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Geoff Whaling: The Goodness of Hemp Act and the Fight to Save the Hemp Industry · Ready To Drink Podcast

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_01: My name is Jeff Whaling.
• 0:02
  SPEAKER_01: I'm the chairman of the National Hemp Association and the chair and president of HEMI Hemp Education Marketing Initiatives.
• 0:12
  SPEAKER_00: Excellent.
• 0:13
  SPEAKER_00: So, Jeff, give me, give right before we went on camera, you were you were drawing your connections in here and giving a little bit of your background.
• 0:20
  SPEAKER_00: Kind of lead right in and give us a give us your background and connection into this business and how you got into this.
• 0:26
  SPEAKER_01: Well, uh, so uh I I love the world of politics.
• 0:29
  SPEAKER_01: Uh worked with a number of Canadian politicians.
• 0:32
  SPEAKER_01: Uh one of them, two of them were the Prime Ministers of Canada.
• 0:36
  SPEAKER_01: Jill Clark was the Prime Minister in 1979 and 80.
• 0:40
  SPEAKER_01: And he was looking to give a speech on the importance of uh looking at the decriminalization of marijuana because of the lifetime um effects that it would have on an individual.
• 0:53
  SPEAKER_01: Um and in order to prepare that speech, I did some research and um certainly uh got research out of the United States that kind of introduced to me the difference between marijuana and hem.
• 1:06
  SPEAKER_01: Um and you know, flash forward uh through the world of motorsports and my relationship, long-standing relationship with um actor Paul Newman, who owned the Newman Haas race team.
• 1:17
  SPEAKER_01: Um, certainly I learned an awful lot about farming and uh Newman's own products uh that he was bringing to the marketplace, his focus on trying to bring good products in the marketplace for the benefit of his children's uh charities, um, the Newman's Own Foundation.
• 1:35
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and certainly uh when he died, and I was rethinking where I go next, um, it was no shock that uh when I saw the interview of Paige Figgy on Sanjay Gupta, um, it was as if Paul Newman had picked up a phone and called me and told me to get off my ass and go and help those people.
• 1:55
  SPEAKER_01: And the rest is kind of the history.
• 1:57
  SPEAKER_01: Um, in between all of that, as many people know, I joined some colleagues of mine from Canada uh who started a company called Tweed.
• 2:07
  SPEAKER_01: I joined them as we grew the company to become Canopy Growth Corporation.
• 2:11
  SPEAKER_01: And Canopy became the largest uh marijuana and half company on the planet.
• 2:16
  SPEAKER_01: Um, so I know both sides of the industry.
• 2:20
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and I've certainly also tried to uh stand up the financing of the industry by creating uh with Bruce, my former partner, um, at Canopy, a special purpose acquisition company.
• 2:34
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, we uh were offered up to 242 million bucks in about seven hours on Zoom during COVID.
• 2:41
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and then we realized that we couldn't invest that money as we were required under that SMAC agreement in the hemp industry because there were no hemp uh businesses that met the requirements.
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_01: Um and as some of your uh viewers might realize, um it was in 2018 that Canopy Growth received a huge infusion of gas from a company called Constellation Brands, ironically, a beverage uh company.
• 3:12
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and uh they kept coming back with more and more money.
• 3:17
  SPEAKER_01: Um and I was one of those uh who uh sat around our executive tables at Canopy and said, let's just take it.
• 3:25
  SPEAKER_01: I have no clue why a beverage company was interested in canopy.
• 3:30
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but at the end of the day, they too, their exquarial studies were showing them that liquor consumption was uh was uh dwindling.
• 3:40
  SPEAKER_01: Um and they saw cannabis, both THC and CBD as being the next wave of intoxicants.
• 3:47
  SPEAKER_01: Um and ironically, here we are today with the industry um looking at ways to survive through the new definition.
• 3:57
  SPEAKER_00: With um what's your the program uh with the uh goodness of hemp act, is that something that's fun?
• 4:04
  SPEAKER_00: How is that funded?
• 4:05
  SPEAKER_00: And then how is how is like uh who who's kind of who's funding that drive?
• 4:09
  SPEAKER_00: Is it kind of tied to those businesses that you already mentioned as well?
• 4:12
  SPEAKER_01: No, not at all.
• 4:13
  SPEAKER_01: Um it is industry driven.
• 4:15
  SPEAKER_01: Um the the reality is is that um now late last September, um I was invited to the White House.
• 4:25
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and some of my colleagues from the Chiber and Grain sector uh attended with me.
• 4:30
  SPEAKER_00: Um you were there with uh Steve, Steve Groff, yeah, one of my former clients there.
• 4:34
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, he's a regenerative agriculture farmer, yeah.
• 4:37
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, Steve, Steve was not at the White House.
• 4:40
  SPEAKER_01: Uh Steve actually, I think, went to Mar-a Lago.
• 4:43
  SPEAKER_00: That's right.
• 4:43
  SPEAKER_00: I'm sorry, he was at Mar-a Lago.
• 4:45
  SPEAKER_01: And and you know, came to me with some pointers since I've been there a few times myself.
• 4:49
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but um the White House approached and asked if we would have a meeting.
• 4:54
  SPEAKER_01: Um, at that point, the National Hemp Association had decided to um remove itself from the discussion on cannabinoids about a year and a half earlier.
• 5:04
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and uh it it was a little bit of a wake up for us in our meeting with the White House senior leadership, who said that they wanted to talk to us.
• 5:15
  SPEAKER_01: Um, in fact, I started the conversation saying, wow, quite an illustrious audience uh to uh discuss industrial hemp.
• 5:23
  SPEAKER_01: And Heidi Overton, whose name is known to our industry, the president's uh advisor on hell, said, Well, actually, we're not here to talk to you about industrial hemp.
• 5:33
  SPEAKER_01: We're here to talk to you about cannabinoids.
• 5:35
  SPEAKER_01: And I've known Heidi since the first Trump administration and her work at John Hopkins.
• 5:39
  SPEAKER_01: So I said, Well, uh, tough luck for you because uh I don't give a rat's ass about cannabinoids anymore.
• 5:46
  SPEAKER_01: The National Hemp Association has stepped away from it because it's taken away from the true and largest opportunity for hemp and what we originally started this mission on.
• 5:57
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and that is the agricultural commodity, fiber and grain.
• 6:00
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and the response was that's great, cyber and grain is going to be safe.
• 6:05
  SPEAKER_01: We need someone with your experience to kind of look at this from a 30,000-foot perspective, and we need a strategy.
• 6:13
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and uh, you know, the strategy that we're getting uh from others, which was just regulate us, uh, is not a strategy.
• 6:22
  SPEAKER_01: We need someone to do so.
• 6:23
  SPEAKER_01: Um, so Morgan Tweet, um the CEO of IED Hemp, uh, was uh with me in those meetings, and she said, let's get to work.
• 6:34
  SPEAKER_01: Um, so we went to a congressional office, we started to do a whiteboard session and look at that so that we could respond to the White House.
• 6:41
  SPEAKER_01: And then we decided to reach out to all of the other hemp organizations, they participate with us.
• 6:46
  SPEAKER_01: We drafted that strategy um and finished it in about a month and a half.
• 6:52
  SPEAKER_01: It's called pushing progress.
• 6:54
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and it kind of looks at the hemp industry to be no different than um corn uh or wheat and the other agricultural commodities that have many uses.
• 7:05
  SPEAKER_01: Um and we just aligned ourselves to the same sort of uh pathway that they had and said this is what we need as a long-term strategy, comprehensive strategy to stand up this industry.
• 7:17
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, the natural progression of uh from pushing progress is legislation.
• 7:22
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and so we decided that we internally, uh, with all those uh participants would draft our own legislation, knowing that NHA is considered one of the most trusted voices on the hill.
• 7:34
  SPEAKER_01: Certainly we pay attention to what people are saying to us.
• 7:37
  SPEAKER_01: Um, our seat at the table in the 2014, 18, and now 2026 Farm Bill.
• 7:42
  SPEAKER_01: Um and in my personal long-standing relationship with Mitch McConnell, um, who I work with since 2013, trying to, you know, really bring this agricultural commodity to a reality, as we did in Canada following Joe Clark's uh speech.
• 8:00
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, we've had a fibrant grain industry in Canada now coming on almost 40 years.
• 8:05
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and um it certainly is, you know, it sells about$700 million worth of products into the United States annually.
• 8:14
  SPEAKER_01: And despite the fact I'm a Canadian at heart, um my uh citizenship is now American, and I don't give a right to ask about my Canadian colleagues anymore.
• 8:24
  SPEAKER_01: Those opportunities should be uh here for American farmers.
• 8:29
  SPEAKER_00: I agree with you.
• 8:30
  SPEAKER_00: Um I want to talk a little bit about this because uh in actuality I wrote a um piece last week about putting some some uh hedging some probabilities on different acts and different things that are going on, and this is obviously a push that out prior to us even booking.
• 8:45
  SPEAKER_00: Um so now with you in the mix, and I saw you guys did a really nice, I don't know if it was organic or or not, but I you were on every media outlet in the past week uh with as far as uh the the announcement of the act.
• 8:56
  SPEAKER_00: Um who are your sponsors, co-sponsors, or how is that gonna kind of help me let me step back, help everybody, the viewers in the audience, understand.
• 9:06
  SPEAKER_00: Um, for those that have followed that, read that article on our newsletter last week, I didn't really have you guys in there as much because it wasn't really there.
• 9:14
  SPEAKER_00: So let's update that and let's let people know where you are, how what's what's the progress behind, or as much as you can share behind the scenes as far as how that fits into the other eight bills that are already out.
• 9:24
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 9:25
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 9:26
  SPEAKER_01: So, you know, there are there are a number of ways that legislation is um brought to passage into the president's test for a signing.
• 9:34
  SPEAKER_01: Um, some is uh instigated by a member of Congress on the either the House or the Senate side who has a constituent that has an issue that that particular that resonates with that particular member.
• 9:48
  SPEAKER_01: Um and uh you know they try to find like-minded people, um, and then together they draft legislation.
• 9:54
  SPEAKER_01: It is uh, you know, it is always a goal to have what is referred to in the legislative pathway for corners uh legislation, which is bipartisan and bicamel uh support.
• 10:09
  SPEAKER_01: Um, so that is the path that most people follow.
• 10:12
  SPEAKER_01: Um, most people believe that legislation is only uh generated from congressional members, but that's not the case.
• 10:19
  SPEAKER_01: Um industry, uh industry advocates participate in the drafting of legislation.
• 10:25
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and certainly, you know, we have, as your viewers have observed over the last year, there have been pieces of legislation that congressional members have introduced, um, and they've tried to introduce, we've tried to you know offset what's coming up with the McConnell language that is to be implemented on November the 13th.
• 10:46
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and all of those have failed.
• 10:48
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and they failed for a number of reasons.
• 10:50
  SPEAKER_01: Um, you know, lack of support, lack of education, lack of understanding of the hemp industry.
• 10:56
  SPEAKER_01: We have many supporters on the Hill for hemp, um, but it's uh they're becoming very uh frustrated by this process themselves.
• 11:06
  SPEAKER_01: And it's only because there are so many uh special interest groups.
• 11:12
  SPEAKER_01: You know, when I first started this 14 years ago, I think there were two organizations in the hemp space, maybe three.
• 11:19
  SPEAKER_00: I was blown away.
• 11:20
  SPEAKER_00: Coming from alcohol, I was blown away at how many there were.
• 11:22
  SPEAKER_00: Like I was like, how it's it's it's it's over, it's overwhelming from any aspect, let alone being a lawmaker having the door swing open all day long.
• 11:29
  SPEAKER_01: Well, and and that's what's happened.
• 11:31
  SPEAKER_01: And uh, you know, I I I hear from staff, I've here heard from members, I hear from the White House um who said to me, like, who are these people?
• 11:42
  SPEAKER_01: Um and and how come everybody says they represent hemp farmers?
• 11:46
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, you know, who are these farmers?
• 11:48
  SPEAKER_01: How many farmers are there?
• 11:50
  SPEAKER_01: And of course, you know, it's a ploy by people, whether it be you know, big alcohol, whether it is uh some of the so-called bad actors, people that are in the lab space, um, that are looking for approval of their special interests uh that have created these groups.
• 12:07
  SPEAKER_01: And, you know, they they might think that members of Congress are dumb.
• 12:11
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, but you know, certainly case in point, um, the comer uh extension language that has been drafted and floating around recently, um, you know, I within probably five minutes of it um being released and made available uh for discussion, and people calling me saying, Do you know that one of the other hemp groups wrote this legislation?
• 12:36
  SPEAKER_01: And I said, Don't be surprised by that, that happens.
• 12:38
  SPEAKER_01: But you know, for people to try and suggest that if you don't have a sponsor, if you don't, and you push um legislation forward, that is not going to go anywhere.
• 12:48
  SPEAKER_01: Case in point with the Goodness of Hemp Act, we as an industry who've invested years in this space and have listened intently um and to the concerns of members of Congress have framed the Goodness of Hemp Act um in such a way that it recognizes the limitations on hemp for intoxicating products.
• 13:11
  SPEAKER_01: Um and it gives pathways uh to stand up an industry.
• 13:15
  SPEAKER_01: And the the unfortunate thing is that there is no committee on the House or Senatide uh that stands up new industries.
• 13:24
  SPEAKER_01: Um and the reality is that the bill that the industry has drafted called the Goodness of Hemp Act, um it it tries to address the entire uh hemp supply chain.
• 13:40
  SPEAKER_01: Um very much like the corn industry, the difference is that we're trying to do this in one piece of legislation because we don't have the benefits of you know 50 years, 100 years of legality.
• 13:50
  SPEAKER_01: Um and just you know, case in point, most people know that corn, like hemp, um, is food and feed.
• 13:57
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but uh, you know, corn quickly became moonshine.
• 14:01
  SPEAKER_01: Um and you know, our moonshine just happens to be the gas station wheat products that are out there.
• 14:07
  SPEAKER_01: Um and when the corn industry realized that this was a huge business opportunity, you know, they went to Congress searching out a pathway to move this forward.
• 14:16
  SPEAKER_01: Um and they they've done so uh with every single segment of the economy that corn can participate in, whether it be textiles or uh fuels or uh sweeteners or you know or food itself.
• 14:31
  SPEAKER_01: Um the uh industry has gone to FDA and to the regulating authorities and asked them for guidance as to how to stand this up, and then have gone back to Congress and said, okay, this is what we need.
• 14:44
  SPEAKER_01: Um Goodness of Hampa is trying to do this all under one bill.
• 14:47
  SPEAKER_01: And we know that it um you know has little chance of moving forward on its own because there isn't a pathway for a bill that touches on six different committees um in the House, let alone maybe four or five in the Senate.
• 15:02
  SPEAKER_01: Um but what we've done as an industry is kind of put our messaging forward um that A, we've listened to Congress, B, we've listened to the White House, and C, our industry needs this help today.
• 15:14
  SPEAKER_01: Um so we've written this legislation as a committee, um, as a group, um, and we've had the seed people and the grain industry, the fiber industry, the beverage industry, the CBD industry all contribute to uh this language.
• 15:32
  SPEAKER_01: And then we've made sure that we've tied it all together uh so that you know we we at least are acknowledged as understanding how this is going to work and how it has to work.
• 15:42
  SPEAKER_01: Uh so um we we drafted this legislation, but we've also, I think wisely, shared it with Congressman Barr, um, and certainly with uh Congressman Griffith and now with Senator Sheehe's office, um, and saying, you know, take what you want from this legislation, but this is what the industry is looking at.
• 16:03
  SPEAKER_01: Um Sheehy was really focused on trying to advance beverages, um, uh, but you know, didn't really understand that Montana, his state, um, also has uh IND hemp there, one of the largest, if not the largest, producers of fiber and grain hemp in North America.
• 16:21
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and when his staff kind of figured that out, they're like, oh, well, how do we deal with this as well?
• 16:26
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and so they have been very supportive.
• 16:28
  SPEAKER_01: And we expect that uh it could be as early as today that we might see a revised uh bar-bill with some support from the Democrats.
• 16:37
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and we have really worked hard to gain uh that um bipartisan support for the bar bill.
• 16:45
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, but at the end of the day, the appetite for this legislation, the bar bill, the Griffith bill, the Shehe bill, is no different than it is for the goodness of hand.
• 16:56
  SPEAKER_01: They might have sponsors, they might have people that are moving it forward, uh, but the overall uh appetite is very limited.
• 17:05
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and and it might, you know, we're slowly working, um, running out of runway uh to get anything moved.
• 17:12
  SPEAKER_01: Just yesterday, uh the uh speaker of the house, um Speaker Johnson, uh confirmed that the continuing resolution language that was introduced last Friday um is going to be a clean continuing resolution.
• 17:28
  SPEAKER_01: There will be no special uh interest.
• 17:30
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, so no, I saw no poison pills or anything like that inside, you know.
• 17:34
  SPEAKER_00: So um so with with what you did with the goodness of help, I read through the entire thing when you sent it to me.
• 17:40
  SPEAKER_00: Um thank you for sending that.
• 17:42
  SPEAKER_00: Um it is by far, and that's why I wanted to bring up the article and not mentioning anything because it is the most comprehensive legislation I've seen.
• 17:50
  SPEAKER_00: Um it is fantastic.
• 17:52
  SPEAKER_00: Um, it is, in my personal opinion, the best platform moving forward for this.
• 17:58
  SPEAKER_00: Also at the same time, the duality is I I agree, the runway is not there.
• 18:03
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I so how do you how do you how does the goodness of hemp move forward or does it move forward in facets between these other bills?
• 18:13
  SPEAKER_00: Does it just get get an enhance the other bills and then you know what I mean?
• 18:17
  SPEAKER_00: Like kind of help the audience understand how it how it kind of moves forward in this timetable that we currently have up until November.
• 18:23
  SPEAKER_00: Obviously, if you're working with bar and all the other stuff too.
• 18:26
  SPEAKER_01: So the the reality is that people who are moving the bar bill forward, the Griffith bill forward, the She Heap bell forward, you know, they like it because it serves their interests.
• 18:37
  SPEAKER_01: Um and you know, the reality is that we need to just let those things play themselves out.
• 18:44
  SPEAKER_01: Um we have not seen the updated versions of bar or she heap.
• 18:48
  SPEAKER_01: We're looking forward to seeing those as soon as this week.
• 18:51
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and we can comment further on them.
• 18:54
  SPEAKER_01: But um, we, you know, based on what we know, solidly know from Congress, is that they are not interested in intoxicating beverages that have no caps on them.
• 19:06
  SPEAKER_01: They're not interested in products that are not highly regulated and available to children.
• 19:11
  SPEAKER_01: Um they they would like to see uh hemp beverages move forward because there is a huge industry that has started, um, but not at where the industry wants.
• 19:23
  SPEAKER_01: They want to start slow.
• 19:25
  SPEAKER_01: And again, to my colleagues in the industry, I encourage them to say to look at the goodness of hemp bill as a starting point, not as a finishing point.
• 19:33
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I don't know, well, I do know actually, you know, after prohibition, beer uh was low dose, um, you know, did not fit the definition of uh alcohol, um, and uh and it was approved.
• 19:48
  SPEAKER_01: And it was a you know an uh uh a beverage uh solution that allowed people to participate until such time as regulations were in place and the alcohol industry could stand on feet again.
• 20:02
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, we have used a lot of those examples in thinking about the goodness of hemp and how it moves forward.
• 20:08
  SPEAKER_01: Um, so we will be happy if uh Senator Sheehe's bill, Congressman Bar Griffith's bill includes elements of the goodness of hemp, but you know, uh in in typical Jeff Whaling fashion.
• 20:22
  SPEAKER_01: I um am hopeful that everyone will see the light and say, you know what, this is uh the goodness of hemp bill is the most comprehensive, it's realistic, and it deals with all the challenges that um both the industry has um but also um you know members of Congress have.
• 20:39
  SPEAKER_01: They, you know, most members of Congress do not recognize hemp as being a fiber or grain, they only know it to be an intoxicant.
• 20:49
  SPEAKER_01: And and that has worked against us.
• 20:52
  SPEAKER_01: Um we hosted a uh reception with um members of the GOP a few weeks ago um under the goodness of hemp.
• 21:01
  SPEAKER_01: And uh I was I was really surprised at the lack of knowledge um about what hemp is, and that they only thought it was you know something that you could get high on.
• 21:12
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it's uh it it opened my eyes actually with Steve Groff.
• 21:16
  SPEAKER_00: I I live uh I live about an hour away from Steve and obviously in Lancaster, and um I think it was 20 2018 or 12 2019 or so uh I went down to his farm and stuff like that.
• 21:27
  SPEAKER_00: And uh touching the plants, walking the plants.
• 21:29
  SPEAKER_00: I had experienced you know being a marijuana participant for my life and stuff like that in a recreational way, but it wasn't until I I spent time with Steve where that's when the correlation came or the connection came through when I saw the different fat all the different facets of what it could mean.
• 21:44
  SPEAKER_00: And it wasn't and even then beverages wasn't even on the radar, wasn't it?
• 21:48
  SPEAKER_00: I was just going with what Steve was producing and what Steve was growing over there, and then to learn the regenerative agriculture aspect of things.
• 21:55
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm so happy that you finally brought up the corn because I think the number one thing.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_00: That everybody wants to act like we're on an island and this is such a shock and all these other things, it's the exact same pathway as corn to moonshine to prohibition and then reverse.
• 22:09
  SPEAKER_00: It's I mean, history is cyclical and we're in the exact same cycle here.
• 22:13
  SPEAKER_00: Um, what is so when the from the from the media aspect of things, we're gonna be putting this out here, and I'm happy to I'm glad that because sometimes when the article's read through, the articles read through like it was gonna be a ninth bill that was gonna compete with the others, but just so I understand and the audience understands, this was an intention of aggregate of education as well as the framework that everybody all these other bills were, the intention was for them to grab what fits for them to more comprehensively enhance their framework to build the industry as a whole, as opposed to the end consumer product with the focus in mind.
• 22:46
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
• 22:47
  SPEAKER_01: And and that is from my years of experience uh both in Canadian politics and here in the United States.
• 22:53
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, that's how things happen.
• 22:55
  SPEAKER_01: They move slowly.
• 22:56
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but you know, I think we need to elevate.
• 22:59
  SPEAKER_01: Um, that is why the Goodness of Hemp Act has been uh introduced and our campaign is under the uh Hemp Education Marketing Initiative, because we believe that right now, at this point in time, we need to continue to educate and market um hemp um as a as an agricultural commodity like corn that has all of these other opportunities.
• 23:25
  SPEAKER_01: The challenge uh first and foremost is that hemp is part of the cannabis um plant.
• 23:32
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and that is the barrier for most members.
• 23:35
  SPEAKER_01: Um, you know, I I jokingly uh tell people that, you know, when uh some of the major media call me and say, well, Jeff, what's it gonna take for your vision to become a reality?
• 23:45
  SPEAKER_01: Um and I'm like, well, I just need um 10 members of the US Senate to retire.
• 23:52
  SPEAKER_01: Um and and that is only because that messaging that was associated with cannabis um uh it you know was an excellent marketing campaign, even though from the 1930s, you know, it was, you know, save, yeah, save our children from hemp and marijuana.
• 24:12
  SPEAKER_01: Um that has stuck with people, um, and particularly with members of the Senate who are you know 75 plus years old.
• 24:20
  SPEAKER_01: Um, they have lived through and have legislated during the you know say no to drug era.
• 24:26
  SPEAKER_01: Um and so to turn them around, although people like Chuck Grassley are really supportive of the hemp industry, but certainly well educated on the potential of uh the shenanigans that could go on.
• 24:38
  SPEAKER_01: Um, I remember in the 2018 Farm Bill, he and I talking about um, you know, reducing or eliminating uh his language that was saying, you know, anybody that's got a drug conviction can't be involved in the hemp industry.
• 24:53
  SPEAKER_01: Um and that conversation led into him saying, you know, Jeff, are you sure this isn't going to be, you know, opening the door, a gateway to drugs?
• 25:02
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm like, nah, you know, it's a gateway to prosperity.
• 25:05
  SPEAKER_01: I had no clue.
• 25:07
  SPEAKER_01: And I'd like to think that he did have a clue, uh, but I think we all had no clue that we would be where we are today when we were moving the 2018 farm bill to uh the president's desk.
• 25:21
  SPEAKER_00: I don't think uh at the time that it moved through, I don't think so.
• 25:24
  SPEAKER_00: But I think at the time from the service side of the industry, when I started out in 2018 servicing this industry alongside the alcohol industry, I was doing um, it was basically service anything that that was in the liquor store.
• 25:38
  SPEAKER_00: So I had beef jerky, pickles, you know, spirits, beer, you know, blah, blah, blah.
• 25:42
  SPEAKER_00: And as soon as the farm bill passed, it was the emails and the phone calls started coming in for, hey, you want to sell the gummies, the flat.
• 25:49
  SPEAKER_00: And then that was for me the biggest wake-up call to saying, shit, this is going to go off the rails.
• 25:55
  SPEAKER_00: And literally, it was when I started getting price books and all kinds of things.
• 25:59
  SPEAKER_00: And and then that was when I wanted to get involved, uh, because I know just like you know, how these infrastructures can work.
• 26:07
  SPEAKER_00: I also being in the alcohol industry, we you know, we have bathtub ginners, we have guys that run state lines and try to cowboy stuff over and break the law.
• 26:15
  SPEAKER_00: I'm used to that chaos and understanding and working in the wholesale side of things, uh, especially that being federally licensed as a wholesaler and being a uh, you know, uh, you know, running that type of stuff, you have to wake up every day and understand that everything's different and everything's got some outside external factors.
• 26:32
  SPEAKER_00: But when when you speak about where it can go, what do you think?
• 26:40
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I don't want to say any odds or anything like that, but like what I don't want to talk about odds at all, so I want to be clear about that.
• 26:46
  SPEAKER_00: What's I what what what do you think it ends up happening in this position right now?
• 26:51
  SPEAKER_00: Do you think it ends up that we go to an extension of the band to then work this system out and build that framework over the next two years?
• 26:58
  SPEAKER_00: Or do you think something does get put together in the next two or three months and and kind of re-pivot this?
• 27:05
  SPEAKER_00: I'm fine with either way.
• 27:06
  SPEAKER_00: I just want to kind of get your opinion, just because I'm getting a lot of in this position that I'm in, you get a lot of opinions.
• 27:12
  SPEAKER_00: You know what I mean?
• 27:13
  SPEAKER_00: And then I'm also physically, I go past the opinions, and I also have sat in those congressional offices over the past few months, as well as my own state uh capital.
• 27:20
  SPEAKER_00: So I go to the source as much as possible.
• 27:23
  SPEAKER_00: But I feel like you're you feel like a very level-headed middle-of-the-road type thing.
• 27:26
  SPEAKER_00: And I'd like to have that kind of a conversation of like, what's the real reality so that our audience, who is founders and farmers and different things like that, can begin to take action and prepare themselves for either path, you know?
• 27:39
  SPEAKER_01: Well, you know, Nate, the thank you for that question.
• 27:42
  SPEAKER_01: The the reality is that you know, there has been very little debate or discussion about true industrial hemp fiber and grain.
• 27:50
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 27:51
  SPEAKER_01: But it's but under the current new definition uh that will be implemented come November the 13th, industrial hemp fiber and grain is safe, um, is fine, um, and will move forward.
• 28:04
  SPEAKER_01: Now, you know, Jeff Whaling saying so doesn't make it an orphan industry um because we still have the issues um that are you know really kind of preventing the industry from growing um access to capital, banking, um, and and markets.
• 28:23
  SPEAKER_01: Um, you know, farmers and most business people are looking for clarity.
• 28:27
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and there is no clarity, and so most people will shy away uh from hemp just because it is too difficult.
• 28:35
  SPEAKER_01: The other side of that coin is that since the 2018 Farm Bill, and I uh credit this comment um given to me to the Congressional Research Service, who in one of their reports um requested by a member of Congress on the hemp industry around the globe, uh they gave NHA credit for assisting some 50-plus countries around the world in advancing their pilot programs, their research programs, their uh you know, their legislation, their regulations, and to the point of standing up the industry.
• 29:12
  SPEAKER_01: Um and uh, you know, I think that if we don't get our act together in the United States soon, um the rest of the world will you know have an industry based on American know-how and knowledge, because there's a number of people in our space that are now traveling the world and educating.
• 29:29
  SPEAKER_01: Um and uh they're doing so without any government support or funding.
• 29:35
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and the funding that is available to the marketplace uh to help promote markets and others is only being used principally to promote CBD and in some cases intoxicating products, which is a violation of USDA rules and federal law.
• 29:52
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but you know, we need to continue to move forward providing opportunities for American farmers.
• 29:59
  SPEAKER_01: That was my original intent.
• 30:02
  SPEAKER_01: Um I did join forces with Paige Figgy.
• 30:05
  SPEAKER_01: She and I created the Coalition for Access Now to help those families who were looking for access to CBD.
• 30:11
  SPEAKER_01: But I don't know that even the Stanley brothers, who were in both the marijuana business and the cannabinoid business, you know, believe that we were going to be where we are today.
• 30:23
  SPEAKER_01: Um and uh, you know, they they don't have the ability to move anything forward.
• 30:29
  SPEAKER_00: From your perspective, and I'm gonna I'm gonna take the heat on this one and just to lead it in, and you can take it wherever you want.
• 30:35
  SPEAKER_00: But um, you know, 22 years in the alcohol industry, I personally, from a business standpoint and as an 18-year business owner, do not understand why the alcohol industry has not accepted the declining alcohol sales and become the biggest champion for this, and and then thus the supply chain, just like we've done with ops and malts and barley and you know, in the in the craft beer industry, you know, people forget home brewing used to be illegal.
• 31:01
  SPEAKER_00: You know what I mean?
• 31:01
  SPEAKER_00: You used to have to buy all the different pieces of the kit, but you couldn't sell the kit together.
• 31:05
  SPEAKER_00: You know, there's different nuances that existed.
• 31:08
  SPEAKER_00: I don't understand, and maybe you can enlighten me as to why we didn't see major brewers and distillers and things like that embracing this as an incremental portfolio item, thus then uh supporting and defending its regulation as opposed to how it turned into what it looks like today, you know?
• 31:28
  SPEAKER_01: Well, and I I think that there were you know spurts and start um on this.
• 31:34
  SPEAKER_01: Um certainly Constellation Brand was interested uh in it.
• 31:38
  SPEAKER_01: They wouldn't have made a four and a half billion dollar investment into canopy growth otherwise.
• 31:45
  SPEAKER_01: Um I think that you know there were companies here in the United States that believe that this was an opportunity.
• 31:52
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but the overall issue is that, again, clarity.
• 31:56
  SPEAKER_01: Um, the uh the alcohol industry, there are enough um people in it that uh don't want any additional competition.
• 32:04
  SPEAKER_01: Uh there are some within the uh alcohol industry that welcome, like the retailers would welcome an opportunity to have more product on the shelves.
• 32:14
  SPEAKER_01: Um the other thing that most people missed in this is that the US taxpayer and the U.S.
• 32:20
  SPEAKER_01: Treasury has lost billions of dollars in excise tax because of the downturn in alcohol consumption.
• 32:29
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and you know, there's no way to stand that up because alcohol is not going to come full circle.
• 32:37
  SPEAKER_01: Um, hemp could be, um, and hemp beverages could be that source of income.
• 32:43
  SPEAKER_01: And what I like about that opportunity is that the industry would accept that you know, the John Hopkins report, which most people um are referring to, uh, is an indication that intoxication begins for some adults at three milligrams in a container.
• 33:02
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and you know, that is the starting point.
• 33:06
  SPEAKER_01: It's not the ending point, but that's the starting point for legislation.
• 33:09
  SPEAKER_01: And when you can point to research and say, this is what is acceptable, um, and this is the line, it's like the 0.3% THC that defines from marijuana.
• 33:21
  SPEAKER_01: No one really knows where that came from.
• 33:23
  SPEAKER_01: I know it came from a Canadian and and it was an arbitrary number, but again, it was based on that is where, you know, 0.3% is when people started to become intoxicated from marijuana.
• 33:36
  SPEAKER_01: So the, you know, that is the reality.
• 33:39
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm I'm now getting a checkup call with a media group um wanting to know what's the latest and greatest today.
• 33:46
  SPEAKER_01: But the beverage industry, um, you know, it's it's like turning the Queen Mary around um and trying to get them to accept something new.
• 33:54
  SPEAKER_01: Again, they're looking for clarity.
• 33:56
  SPEAKER_01: And the reason why they uh, you know, don't seem to be obviously involved in this space is that they don't know anything beyond beverages.
• 34:06
  SPEAKER_01: That's their expertise.
• 34:08
  SPEAKER_01: And they don't look at hemp as being, you know, all of its potential component parts.
• 34:14
  SPEAKER_01: Um and they're they don't want to support the goodness of hemp um build because they only know the beverage component of it.
• 34:22
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and you know, they don't want to get into the cannabinoid um gummies and and other intoxicating products and non-intoxicating products, the CMS program, they don't want to get involved in fiber and grain.
• 34:34
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and so that's why it seems like they're sitting on the sidelines.
• 34:38
  SPEAKER_01: But there are a number of the hemp beverage companies that are getting their associations or putting together associations.
• 34:47
  SPEAKER_01: You've seen many of them come to the long laundry list of those.
• 34:53
  SPEAKER_01: Well, there is a long laundry.
• 34:55
  SPEAKER_00: I don't mean to devalue, I'm gonna be clear.
• 34:56
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not devaluing anything.
• 34:58
  SPEAKER_00: I just mean that when it comes to the time of panic and the and and the time of bracing things, it's a challenge to have multiple directives and multiple perspectives.
• 35:06
  SPEAKER_00: So that's my point.
• 35:07
  SPEAKER_00: I don't I'm not devaluing anyone's work other than at this point, in this time in the football field, we're in the we're in the in the red zone, and a unifying voice is the most important voice right now.
• 35:18
  SPEAKER_01: Well, and it and one that deals with reality.
• 35:21
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, uh And that that's that even better to say it that way.
• 35:25
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you.
• 35:25
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 35:25
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I I you know I know that.
• 35:28
  SPEAKER_00: See the tone in my voice changes because I'm very passionate about this, because unlike everything else, I've been down this road.
• 35:34
  SPEAKER_00: And that where I get frustrated, I want to interrupt you one sec.
• 35:37
  SPEAKER_00: When I get frustrated is exactly what you just said about beverage as well as other people, only focusing on what affects them.
• 35:43
  SPEAKER_00: And something that I'll credit my history in the craft beer industry, I walk the farm fields of rain and the mulch, and I walk the hop fields, I touch the hops.
• 35:51
  SPEAKER_00: I actually, from that, my history learned and trained all of our sales team and took them to the fields.
• 35:57
  SPEAKER_00: We went to hop fields, we went and met farmers.
• 36:00
  SPEAKER_00: Like we went to show this whole the whole supply chain and have people tangibly experience it.
• 36:04
  SPEAKER_00: And I think now you're exactly right.
• 36:07
  SPEAKER_00: We're in this situation where it's confusing, there's a million different perspectives.
• 36:10
  SPEAKER_00: And if you don't have a tangible visceral experience to the supply chain, you have no understanding about what everybody's saying.
• 36:17
  SPEAKER_00: And honestly, I part of me wishes that more people had spent that time doing their due diligence before starting their businesses because you'd have a not only an emotional attachment, but an actual experience that you can understand that it's more than just the droplet that goes in the can that runs down the conveyor belt and gets cleaned up.
• 36:34
  SPEAKER_00: There's a whole world that happens prior to that.
• 36:36
  SPEAKER_01: Well, and I I think Nate, that's a good segue to you know, uh, one of our biggest challenges is that um in this process, um, people forget about farmers.
• 36:48
  SPEAKER_01: Um and, you know, if if we really were able to move legislation forward um that allowed for natur only naturally occurring American-grown um cannabinoids, um, you know, we would have a flourishing um agricultural, maybe specialty crop um industry, greenhouse grow um for uh cannabinoids, um, dual purpose crops and and and others, but um we don't right now because there is the ability to make all of these intoxicating products in a laboratory.
• 37:24
  SPEAKER_01: Um and that and that is not what any of us um, you know, who sat around the table and you know, I love to joke because I hear all of these people saying, well, when we were, you know, the 2018 Farm Bill, and I'm like, I don't even know you.
• 37:40
  SPEAKER_01: Like, I've never seen your face before.
• 37:42
  SPEAKER_01: Like, what do you mean the 2018 Farm Bill?
• 37:44
  SPEAKER_01: And and I also put, you know, some of the weight uh for where we are on my shoulders because at the time of the 2018 Farm Bill, you know, there there appeared to be people who are far smarter than me uh that uh were really pushing for a definition of hemp that included isomers and salts and all of these other things.
• 38:05
  SPEAKER_01: And and certainly they were saying so for the cannabinoid market.
• 38:11
  SPEAKER_01: And certainly because of my work with Page and those families, I wanted to see that happen.
• 38:15
  SPEAKER_01: My focus on the 2018 Farm Bill was trying to fill the gap that prevented uh tribal councils and territories from participating in this space.
• 38:27
  SPEAKER_01: And and at that time there was an incredible pushback from people who said, Well, uh, why do we want to give those people?
• 38:33
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm like, what do you think?
• 38:36
  SPEAKER_01: They're they're Americans.
• 38:37
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and and we should give them a lot of people.
• 38:40
  SPEAKER_00: They've been just for a minute longer than we've been alive.
• 38:42
  SPEAKER_01: Well, and and I I think you know, that might be my Canadianism because uh, you know, the indigenous communities in Canada are first and foremost in every piece of legislation that moves forward.
• 38:54
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but but not so here.
• 38:56
  SPEAKER_01: I I've learned so much in this experience that um you know it's uh it's it is usually the loudest voices than the biggest wallets that uh you know try to uh you know interfere with the you know traditional process um and have tried to get their special interests.
• 39:18
  SPEAKER_01: And right now we have groups that are investing hundreds of thousands of dollars to try to influence members of Congress who themselves, you know, I I I don't want to say that some of my colleagues in in this industry are uh loaded with cash and and not a lot of brains.
• 39:36
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, but those members of Congress would gladly take their money because they're all you know running for uh you know midterm elections and re-elections.
• 39:45
  SPEAKER_01: And you know, they all have, I understand the entire responsibility of congressional members.
• 39:51
  SPEAKER_01: They spend a lot of time down the street from Congress raising money.
• 39:55
  SPEAKER_01: Um so this is easy money for them, people in our industry.
• 39:59
  SPEAKER_01: But I'm starting to see that there are cracks in that.
• 40:02
  SPEAKER_01: Where, you know, after last Friday's um uh continuing resolution language was released and there was nothing in it from them, then I started to see some you know email chains from the beverage industry saying, you know, we're spending$25,000 a month or$50,000 a month on lobbyists, and we can't do that anymore.
• 40:21
  SPEAKER_01: We just can't afford it because, you know, this pathway seems to be getting narrower and narrower.
• 40:27
  SPEAKER_01: And I don't want to say I told you so, um, but I I reflected on something that I've been telling the industry since the passage of the 2018 Farm Bill about uh cannabinoids.
• 40:39
  SPEAKER_01: You know, if people go back and look at uh the 2014 and 2018 Farm Bill, you can quickly come to a conclusion, if you understand legislative language, uh that there was no pathway provided to legalize cannabinoids out of the box.
• 40:57
  SPEAKER_01: Um they they preserved the rights and authority of HHS and the FDA.
• 41:02
  SPEAKER_01: Um and I've kept reminding people, but there have been louder voices than mine who said, no, no, you know, this was legal.
• 41:11
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and you know, I hold those people responsible for where we are today because uh they have sold their clients, again, people who want to invest in this space, a bill of goods.
• 41:23
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and now you know those people are not as vocal as they once were.
• 41:32
  SPEAKER_00: That's that's very uh it's very telling as well.
• 41:35
  SPEAKER_00: It's um I'm very much an observer in patterns and everything like that.
• 41:39
  SPEAKER_00: In the past couple years, it's been very interesting watching those.
• 41:42
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know if you see uh the memes online where like Simpson kind of backs into the the bushes a little bit and tries to disappear.
• 41:48
  SPEAKER_00: Homer Simpson, you know.
• 41:50
  SPEAKER_00: Like that's I feel like there's been a lot of that where they're backing into the the crop field.
• 41:54
  SPEAKER_00: And where I want to I want to kind of leave this with in the last couple minutes here is you know, I don't want anybody to take any of this as a doom and gloom.
• 42:04
  SPEAKER_00: I think there's a realistic, there is a realistic mission going here.
• 42:07
  SPEAKER_00: And I know we talked about lobbying dollars possibly going down, people kind of expending out their budgets over the past couple months and leading up to this.
• 42:15
  SPEAKER_00: What is a what is a path for for any uh anyone in this to, you know, kind of how does how does somebody I think it's a little late now to jump in and I wouldn't say, but what can somebody use?
• 42:26
  SPEAKER_00: Let me rephrase this.
• 42:27
  SPEAKER_00: If somebody's in this industry and has an audience as well as has a community, how has consumers, how can they activate that and not writing checks necessarily, but how can they positively affect what's going on right now?
• 42:40
  SPEAKER_01: Well, and and Nate, I think the commentary that you made about the Goodness of Hemp Act is an example of what can be done by the industry without money.
• 42:51
  SPEAKER_01: Um, you know, we these were people who are um really standing up with a long-term vision of the goodness of hemp.
• 42:59
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and we've worked diligently.
• 43:01
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I've been a volunteer in this space for 14 years now.
• 43:05
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and I would encourage people to go to the Goodness of Hemp uh website, which is thegoodnessofemp.org, um, and learn more about the work that we're doing, um, not only to pass legislation, but to educate members of Congress.
• 43:20
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and certainly if they have the ability to support the initiative, then fine.
• 43:24
  SPEAKER_01: But you know, we don't allow uh your ability to pay to dictate whether or not you can, you know, be a participant in this process.
• 43:32
  SPEAKER_01: I deal with hundreds of people around the world who are trying to learn about how this could help their industry, their community, their country.
• 43:42
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and you know, we don't have a lot of special interests.
• 43:46
  SPEAKER_01: We're saying, you know, my only the most intoxicating products to be legal unless you do that, you know, we're we're we're wrong.
• 43:53
  SPEAKER_01: Um remind people that the starting point, not an ending point.
• 43:59
  SPEAKER_01: Um Your history with the alcohol industry certainly will dictate to those that are interested in listening to you that, you know, corn for bourbon and others didn't start out where we are today.
• 44:14
  SPEAKER_01: And we're just following that pathway as we move forward.
• 44:18
  SPEAKER_01: But, you know, we are more than intoxicating beverages.
• 44:21
  SPEAKER_01: We are more than intoxicating cannabinoids.
• 44:24
  SPEAKER_01: Certainly we are trying to move an entire industry forward and all of its segment parts.
• 44:30
  SPEAKER_01: And we welcome people to come and join us for the ride.
• 44:34
  SPEAKER_00: Perfect.
• 44:34
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I am uh I'm gonna let you know my commitment to you is I will edit this this afternoon and I will publish this episode tomorrow.
• 44:40
  SPEAKER_00: That way you know when it'll drop.
• 44:41
  SPEAKER_00: I think it's very timely to have this up now.
• 44:43
  SPEAKER_00: And um if there's any changes in the in the some of the things you talked about between now and then, um I'll be paying attention as well.
• 44:50
  SPEAKER_00: And I'll send you an email with some filler questions that way.
• 44:53
  SPEAKER_00: Also to let you know, uh, I'll be doing a feature article in the newsletter uh specifically just on the goodness of hemp as well.
• 45:00
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, because personally, after uh after I published last week's, and then you put this out, I was like, ah, I need to, I need to, I'd have to give this the platform it needs because I'm not kidding.
• 45:09
  SPEAKER_00: I absolutely love this.
• 45:10
  SPEAKER_00: I absolutely love the framework you have.
• 45:11
  SPEAKER_00: I've dug into the website, I've watched the videos.
• 45:14
  SPEAKER_00: Like it is a fantastic framework and an educational platform for everybody to catch themselves up and figure out what's going on in the entire vertical aspect of what goes on in the industry.
• 45:24
  SPEAKER_00: So I want to thank you so much for taking the time today.
• 45:27
  SPEAKER_00: You have a lot of phone calls that are going to come in today and tomorrow and things like that.
• 45:30
  SPEAKER_00: So I really appreciate you taking the time out this morning.
• 45:32
  SPEAKER_00: Uh as soon as things I know, I know as soon as these changes hit and marijuana movement or moment and everybody else covers it, and I'm sure you're buzzing all over the place over in Westchester.
• 45:41
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 45:41
  SPEAKER_01: Well, and and and you know, in between, uh immediately following this, I'm supposed to be accompanying my wife on a on a medical um trip, but um I have a meeting with the uh USDA FAS officials in Pretoria, South Africa, who want us to, you know, come to educate the 13 countries that they represent on the goodness of them.
• 46:08
  SPEAKER_01: So um, you know, we are not going anywhere, whether or not legislation comes or goes, whether or not the implementation comes and goes.
• 46:16
  SPEAKER_01: And certainly we're ready for that.
• 46:18
  SPEAKER_01: We've got our own version of uh of uh an extension with pretty big guardrails again, representing what we know Congress has an appetite for.
• 46:29
  SPEAKER_01: Um so we'll continue to move this, but you know, come November the 13th, if there isn't legislation, you can be rest assured that the goodness of impact is not going anywhere.
• 46:38
  SPEAKER_01: Uh we will bring it up in the next Congress, um, where I think we might even have a better chance of getting the full bill broken into its you know component pieces and taken through committee.
• 46:48
  SPEAKER_01: So um uh, you know, come along for the ride.
• 46:52
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely.
• 46:53
  SPEAKER_00: Well, thank you so much again.
• 46:54
  SPEAKER_00: And uh I want to close out to remind everybody this is the Ready to Drink podcast.
• 46:58
  SPEAKER_00: We talk about ROIs, we talk about investments, we talk about brands, but at the end of the day, also, what is this?
• 47:04
  SPEAKER_00: It's about a human connection.
• 47:05
  SPEAKER_00: So when you're walking down the street, put your phone in your pocket, look at the stranger as you're walking through, smile at him, nod at him, whatever.
• 47:11
  SPEAKER_00: Don't be creepy, just kind of feel the vibe and feel the uh the behavior body language.
• 47:15
  SPEAKER_00: When you're at the gas station filling up your cup of coffee, ask the person next to you how they're doing, and actually shut your mouth and listen to what they have to say.
• 47:22
  SPEAKER_00: All right, five minutes of sh of kindness to a stranger every week is my challenge to the audience.
• 47:26
  SPEAKER_00: All right, that's 20 minutes a month.
• 47:28
  SPEAKER_00: There's a lot of things going on in this world.
• 47:29
  SPEAKER_00: It's a beautifully destructive place.
• 47:31
  SPEAKER_00: Your life might be full.
• 47:32
  SPEAKER_00: You got the house, the wife, the kids, the husband, the dog, but that's not the case for everybody.
• 47:37
  SPEAKER_00: So 20 minutes a month of kindness to a stranger, and let's start putting some positive impacts out there.
• 47:42
  SPEAKER_00: So, Jeff, thank you again so much for what you're doing.
• 47:44
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm looking forward to a few more conversations with you as as the excitement continues over the next few months.
• 47:49
  SPEAKER_01: And before I say goodbye, I would like to remind your listeners and viewers that it costs nothing to be kind.
• 47:57
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely.
• 47:58
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely.
• 47:59
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, you have a good rest of your day, buddy.
• 48:00
  SPEAKER_00: Good luck today.