaking with Paul Henderson, the president of high times. And you can find all of their information in the show notes in on M.J. Blaze.com. Paul, I'm going to have to have you back on the show again, because I have a feeling the story is just going to continue.
Dan Humiston: [00:11:53] Well, thanks for being here. Yeah. Thanks for being on the show today. Absolutely. Based on.
Dan Humiston: [00:11:59] Today's show was made possible by the generous support of our sponsors, like all 36, the country's premiere blockchain payment processing platform that's providing dispensaries and its customers with a safe and secure payment option other than cash. To learn more. Go to all 36 dot com. Today's podcast was produced by MJBulls Media. The industry's premier Cannabis podcast network with original music produced in part by Jamie Humiston.
Dan Humiston: [00:12:26] I'm Dan Humiston and you've been listening to the Raising Cannabis Capital podcast.
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