Latest / CashcolorcannabisPodcast / Legacy to Leadership: Ethos CEO Gibran Washington on Cannabis, Corporate Leadership & the Future of the Industry

Transcript

Legacy to Leadership: Ethos CEO Gibran Washington on Cannabis, Corporate Leadership & the Future of the Industry · CashcolorcannabisPodcast

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_03: What's going on, everybody?
• 0:01
  SPEAKER_03: Welcome back to the Cash Color Cannabis Podcast, a high level of conversation.
• 0:05
  SPEAKER_03: I am your host, Mecca.
• 0:06
  SPEAKER_03: Today I'm joined by Jabron Washington, CEO of Ethos Cannabis.
• 0:11
  SPEAKER_03: In this episode, we talk about his journey from athlete to corporate leader, how cannabis shaped his life long before he entered the industry.
• 0:18
  SPEAKER_03: What makes Ethos different, and why the future of cannabis depends on quality, opportunity, and thought for leadership.
• 0:25
  SPEAKER_03: So let's get into this conversation with Jabron.
• 0:37
  SPEAKER_04: So Jabron, how are you doing today?
• 0:38
  SPEAKER_01: Man, I appreciate it, man.
• 0:39
  SPEAKER_01: I'm doing well, brother.
• 0:40
  SPEAKER_01: Thanks for coming down to our barbershop, man.
• 0:42
  SPEAKER_04: No problem.
• 0:43
  SPEAKER_04: First off, man, I gotta salute the barber, man.
• 0:44
  SPEAKER_04: That's a good cut.
• 0:45
  SPEAKER_04: I got my cut yesterday because I said I can't walk into a barbershop.
• 0:48
  SPEAKER_04: You know, again, we speak our code.
• 0:49
  SPEAKER_04: I can't walk into a black barbershop looking busted.
• 0:51
  SPEAKER_04: I gotta get make sure I'm looking right.
• 0:53
  SPEAKER_04: He got you together today.
• 0:54
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, he always does, man.
• 0:55
  SPEAKER_00: He always does, man.
• 0:56
  SPEAKER_00: 20 20 plus years, man.
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_04: That's what's up, man.
• 0:59
  SPEAKER_04: All right, so speaking of um just yourself, man, talk to us about how you found yourself in this space of cannabis.
• 1:05
  SPEAKER_04: I know that you're initially, you know, you're an athlete, you know, you start off playing ball, but what got you into cannabis overall?
• 1:12
  SPEAKER_02: Well, I mean, I think the the journey for me in cannabis is is kind of bifurcated.
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_02: You know, I I've told the story maybe once or twice, but you know, I first got high when I was 10.
• 1:21
  SPEAKER_02: Um, so my journey with cannabis has always been uh experimental, um, I guess you would say.
• 1:28
  SPEAKER_02: You know, I've older brothers, so you know, my older brothers got into cannabis, I got into cannabis.
• 1:32
  SPEAKER_02: Um, you know, I was valedictorian in high school, so cannabis never held me back.
• 1:36
  SPEAKER_02: And then as I got older, my father got cancer.
• 1:38
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and then with through the cancer thing, I saw an executive um use cancer as a therapeutic um treatment for cancer as he was going through the radiation and chemo and all those other kinds of things.
• 1:48
  SPEAKER_02: And then my brother um unfortunately lost his life to the war on drugs.
• 1:52
  SPEAKER_02: You know, he was probably a street pharmacist way before I was.
• 1:54
  SPEAKER_02: Um I had this bifurcated experience with cannabis.
• 1:57
  SPEAKER_02: So it was always kind of a part of my DNA, part of everything that was uh what I thought was okay.
• 2:02
  SPEAKER_02: You know, I knew two good people who had experience with cannabis.
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_02: One had a negative impact, one had a positive, negative outcome, one had a positive outcome.
• 2:09
  SPEAKER_02: Um so it was always part of who I was.
• 2:10
  SPEAKER_02: And then I played basketball in college.
• 2:12
  SPEAKER_02: Um and I preferred CBD than anything else as it pertains to you know pain pills, anti-inflammatory stuff like that.
• 2:18
  SPEAKER_02: So then as part of my therapeutic regimen, cannabis became part of who it was.
• 2:22
  SPEAKER_02: And then as I got out of college, I was always the guy known to like not go to happy hour or leave happy hour early because I used to have to go get high.
• 2:30
  SPEAKER_02: And once you smell like weeds, you can't go back down into corporate America and go hang out.
• 2:34
  SPEAKER_02: So it was always a part of, you know, kind of my DNA and my upbringing and who I was.
• 2:39
  SPEAKER_02: Um so when the opportunity kind of came to get into the industry on a more formal basis, um, you know, I said no a couple times because of my black market experience with my brothers, both my brothers, um, and some of the stuff that I was doing in college.
• 2:52
  SPEAKER_02: I didn't know if the negative connotation around cannabis was right in my corporate American um career path that I was taking.
• 2:59
  SPEAKER_02: Um and then after a couple no's, I finally turned it into a yes because I felt as though, you know, not many people um have my background in terms of you know having the legacy understanding of cannabis and the therapeutic understanding of cannabis as well as the corporate training.
• 3:11
  SPEAKER_02: Um so coming into the industry, I thought I was a unicorn.
• 3:14
  SPEAKER_02: I still think that I'm probably one of a few um that kind of understand both worlds.
• 3:18
  SPEAKER_02: Um so that's kind of like the journey, you know, indirect but directly, um, to where I kind of sit today as the CEO ethos.
• 3:24
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, you're right.
• 3:24
  SPEAKER_04: You are a unicorn in a lot of ways, because as I mentioned when we first spoke on the phone, that the only other black CEO I could think of who was a head of a company was um Troy Thatch, SP's Troy Datro, but um when he was at the People's Club.
• 3:37
  SPEAKER_04: Um speak to us about being that kind of person because we don't see too many black people or black faces at all at the head of the food chain when it comes to MSO.
• 3:45
  SPEAKER_04: What's that per what's that being what's that situation like?
• 3:48
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, I think it's an honor and a privilege.
• 3:50
  SPEAKER_02: Um for me and for people that know me.
• 3:53
  SPEAKER_02: I don't think that um it's a shock.
• 3:56
  SPEAKER_02: Um, you know, I think that, you know, uh African Americans and leadership positions or roles is natural for us.
• 4:01
  SPEAKER_02: I think, you know, the the the larger population, other than African-American communities, um, you may think that I'm a unicorn, but I know a lot of business owners that look like me.
• 4:08
  SPEAKER_02: I know a lot of successful uh entrepreneurs that look like me or CEOs of companies.
• 4:12
  SPEAKER_02: So for me, it was a natural progression in my career path to take this on.
• 4:16
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, we're sitting in a barbershop that is owned and operated legacy-wise by two African-American men, CEOs of their own businesses.
• 4:23
  SPEAKER_02: So for me, being a CEO of a cannabis company or any company, um like a natural progression, not a rarity, or um, you know, maybe the way people look at it as it is as unique.
• 4:33
  SPEAKER_02: Um, but I think it's just, you know, one of many people that probably could take in this job and do what I do.
• 4:37
  SPEAKER_02: I just have not been given the opportunity.
• 4:40
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 4:40
  SPEAKER_04: You know, and you came in to another another part of corporate America.
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_04: Um, how do you feel like the skill set you had prior to that was able to help you be successful in this food space?
• 4:50
  SPEAKER_02: Well, I think there's a lot of similarities between, you know, food and beverage and the cannabis space.
• 4:54
  SPEAKER_02: Um, you know, so before that I ended up in cannabis, I spent most of my career in the food and beverage space, starting with um, you know, an African-American-led business called Tinsley Family Concessions, slash my aunt and uncle's company, um, where they have a bunch of restaurants in the Southeast.
• 5:07
  SPEAKER_02: So the entrepreneurial ship mindset was instilled to me as soon as I started in corporate America.
• 5:13
  SPEAKER_02: Um, the skill set of, you know, the service element and reaching across the bar and serving people, um, that element still kind of exists in cannabis.
• 5:20
  SPEAKER_02: You know, people are still trying to come into a space, um, escape their day, um, escape the stress of the day, just like you would at a bar, except now they're coming there and coming to get cannabis from us to be able to get that therapeutic element that they're looking for, whether that's stress, anxiety, sleep, pain, whatever that may be, they're trying to get uh ailment they're trying to get relief from, or whatever ailment they're trying to get relief from.
• 5:39
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, MSOs get kind of a bad rap out here nowadays.
• 5:42
  SPEAKER_04: You know, when people hear the word MSO, it's almost like enemy of the state immediately.
• 5:46
  SPEAKER_04: Ethos tries to try to tries to move by, you know, basically a different ethos when it comes to being an MSO.
• 5:53
  SPEAKER_04: Talk to us about what separates ethos from other MSOs.
• 5:56
  SPEAKER_02: Well, I mean, I don't uh I don't like to play the comparison game.
• 5:59
  SPEAKER_02: Um so I'll tell you what we do, um, and then you can make the determination whether or not other people are doing this, whether it's an MSO or not.
• 6:05
  SPEAKER_02: Um, first of all, we don't remediate.
• 6:07
  SPEAKER_02: Um we do a very organic process as much as you possibly can in cannabis, um, where we believe in quality over quantity.
• 6:13
  SPEAKER_02: Um so if it's not good enough to kind of fit into our regiment of or our rubric of what should be in a jar, it never never makes into a jar for us.
• 6:21
  SPEAKER_02: So we were really big on in the original onset of this company of figuring out quality was going to be about who we were and what we were going to be about.
• 6:29
  SPEAKER_02: Uh, we were the first in the country to have a research partnership with an actual medical unit, a medical institution, Thomas Jefferson University.
• 6:35
  SPEAKER_02: So we really do believe in the medical efficacy of what cannabis can do.
• 6:39
  SPEAKER_02: So having the highest quality, um, the cleanest medicine for our patients and our customers possible as possible has always kind of been what's in the backbone of who we are and is our ethos.
• 6:49
  SPEAKER_02: Um and I think that we understood that doing it the right way may take a little longer.
• 6:53
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and because we take a little longer than some of the things that we've done or come out with, we feel the quality has kind of always kept up to what we wanted it to be.
• 7:01
  SPEAKER_02: So whether other people take that same premise or not, or what their approach is to running a cannabis business, I mean, I can't speak for them, but those are some of the things that we do that we feel are part of the bedrock of what's made us special.
• 7:13
  SPEAKER_04: So, schedule three has been a conversation that's been, you know, basically the lead conversation at Canvas for the last couple of months.
• 7:20
  SPEAKER_04: Um, when it comes to Schedule Three, how do you feel like the that becoming a thing becomes a something for ethos where it becomes a positive, you know, like how is how you feel like schedule three would be a positive?
• 7:32
  SPEAKER_02: Well, I mean, there's it's gonna be a positive for the whole industry once we kind of figure out exactly what schedule three means.
• 7:36
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, I think from a tax implication, um, you know, and the barrier of entry, I think for people who look like me who aren't at Ethos, um who maybe want to get in the industry, I think it's a lot less cost prohibitive now because now you're not paid an effective tax rate of 80%.
• 7:49
  SPEAKER_02: Um, but we still have a lot of unclarity around, you know, what does it mean to be a medical cannabis?
• 7:54
  SPEAKER_02: Um, if it's all the same plant, um, adult use versus medical use, like how do you um thread that needle?
• 7:59
  SPEAKER_02: Because we're in multiple different states where some are medical, some are medical and recreational, some are dual use.
• 8:04
  SPEAKER_02: Um so for Schedule III, there's a lot of opportunistic um elements to it, but we still need clarity from the from the administration of exactly what they were trying to do because we still don't really know exactly what the impact's gonna be, short term or even the long term.
• 8:17
  SPEAKER_02: But we do know now that hopefully in our medical states, we do not have to pay this exorbitant 80% effective tax rate that all cannabis companies are kind of uh beholden to.
• 8:26
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, it was it was literally crippling some companies, man.
• 8:29
  SPEAKER_04: Trying to pay the taxes, but also try to stay afloat.
• 8:31
  SPEAKER_04: Like so many people aren't even in business and they're already paying enough money when it comes to taxes, rental properties.
• 8:36
  SPEAKER_04: It was crazy.
• 8:37
  SPEAKER_02: Well, I mean, that's the element that you know is unfortunate, is I think there's this misnomer of who was paying taxes and who is paying taxes.
• 8:44
  SPEAKER_02: So I think the smaller companies in cannabis, you know, the the people under$100 million,$50 million, they were trying to do their best to pay their taxes.
• 8:51
  SPEAKER_02: The larger MSOs haven't paid taxes for years.
• 8:54
  SPEAKER_02: Um, they have large UTP balances, up to a billion dollars of some of those organizations where they have basically said, you know, cannabis they didn't believe should be, you know, federally prohibited.
• 9:03
  SPEAKER_02: Um and their stance was, you know, we'll fight this out in the long term.
• 9:06
  SPEAKER_02: Um, so we're not going to pay our taxes.
• 9:08
  SPEAKER_02: So those a larger, a lot of the larger organizations haven't been paying that effective 80% tax rate.
• 9:13
  SPEAKER_02: That's giving them an unfair competitive advantage.
• 9:16
  SPEAKER_02: Um, in both the short term and the long term, that a lot of people that you spoke to are now out of business who could not even fight with the government and say, well, I may owe you money, but I may not owe you money.
• 9:24
  SPEAKER_02: So that that's the unfortunate thing is that not all of us weren't paying our taxes this entire time.
• 9:30
  SPEAKER_04: So when it comes back to Ecos, right?
• 9:32
  SPEAKER_04: So what are you some of your favorite products that Ecos has currently that are in supports?
• 9:36
  SPEAKER_04: What's your favorite?
• 9:37
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, I'm a flower guy, so you know, we we pride ourselves in all the genetics.
• 9:41
  SPEAKER_02: I think this year we'll drop about 75 different genetics across our portfolios, across the three states that we operate in.
• 9:46
  SPEAKER_02: Um a Rosin line is coming out um now in the fall.
• 9:49
  SPEAKER_02: Um, we're really excited about what that's gonna look like.
• 9:52
  SPEAKER_02: Um we have a sexual lubricant that's also coming out in the fall.
• 9:55
  SPEAKER_02: So, you know, we have a lot of different product lines that I would say that, you know, I'm a fan of, that I would celebrate, that would tell anyone to kind of uh grab, participate in.
• 10:02
  SPEAKER_02: But you know, our flower is who we are.
• 10:04
  SPEAKER_02: Um, you know, if you're in the flower, if you want good quality cannabis um with unique genetics, good nose on them, you know, good terpenes, good total active cannabinoise, not THC.
• 10:15
  SPEAKER_02: Um, you know, I think that's where you would probably find um me all the time, um, is in those menus where all that stuff is going on.
• 10:22
  SPEAKER_04: So um right now we also see in a fight against anything that seems like it's is inclusive, anything the uh has definitely affected the cannabis space.
• 10:31
  SPEAKER_04: How, if any, has that affected ethos?
• 10:33
  SPEAKER_04: Or how does ethos be able to ensure that there is an equal balance when it comes to the vendors you use and comes to people that's in your business?
• 10:41
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, for me, it's it's always just been about business.
• 10:44
  SPEAKER_02: Um, you know, I I think that I I believe in color, I believe in racism, I think all that stuff exists, and um I think you know what we have tried to do in Ethos is create an environment where the best people um are given the opportunities to see.
• 10:56
  SPEAKER_02: You know, I think last year we had almost 75 internal promotions.
• 11:00
  SPEAKER_02: Um so we kind of look within a lot.
• 11:02
  SPEAKER_02: Um I know our our executive team has more females on it um than most executive teams in cannabis, you know, minority-wise, um, as African Americans, you know, we're probably not exactly where I would love us to be.
• 11:13
  SPEAKER_02: But again, we're looking for the best people to work for us at Ethos.
• 11:16
  SPEAKER_02: And that's always kind of been um the philosophy.
• 11:18
  SPEAKER_02: Um, when I kind of came into Ethos, that was the philosophy of our CEO at the time, who was also our founder, um, was just hire the best people.
• 11:25
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, hence how I got the job um to run this company, where I had been here 11 months.
• 11:30
  SPEAKER_02: Um, so I went from VP to CEO within an 11-month time frame, not because you know, of any other reason besides that they felt that I was the best person for the job.
• 11:37
  SPEAKER_02: So I try to do my best to do the same thing with um all organizations hire the best people, irregularly color and race or age.
• 11:44
  SPEAKER_02: Um, we want the best people to work who are excited and enthusiastic about cannabis.
• 11:48
  SPEAKER_04: So mentorship is important when it comes to being in business.
• 11:51
  SPEAKER_04: You gotta find the right people to keep you motivated and give you something that you can shoot for.
• 11:55
  SPEAKER_04: Um, who are some of the mentors that you have, that's necessary deep being a cannabis, but overall who just helped you kind of grow to who you are?
• 12:02
  SPEAKER_02: I was really blessed to be able to kind of have you know a group of people, um, a village, if you may, that to kind of be around me to kind of get me to where I am.
• 12:10
  SPEAKER_02: Um my godfather and you know, probably my biggest mentor, George Tinsley, um, runs a pretty successful restaurant business.
• 12:18
  SPEAKER_02: Um, my other godmother, a lady by the name Jeanetta Cole, um, she used to be the president of Spelman and been into college, United Way, and things of that nature.
• 12:25
  SPEAKER_02: So she's always been in my ear.
• 12:27
  SPEAKER_02: Um, so I've been a very eclectic group of business leaders and executives around me that have been able to kind of say it in my ear the entire time.
• 12:34
  SPEAKER_02: But you know, my probably biggest, you know, mentor or you know, hero or shiro.
• 12:39
  SPEAKER_02: Um but in first, in terms of her giving the guidance and the mentorship, mom is is probably by four the the greatest impact um on my success or on my life overall.
• 12:49
  SPEAKER_04: So looking down the road, um, what are some of the things you think that we should be looking forward to when it comes to ethos?
• 12:54
  SPEAKER_04: Some of the new things that you're rolling out, any innovations, any things you can speak up like that?
• 12:59
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, so I mean we have the Rosin line that I kind of mentioned a little bit earlier.
• 13:02
  SPEAKER_02: That's coming out.
• 13:02
  SPEAKER_02: It's gonna be you know some of the purest clarity that you've ever seen in Rosin.
• 13:06
  SPEAKER_02: We have the sexual lubricant um that will be dropping out this fall.
• 13:09
  SPEAKER_02: We're also coming out with a spray that you can put into your cheek and it has a very good impact.
• 13:14
  SPEAKER_02: So we're really trying to figure out on different delivery methods that you don't have to necessarily inhale that still have the same medical efficacy or impact um on your body that you're trying to look for when you're trying to treat different ailments.
• 13:25
  SPEAKER_04: And last but not least, man, what do you want to be remembered for the most in the cannabis space?
• 13:29
  SPEAKER_02: We're staying pure and true to the plan.
• 13:31
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and the true cannabis culture.
• 13:33
  SPEAKER_02: I feel that, you know, hopefully some of the things that we do, like putting breeders on jars and you know, going with a lot of the legacy market in terms of like finding those people to source materials from.
• 13:42
  SPEAKER_02: Um, I hopefully there, I'm we left the legacy to be known that you know we try to chase true um to what the cannabis culture was built on, and then hopefully what it evolves into.
• 13:50
  SPEAKER_02: And he wasn't just another shoot um trying to make a quick dollar.
• 13:53
  SPEAKER_03: And that's Cash Color Canvas Podcast.
• 13:55
  SPEAKER_03: Subscribe to the Cash Color Canvas Podcast on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you stream podcasts.
• 14:01
  SPEAKER_03: If you want to help the brand, join our Patreon.
• 14:04
  SPEAKER_03: For a dollar a month, you can get a chance to hear interviews a week before they go live, behind the scenes of the magazine, discounts on merch, and more.
• 14:13
  SPEAKER_03: Head to patreon.com backslash cash color cannabis or copy the link in the description and join out.
• 14:19
  SPEAKER_03: Healthy Cash Color Cannabis delivering the quality shows and stories you like.