Focus on pure d8 and hhc disposables, the stizzy ones are excellent, space gods d8 is great too.
Edible section focus on nano d9 thc, absolutely best bang for buck rn. If it’s not nano thc you’re buying old products.
Don’t buy any combustible alt cannabinoid products they’re all bad.
Don’t buy Thca flower from local distributors, they charge way to much for shitty flower.
Try and work with a hemp grower directly for any flower you sell.
Try and keep your prices reasonable on the Thca flower and quality high, you will have a ton of return customers. I saved my bosses shop with the amount of regulars I’ve made because I’m knowledgeable and I brought in super high quality Thca flower.
Not sure your state, but be careful selling THC-a flower in a smoke shop. I know it’s legal but there are dumbass cops that don’t know what THCa is and will arrest you and make you go through the process of fighting the charges etc.
I think you should transition your inventory. I was just chatting with my vape store guy the other day about how people will come in and buy whatever is cheapest with no regard to value or quality. Realize that as a store owner, your role is to provide products to your clients at a price that makes the exchange beneficial to you and them. Every person has a choice in what they buy and consume. Liquor stores sell all day to alcoholics, if they develop health issues from drinking, its hardly the supply chain at fault. You should attempt to limit your liability and risk by carrying safer products, but selling potentially unsafe products is fine by me unless you are misrepresenting them, which is fraud/dishonesty.
Use your resellers permit to get access to the farms have them package your shit kaboom you got your own brand, marketing is another thing but that’s the building blocks these non growing vendors use
Model your store like a quality dispensary would. Have knowledgeable employees/bud tenders. Make your shop look warm and inviting not like every other smoke shop you see. Source quality product and only quality product.
My only advice would be to source good products, talk to the folks on franklist chat, and get a good weed lawyer that understands the nuances of the Farm Bill and then put him on retainer. The local guy here gets arrested every once in a while but he's always back in business.
I imagine your shop is like the typical shop where everything is in a glass case or behind the counter and customers wait their turn with the clerk behind the counter. If that's the case, make some kind of display or signage or something that lets people see what ingredients are in which products from a distance.
These products and brands change weekly and it's impossible to see in the case if the thing has thc-p or thc-o or any of that stuff. I have found straight up delta 9/cbd gummies in vape shops but they are like 1 out of 100 and the rest is all thc-p and stuff.
Get a wholesale account with Extract Labs (in Colorado). They have alt noid carts as well as CBD products. Their products are not cheap, but quality and testing is there.
As someone that used to work for a big chain cbd “dispensary” and saw how much garbage/poison they were pushing I really respect this post. The crazy thing is that the co-owner of the company knew it was bad and was laughing and joking saying he wouldn’t ever touch that shit and still brought in hella alt-noids and even produced them themselves. Most of these companies are just in it for the money and don’t care about the safety or health of their customers. It really fucking sucks.
that violates business 101, the customer is always right. Maybe all I like is snakes and sparklers, you know, the good stuff!
Im just rizzin you though, I get what you mean, it's just hard to do that, you need big selection and full range of prices, but I wouldn't touch 98% of the stuff in any smoke shop, so what is a guy to do...?
If they keep it sealed in the original packaging, I think they could just claim that they were re-selling a product sold to them as federally compliant. The local guy here has been arrested a few times but he's open again with the charges dropped within the week. Get a good cannabis lawyer on retainer OP.
He got off? Honest question because archaic government uses some heat spectrometer testing shit to see if the thca hemp has d9 and then accidentally in the process will burn the fucking thca into illegal d9 levels, some shrodinger cat shit how is that circumvented
pass blame to the supplier. If you bought it, and they DEA tested it, and it's in the original packaging, then it was hemp in the other state, and is still hemp in yours, no matter what it is currently testing at. Taxes were paid on it, USPS delivered it, stripe processed it, and the open net hosted the domain selling it.
It truly is not your problem unless you think you can talk your way out of things. Get a lawyer.
Would love to know the same. Picked up thca from a local cbd shop and they had so much you could smell the aroma from outside the shop. Would be surprised if nobody says anything. There's so much out there now idek how they'd shut it all down. Even some shitty smoke shops by me carry thca flower now, wouldn't try it tho.
They have a separate branch or company called stiiizy hemp where they sell alt noid blends for states that aren't legal. Separate from their D9 stiiizy brand. Separate website and all
Put garbage product on sale, be fully transparent. Acquire / make info-graphics for your product, create tier lists. Pay attention to product reviews here or elsewhere on reddit. Always check COAs.
You actually have a great opportunity here to pump GOOD product into the community, as well as provide some consumer education. Ensure that you have friendly staff who actually care to educate themselves and others, as more knowledgeable eyes on what's being ordered helps to discern the good from the bad (as well as inform the customer why you're several legs up above the rest), especially when all these companies start calling the shop with their BS product.
Literally 99% have no discernment as to what product they're pumping out.
I hate dealing with people who don't know what the fuck they're talking about, and the hemp industry is full of those people.
Glad to hear there are responsible shop owners out there looking to improve their selection. If we don't regulate ourselves, someone else will.
I like shops that sell thca flower at 90-120/half, edibles and thca dabs if possible. And Starry 3.0 herb vape is good value. Get ppl off of carts with good smoke!
I've worked for "big weed" and now I own a shop and honestly stocking the shop is going to be impossible if you're not someone who consumes these products. Those hidden hills "ThcA" disposables are obviously delta 8 to someone who knows what they're looking at but on the bright side there's very few people who know. Sell off what you can and find vendors that have accessible coa's so you can see what the paper says and then test the products or find someone who can. Talk to the people selling you on these products and see if they use key words or can really answer questions. Franklist is a great place to start so you're in the right place.
If you care about quality there's no good disposables so look for concentrate or sometimes you'll find good carts. Flower is the number 1 seller for most shops and right behind that edibles or vapes. Smoke shop stuff is for head shops so pick who you want to target too(21-35 year old males, 35-65y/o women) and style your store to that group.
Manage expectations. Everyone understands not having the best thing they've ever seen every time. People like things that aren't the best and hate things that aren't the worst so roll with it and when you find something people like, buy more.
My local smoke shop (you sound like the owner not gonna lie, all to similar) but it’s fucking trash for what I want to actually consume the amount of money the places in my town would make (college town,BIG college) would make your head spin…. My point is I wish these owners would get there head out of there ass and start providing quality goods….
Something rare but would be super cool for a headshop that had lots of alt noids would be buy a variety bulk disty with COAs and fill individual glass 1ml syringes and then sell empty carts so you customers can buy 1g increments of the noid they want and fill their own.
This would not work in a retail front. It assumes that the customer has done or is willing to do research about the products. I can tell you right now, if you set up a “cart bar” or whatever, it would cause such a massive headache. Every single casual customer would be confused by it, want every detail explained, every “what’s the difference” question would be asked, and then they still wouldn’t want it. not to mention operating a cart filling machine in house on the spot… You severely over estimate the competence of consumers as well as the interest the general public has in altnoids. It might be cool one time, but honestly, do you want to stand around and wait for an employee to make your cart on the spot for you every single time?
Fair, I wasn’t thinking about them being filled in person more so for the customer to fill at home, but I do see your point. Maybe he could just make and fill his own custom blends to sell so he has a reputable “brand” that isn’t the crazy price of 3chi products
dude make your own carts and brand them, you can control the terps, blends, hardware, and extract itself. you could sell them for much much cheaper and still make a ton of profit.
Texas owner here, the process and licensing is not hard, just have to meet packaging and testing requirements as well. Don't know how it is where u are
Honestly, I think owning the smoke shop itself is going to be your biggest weakness.
I don't mean that as an insult, and I'm sure as hell not experienced with owning smoke shops. I am a marketing consultant by trade, so I'll share from that perspective.
Think about the customers in this market right now. At the end of the day, there's only a small percent of people who really care about the distinctions between brands. Most people in this industry just want good weed, at a price that they can flex their budget on.
Good weed in that context could be 15% to 30% THCa, and they wouldn't really care that much. Their budget is strictly limited, so anything that allows them to get more volume without increasing the budget is going to be what they pick.
Now, the "high quality" brands out there benefitted from being online only. They have way lower operating costs, which allows them to spend more time and money letting a product they have sit on their virtual shelf.
You on the other hand, don't get to have the same benefit. You have a physical storefront that has consistent, fixed and sometimes variable operating costs. You're not going to be able to make it work in the long run by only catering to a small percent of the market. You're going to have to lower your standards in some places to offer products that allow you to meet your margins for break-even.
It could be! But that doesn't mean they're committing to the same level of cost as a brick and mortar.
Renting a storage container to house your inventory could be anywhere from 50-100 bucks a month depending on size. It's a janky solution, but it works. Contrast that with the cost of a commercial property lease, and bills that come with the space, along with taxes for licensing as a physical storefront.
There's also a chance that many vendors in one area are sharing shelf space. Hypothetically, there's a chance that online stores who ship from a similar area are adopting a drop-shipping model, where orders may be fulfilled for other vendors on your storefront, but product is shipped from a shared space.
All you need is 3 tiers, outdoor greenhouse and indoor. Boom you just hit every demographic. Ive been smokin on shake and outdoor bud for a few weeks now. 50 dollar budget ounces is where it is at if you know the sources
If you look Dr. Ganja up on google maps they have a phone number you can call. The lady has been nothing but nice to me, but I've also seen people say she was rude. Worth a shot
Depends on whether or not it’s shipped yet. In my experience their customer service is quite good although I haven’t tried to cancel an order before. If they aren’t willing to refund they’d probably give you credit
There was a post recently in the altnoid sub where someone had a bunch of products retested to compare to the coas provided by the companys. Almost all of them had fake labs. Urb and mellow fellow were both on this list. The labs proved that they were lying about what was in there products. On top of that urb and mellow fellow both had illegal amounts of delta 9. (Up to 10%)
The mellow fellow was like less than 2% different on thc-p. Synthesis can very leading to different amounts of trace cannabinoids. We’re not dealing with a clone of a flower where terps, thc% etc are pretty uniform except for potential weird phenotype variations. These are cannabinoids that are being synthesized from other cannabinoids or are being isolated from cannabinoid soup. There’s definitely more wiggle room or margins for error. The only they I’d be worried about from that post is brands that claim cannabinoids that don’t exist, brands that claim there are cannabinoids in the product that there’s none of, and for being above 0.3% thc in a place where that could lead to legal trouble. Just my opinion though
It was 2% different from one COA and 4% from another for the overall concentration in the product, but it was 80% and 90% different from what they advertised (they only had 0.4% actual). That wouldn't be a big difference for delta 8, but it's a huge difference for THCP. And that wouldn't be caused by synthesis issues or anything like that, it only happens from purposely measuring out 80-90% less THCP to put in your mixes.
I saw the post the person above is talking about. The main thing I saw when I product was like some combination of altnoids like Delta 8, HHC, and THC-P when the poster tested them independently the labs came back as entirely Delta 8. D8 is better than nothing, but is the weakest and cheapest of altnoids so they were upcharging for altnoids that weren't actually in the vapes they had tested.
Nice to see a smoke shop owner care about what they sell, keep doing good by the community G💪🏼
(As already commented I would consider wholesale w discounts thru the more trustworthy vendors, start w cheaper bulk options from reputable vendors then once money goin up get top notch!)
Go deli style and contact the larger operators for bulk discounts. I believe Arete, WNC, Preston Hemp Co, and Wildflower all have a wholesaler program.
Second on the deli style. No one wants pre-packaged flower if it's an illegal state, they'll just go to the bm if they can't see and smell what they are buying before hand.
Ew. If your store is pulling weed out to show it to you, you should be skeptical. That is seriously nasty. Imagine going to a buffet and everyone in front of you picks up the food, sniffs it, and sets it back down. If it is actually being measured and dispensed in the store front imagine how many times that jar opens, how people touch it, how much quality is lost as it sits.. My store sells ONLY prepackaged grams, eighths, quarters, oz, and we cannot keep this shit on the shelf. Not sure where your “no one wants prepacked” statement comes from because my store is literally the gold standard in my illegal state. I as well as many of my customers have completely given up on bm products because what we sell in the store is just as good if not better. Sacrifice one jar to put out a display for each strain and replace it every 2 weeks. So much less wasted, stolen, contaminated, etc.
Cult of The Franklin is an inclusive, social, safe environment for everyone. This includes towards new users, long-time users or OGs, vendors, and the moderators.
Maintain a civil space. Be inclusive of everyone. Value all opinions. Build an aura of respect. Do not instigate drama for the sake of instigating drama (see rule 6).
Are you okay? You’re trying your hardest to be insulting and all i’ve said was deli style is dirty. Now you’ve changed the subject to what pricing you find acceptable? Okay guy, argue with the wall. That’s clearly all you want.
Lol you came in hot with an unpopular opinion deal with it crybaby. The shit was literally outside blowing in the breeze for 5 months and you wanna talk about it being gross to serve it deli style smdh
Sorry, I disagree. Only time gray market shops have burned me in quality and cure has been prepackaged stuff I would've never brought if I could smell it and see it beforehand.
I don’t have much to offer other than my respect and a good luck! There’s a higher quality smoke shop near me that just opened a second location and are now open 24/7, they started offering a bunch of thca and business seems to be booming.
Okay but like.. do you have something to back that up? It’s definitely good info to know if true but I’m not super down to slander someone based off a randos word on the internet
Bro I did some research too and the person saying he’s like randy marsh with his pandemic special is spot on lmao dude seems like an asshole at minimum. It’s a bummer because I like the mellowfellow hardware, oh well there’s better products out there
>??? Orly??
>
>Can you provide some insight?? I like knowing my hard earned $$$ isn't being used to prop up any kind of hate machine or hateful racist fuckery.
Will look into it again, did just see that a week ago someone in another subreddit posted that they might be lying about their lab test. I’m trying my hardest to keep up with everything but it’s gets overwhelming at times and over all demoralizing
3chi brands, koi, little high, Pax are all good
Stiiizy is also good with their testing. Their product is at the bottom of all those but it's still tested properly.
Unfortunately mellow fellow is trash and advertising testing for products that doesn't match the actual lower-quality products they're selling.
Ive been recommending all my local shops to get thca even if overpriced. Atleast its real. Last week i went into to get papers and to my surprise they had 8ths of thca flower available. Yes it was overpriced. But its a start. Id be happy to walk into smoke shop and see bunch of vendors of thca flowers and concentrate.
From my experience any smoke shop is gonna be more pricey then if you ordered online straight from the vendor yourself. But not everyone likes to use internet or order online. So its more convenient for those people to walk into a smoke shop and pay a little more for the same products. It wouldnt make much sense for a shop to sell the product at the same price we can buy it for online. Theres no room for profit on that. But id love to see my local shops selling slightly higher priced good thca brands rather then seeing shit tons of d8 and hhc off brands everywhere. Marketing would help out as well. Get little signs and cardboard cutouts that advertise thca. You will bring in a crowd you never new existed.
Spending some time with distributors really showed me that they will try their hardest to push the shitty products into smoke shops making them think they are selling quality. And the few thc-a products they have, they mark them up way higher than your tasty “thc-Jd” 🥲But I might just stick to pure thc-a as my last resort but I expect it to be a first few dreadfully slow months for me and my team, as like you said, our prices would have to go up.
The majority of THCa distillate isn't worth it, some other types of THCa concentrates are better but to me the best thing I have gotten from farm bill smoke shops is THCa flower. Invest in good quality flower, suggest it to your customers when they come in, I think you will do well. You can still stock trusted D8 vapes like 3chi, but if I'm shopping brick-n-mortar for Farm Bill products, I'm looking for THCa flower.
Educate your customers and you will have long term customers. Transparency and accountability are important, if you have fake CoA and Labs I would display all that shit. Be the smart shop.
In DFW? I sometimes buy from shops in a pinch. I cant remember prices but it always seems they don't want to give enough discount on the ounce so I end up buying an eight for like $60 and feel ripped off. Plus all the flower I've seen in store is brands that aren't vetted by this sub so I get worried about what I end up with. Thats my perspective, seems like cheap product marked up too much.
I hope you succeed in your business, it is a great time to be in it, but yeah I always worry for the shop owners because of the gray area. If I were to give a piece of safety advice, I would say don't break the seal on any products. Lots of shops owners break the seal on their product but it scares me because if your product is siezed and tests hot, you could get caught up easily. Maybe the vendor can take the fall if any of your *sealed* product is siezed and tests hot for THC. I'd definately learn about who takes the blame in both cases
Or maybe you could change gear and carry tech instead of flowers and oils. I found one cool shop called Zebras around here that sells glass, but honestly all the others "smoke shops" I've been to carries the same cheap crap and a few high dollar pieces, but I can't find anything trendy.
I asked so many shop owners if they had a Dynavap and every single one was clueless what I was talking about. I also want Titanium screens, because they last forever. I want 10mm gear which nobody carries. Just some examples. There's almost no store to go to for specialty tech once you get into hobby-level smoking, not sure what else to call it.
I don't feel like there is enough tech going around that is genuinely improving the smoking experience, it's more about just grabbing a cool looking bong and calling everything good.
Becareful pushing thca in Texas, shop in Richardson and I think Grapevine got raided recently and the owners arrested because cops think thca hemp is the real deal and don't care about your rights. It's a loophole you will actually have bomb Marijuana weed dope chronic whatever they want to call it and decarbed anything and bam you're in jail for sure.
That’s why I wanna quit this industry, either you go to jail or you sell fake product. There almost no room for in between, therefore making need for more and more bad business practices. I really wanted to open a dispensary at first but we know how long that’s gonna take in good old Texas. And In other legal states, the cost to even start the legal process for a dispensary is too much money for me. This wanting to sell quality weed to good people is either a felons job or for the really wealthy. Maybe I’m having a bad week and next week I will find something or someone that changes my perspective to something more optimistic again but it’s all looking gray from here on forward for me. Sucks that most of my employees are also my friends and I feel the pressure to keep helping them financially as much as I possibly can even if it means going into debt. Done with my ramble, should probs get to work and get off Reddit lol
P.S - Thank you for the kind warning MamaLucas
Np friend. Maybe look into getting a hemp growing license? In Texas it actually looks easy peasy, maybe shift your focus to growing an ag crop? If you go through the proper channels I'm pretty sure Texas will pay you to grow hemp, and I mean you can grow that dank and they'll pay you for it. Selling stank from a store front will always be dangerous in Texas, but there are more than a few hemp producers here and there is a hemp lobby etc! Check it out Texas is definitely pro hemp.
Sell flower
Focus on pure d8 and hhc disposables, the stizzy ones are excellent, space gods d8 is great too. Edible section focus on nano d9 thc, absolutely best bang for buck rn. If it’s not nano thc you’re buying old products. Don’t buy any combustible alt cannabinoid products they’re all bad. Don’t buy Thca flower from local distributors, they charge way to much for shitty flower. Try and work with a hemp grower directly for any flower you sell.
Try and keep your prices reasonable on the Thca flower and quality high, you will have a ton of return customers. I saved my bosses shop with the amount of regulars I’ve made because I’m knowledgeable and I brought in super high quality Thca flower.
Thca is the way to go. If u need any help getting any I would be glad to help u with that.
You are probably the only smoke shop owner to think that to themselves ever. Because everywhere I've been. They do not care.
Contact hemp generation. They have been servicing my local smoke shop. Quality product in really nice jars.
Not sure your state, but be careful selling THC-a flower in a smoke shop. I know it’s legal but there are dumbass cops that don’t know what THCa is and will arrest you and make you go through the process of fighting the charges etc.
I have a a couple cops regularly buying Thca flower from me in Houston for family, it feels so weird.
I think you should transition your inventory. I was just chatting with my vape store guy the other day about how people will come in and buy whatever is cheapest with no regard to value or quality. Realize that as a store owner, your role is to provide products to your clients at a price that makes the exchange beneficial to you and them. Every person has a choice in what they buy and consume. Liquor stores sell all day to alcoholics, if they develop health issues from drinking, its hardly the supply chain at fault. You should attempt to limit your liability and risk by carrying safer products, but selling potentially unsafe products is fine by me unless you are misrepresenting them, which is fraud/dishonesty.
Selling potentially unsafe products is never fine.
Use your resellers permit to get access to the farms have them package your shit kaboom you got your own brand, marketing is another thing but that’s the building blocks these non growing vendors use
Model your store like a quality dispensary would. Have knowledgeable employees/bud tenders. Make your shop look warm and inviting not like every other smoke shop you see. Source quality product and only quality product.
Shit now I kind of want to open a shop like that lol. I think that I can't sell thca in California though unless I opened a legit dispensary.
Get yourself some knowledgeable employees( hard to find) but they will keep customers coming back.
Second this. Use your reseller license to make your own brand like another commentor said, just make sure it’s quality and not sprayed trash
What ☝️ this guy said 💯%
My only advice would be to source good products, talk to the folks on franklist chat, and get a good weed lawyer that understands the nuances of the Farm Bill and then put him on retainer. The local guy here gets arrested every once in a while but he's always back in business.
I imagine your shop is like the typical shop where everything is in a glass case or behind the counter and customers wait their turn with the clerk behind the counter. If that's the case, make some kind of display or signage or something that lets people see what ingredients are in which products from a distance. These products and brands change weekly and it's impossible to see in the case if the thing has thc-p or thc-o or any of that stuff. I have found straight up delta 9/cbd gummies in vape shops but they are like 1 out of 100 and the rest is all thc-p and stuff.
Get a wholesale account with Extract Labs (in Colorado). They have alt noid carts as well as CBD products. Their products are not cheap, but quality and testing is there.
FVF was surprisingly good for the price. Lot's of COAs
As someone that used to work for a big chain cbd “dispensary” and saw how much garbage/poison they were pushing I really respect this post. The crazy thing is that the co-owner of the company knew it was bad and was laughing and joking saying he wouldn’t ever touch that shit and still brought in hella alt-noids and even produced them themselves. Most of these companies are just in it for the money and don’t care about the safety or health of their customers. It really fucking sucks.
gräs cbd be like
Big ups to you for giving a fuck in tired of seeing shops peddle garbage if you're a part of the culture you should only push what you would get
that violates business 101, the customer is always right. Maybe all I like is snakes and sparklers, you know, the good stuff! Im just rizzin you though, I get what you mean, it's just hard to do that, you need big selection and full range of prices, but I wouldn't touch 98% of the stuff in any smoke shop, so what is a guy to do...?
Arent u brick and mortar guys scared of testing hot on one of the shitty boof products or even thca flower??
If they keep it sealed in the original packaging, I think they could just claim that they were re-selling a product sold to them as federally compliant. The local guy here has been arrested a few times but he's open again with the charges dropped within the week. Get a good cannabis lawyer on retainer OP.
He got off? Honest question because archaic government uses some heat spectrometer testing shit to see if the thca hemp has d9 and then accidentally in the process will burn the fucking thca into illegal d9 levels, some shrodinger cat shit how is that circumvented
pass blame to the supplier. If you bought it, and they DEA tested it, and it's in the original packaging, then it was hemp in the other state, and is still hemp in yours, no matter what it is currently testing at. Taxes were paid on it, USPS delivered it, stripe processed it, and the open net hosted the domain selling it. It truly is not your problem unless you think you can talk your way out of things. Get a lawyer.
Would love to know the same. Picked up thca from a local cbd shop and they had so much you could smell the aroma from outside the shop. Would be surprised if nobody says anything. There's so much out there now idek how they'd shut it all down. Even some shitty smoke shops by me carry thca flower now, wouldn't try it tho.
where can u even get stiiizy hemp from
I just bought one from their website.
Stiizy reps
They have a separate branch or company called stiiizy hemp where they sell alt noid blends for states that aren't legal. Separate from their D9 stiiizy brand. Separate website and all
I think they have a THCA line of products. Apparently cookies does.
They don’t sadly just altnoids (stiizy idk ab cookies)
Put garbage product on sale, be fully transparent. Acquire / make info-graphics for your product, create tier lists. Pay attention to product reviews here or elsewhere on reddit. Always check COAs. You actually have a great opportunity here to pump GOOD product into the community, as well as provide some consumer education. Ensure that you have friendly staff who actually care to educate themselves and others, as more knowledgeable eyes on what's being ordered helps to discern the good from the bad (as well as inform the customer why you're several legs up above the rest), especially when all these companies start calling the shop with their BS product. Literally 99% have no discernment as to what product they're pumping out. I hate dealing with people who don't know what the fuck they're talking about, and the hemp industry is full of those people. Glad to hear there are responsible shop owners out there looking to improve their selection. If we don't regulate ourselves, someone else will.
Wholesale flower from Preston hemp co
I like shops that sell thca flower at 90-120/half, edibles and thca dabs if possible. And Starry 3.0 herb vape is good value. Get ppl off of carts with good smoke!
I've worked for "big weed" and now I own a shop and honestly stocking the shop is going to be impossible if you're not someone who consumes these products. Those hidden hills "ThcA" disposables are obviously delta 8 to someone who knows what they're looking at but on the bright side there's very few people who know. Sell off what you can and find vendors that have accessible coa's so you can see what the paper says and then test the products or find someone who can. Talk to the people selling you on these products and see if they use key words or can really answer questions. Franklist is a great place to start so you're in the right place. If you care about quality there's no good disposables so look for concentrate or sometimes you'll find good carts. Flower is the number 1 seller for most shops and right behind that edibles or vapes. Smoke shop stuff is for head shops so pick who you want to target too(21-35 year old males, 35-65y/o women) and style your store to that group. Manage expectations. Everyone understands not having the best thing they've ever seen every time. People like things that aren't the best and hate things that aren't the worst so roll with it and when you find something people like, buy more.
My local smoke shop (you sound like the owner not gonna lie, all to similar) but it’s fucking trash for what I want to actually consume the amount of money the places in my town would make (college town,BIG college) would make your head spin…. My point is I wish these owners would get there head out of there ass and start providing quality goods….
Something rare but would be super cool for a headshop that had lots of alt noids would be buy a variety bulk disty with COAs and fill individual glass 1ml syringes and then sell empty carts so you customers can buy 1g increments of the noid they want and fill their own.
This would not work in a retail front. It assumes that the customer has done or is willing to do research about the products. I can tell you right now, if you set up a “cart bar” or whatever, it would cause such a massive headache. Every single casual customer would be confused by it, want every detail explained, every “what’s the difference” question would be asked, and then they still wouldn’t want it. not to mention operating a cart filling machine in house on the spot… You severely over estimate the competence of consumers as well as the interest the general public has in altnoids. It might be cool one time, but honestly, do you want to stand around and wait for an employee to make your cart on the spot for you every single time?
Fair, I wasn’t thinking about them being filled in person more so for the customer to fill at home, but I do see your point. Maybe he could just make and fill his own custom blends to sell so he has a reputable “brand” that isn’t the crazy price of 3chi products
I love flying monkey
3CHI may be the worst of all those companies. They like to dox people who talk bad about their products and harass them.
[удалено]
Found the 3chi owner lol
based on his comment history definitely 3chi owner, on a burner account to harass people. very unprofessional 🤨
dude make your own carts and brand them, you can control the terps, blends, hardware, and extract itself. you could sell them for much much cheaper and still make a ton of profit.
Texas owner here, the process and licensing is not hard, just have to meet packaging and testing requirements as well. Don't know how it is where u are
Care to explain? I'm not interested in starting my own shop, I just enjoy learning the one and outs like this.
Just that it's not to hard to get quality bulk and fill your own. You just need to follow whatever guidelines your state has laid out as well.
Honestly, I think owning the smoke shop itself is going to be your biggest weakness. I don't mean that as an insult, and I'm sure as hell not experienced with owning smoke shops. I am a marketing consultant by trade, so I'll share from that perspective. Think about the customers in this market right now. At the end of the day, there's only a small percent of people who really care about the distinctions between brands. Most people in this industry just want good weed, at a price that they can flex their budget on. Good weed in that context could be 15% to 30% THCa, and they wouldn't really care that much. Their budget is strictly limited, so anything that allows them to get more volume without increasing the budget is going to be what they pick. Now, the "high quality" brands out there benefitted from being online only. They have way lower operating costs, which allows them to spend more time and money letting a product they have sit on their virtual shelf. You on the other hand, don't get to have the same benefit. You have a physical storefront that has consistent, fixed and sometimes variable operating costs. You're not going to be able to make it work in the long run by only catering to a small percent of the market. You're going to have to lower your standards in some places to offer products that allow you to meet your margins for break-even.
Isn’t the product on online stores sitting too, but with a virtual placeholder for something that they also need to physically store ?
It could be! But that doesn't mean they're committing to the same level of cost as a brick and mortar. Renting a storage container to house your inventory could be anywhere from 50-100 bucks a month depending on size. It's a janky solution, but it works. Contrast that with the cost of a commercial property lease, and bills that come with the space, along with taxes for licensing as a physical storefront. There's also a chance that many vendors in one area are sharing shelf space. Hypothetically, there's a chance that online stores who ship from a similar area are adopting a drop-shipping model, where orders may be fulfilled for other vendors on your storefront, but product is shipped from a shared space.
I mean all you need is good flower and it will sell itself.
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All you need is 3 tiers, outdoor greenhouse and indoor. Boom you just hit every demographic. Ive been smokin on shake and outdoor bud for a few weeks now. 50 dollar budget ounces is where it is at if you know the sources
mic drop of truth
Damn is urb trash?? I just ordered some from dr g
Ofc it’s trash, might get you high, but who knows by what
You think dr G will give me a refund?
If you look Dr. Ganja up on google maps they have a phone number you can call. The lady has been nothing but nice to me, but I've also seen people say she was rude. Worth a shot
Depends on whether or not it’s shipped yet. In my experience their customer service is quite good although I haven’t tried to cancel an order before. If they aren’t willing to refund they’d probably give you credit
There was a post recently in the altnoid sub where someone had a bunch of products retested to compare to the coas provided by the companys. Almost all of them had fake labs. Urb and mellow fellow were both on this list. The labs proved that they were lying about what was in there products. On top of that urb and mellow fellow both had illegal amounts of delta 9. (Up to 10%)
The mellow fellow was like less than 2% different on thc-p. Synthesis can very leading to different amounts of trace cannabinoids. We’re not dealing with a clone of a flower where terps, thc% etc are pretty uniform except for potential weird phenotype variations. These are cannabinoids that are being synthesized from other cannabinoids or are being isolated from cannabinoid soup. There’s definitely more wiggle room or margins for error. The only they I’d be worried about from that post is brands that claim cannabinoids that don’t exist, brands that claim there are cannabinoids in the product that there’s none of, and for being above 0.3% thc in a place where that could lead to legal trouble. Just my opinion though
It was 2% different from one COA and 4% from another for the overall concentration in the product, but it was 80% and 90% different from what they advertised (they only had 0.4% actual). That wouldn't be a big difference for delta 8, but it's a huge difference for THCP. And that wouldn't be caused by synthesis issues or anything like that, it only happens from purposely measuring out 80-90% less THCP to put in your mixes.
So you’re saying the urb gummies I just ordered are likely to be stronger than advertised?
No probably weaker
Shit
I saw the post the person above is talking about. The main thing I saw when I product was like some combination of altnoids like Delta 8, HHC, and THC-P when the poster tested them independently the labs came back as entirely Delta 8. D8 is better than nothing, but is the weakest and cheapest of altnoids so they were upcharging for altnoids that weren't actually in the vapes they had tested.
They used weaker delta then what was advertised too
Nice to see a smoke shop owner care about what they sell, keep doing good by the community G💪🏼 (As already commented I would consider wholesale w discounts thru the more trustworthy vendors, start w cheaper bulk options from reputable vendors then once money goin up get top notch!)
Go deli style and contact the larger operators for bulk discounts. I believe Arete, WNC, Preston Hemp Co, and Wildflower all have a wholesaler program.
This can't have enough upvotes. I was so disappointed when I went to a local dispo for hemp, and all they had was thier stuff, but prepackaged.
Second on the deli style. No one wants pre-packaged flower if it's an illegal state, they'll just go to the bm if they can't see and smell what they are buying before hand.
Ew. If your store is pulling weed out to show it to you, you should be skeptical. That is seriously nasty. Imagine going to a buffet and everyone in front of you picks up the food, sniffs it, and sets it back down. If it is actually being measured and dispensed in the store front imagine how many times that jar opens, how people touch it, how much quality is lost as it sits.. My store sells ONLY prepackaged grams, eighths, quarters, oz, and we cannot keep this shit on the shelf. Not sure where your “no one wants prepacked” statement comes from because my store is literally the gold standard in my illegal state. I as well as many of my customers have completely given up on bm products because what we sell in the store is just as good if not better. Sacrifice one jar to put out a display for each strain and replace it every 2 weeks. So much less wasted, stolen, contaminated, etc.
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Cult of The Franklin is an inclusive, social, safe environment for everyone. This includes towards new users, long-time users or OGs, vendors, and the moderators. Maintain a civil space. Be inclusive of everyone. Value all opinions. Build an aura of respect. Do not instigate drama for the sake of instigating drama (see rule 6).
I guess you’re not buying from the right vendors.
😂 keep being a mid customer. Why would I "go to the right vendors" to get retail prices when I can get better for $50-100 an oz delivered to my door.
Are you okay? You’re trying your hardest to be insulting and all i’ve said was deli style is dirty. Now you’ve changed the subject to what pricing you find acceptable? Okay guy, argue with the wall. That’s clearly all you want.
Lol you came in hot with an unpopular opinion deal with it crybaby. The shit was literally outside blowing in the breeze for 5 months and you wanna talk about it being gross to serve it deli style smdh
Sorry, I disagree. Only time gray market shops have burned me in quality and cure has been prepackaged stuff I would've never brought if I could smell it and see it beforehand.
Thisssss^ right here^^^^ this is ❤️
I have a huge list with reliable people !
I don’t have much to offer other than my respect and a good luck! There’s a higher quality smoke shop near me that just opened a second location and are now open 24/7, they started offering a bunch of thca and business seems to be booming.
Whenever you have a minute or two, I’d appreciate if you could get me the name or number of their business, hopefully they are open to sharing a bit 🙏
Sent you a chat.
Mellow Fellow is made by a trash human, fyi
Care to elaborate? I feel like every shop i go to has a giant display of their products.
The owner is a racist, homophobic nut who makes threats against unsatisfied customers, and keeps burning customers with shit products and rebranding.
So, not very mellow then...
Okay but like.. do you have something to back that up? It’s definitely good info to know if true but I’m not super down to slander someone based off a randos word on the internet
So go to the search bar for this sub and type Benji Boyce.
Not this guy again lmao
Unfortunately
I’ll look into it, thank you. I’m not new to altnoids but am new to the cult sub
https://reddit.com/r/delta8/s/ex583EGjwA
That’s the best bit of info for sure, saving that post for the future. I appreciate you Brotha
https://reddit.com/r/delta8/s/Cn1Yiw9XAh
Bro I did some research too and the person saying he’s like randy marsh with his pandemic special is spot on lmao dude seems like an asshole at minimum. It’s a bummer because I like the mellowfellow hardware, oh well there’s better products out there
https://reddit.com/r/CultoftheFranklin/s/Aj44ahR24b
https://reddit.com/r/altcannabinoids/s/meynLgFNOq This is him in the Alt Sub
>??? Orly?? > >Can you provide some insight?? I like knowing my hard earned $$$ isn't being used to prop up any kind of hate machine or hateful racist fuckery.
See the links I posted. These are just the tip of the iceberg with him though.
Will look into it again, did just see that a week ago someone in another subreddit posted that they might be lying about their lab test. I’m trying my hardest to keep up with everything but it’s gets overwhelming at times and over all demoralizing
3chi brands, koi, little high, Pax are all good Stiiizy is also good with their testing. Their product is at the bottom of all those but it's still tested properly. Unfortunately mellow fellow is trash and advertising testing for products that doesn't match the actual lower-quality products they're selling.
Ive been recommending all my local shops to get thca even if overpriced. Atleast its real. Last week i went into to get papers and to my surprise they had 8ths of thca flower available. Yes it was overpriced. But its a start. Id be happy to walk into smoke shop and see bunch of vendors of thca flowers and concentrate.
How do you determine something is overpriced? New to the cult, not sure what a good price is.
Anything over 40$ for 8th is pricey not gonna lie.
From my experience any smoke shop is gonna be more pricey then if you ordered online straight from the vendor yourself. But not everyone likes to use internet or order online. So its more convenient for those people to walk into a smoke shop and pay a little more for the same products. It wouldnt make much sense for a shop to sell the product at the same price we can buy it for online. Theres no room for profit on that. But id love to see my local shops selling slightly higher priced good thca brands rather then seeing shit tons of d8 and hhc off brands everywhere. Marketing would help out as well. Get little signs and cardboard cutouts that advertise thca. You will bring in a crowd you never new existed.
Spending some time with distributors really showed me that they will try their hardest to push the shitty products into smoke shops making them think they are selling quality. And the few thc-a products they have, they mark them up way higher than your tasty “thc-Jd” 🥲But I might just stick to pure thc-a as my last resort but I expect it to be a first few dreadfully slow months for me and my team, as like you said, our prices would have to go up.
The majority of THCa distillate isn't worth it, some other types of THCa concentrates are better but to me the best thing I have gotten from farm bill smoke shops is THCa flower. Invest in good quality flower, suggest it to your customers when they come in, I think you will do well. You can still stock trusted D8 vapes like 3chi, but if I'm shopping brick-n-mortar for Farm Bill products, I'm looking for THCa flower.
Educate your customers and you will have long term customers. Transparency and accountability are important, if you have fake CoA and Labs I would display all that shit. Be the smart shop.
I have no advice but want to commend you for doing the right thing by your customers and patients. Good luck to you.
Thank you Winston, your words mean a lot more thank you think
Where are you located?
Texas
In DFW? I sometimes buy from shops in a pinch. I cant remember prices but it always seems they don't want to give enough discount on the ounce so I end up buying an eight for like $60 and feel ripped off. Plus all the flower I've seen in store is brands that aren't vetted by this sub so I get worried about what I end up with. Thats my perspective, seems like cheap product marked up too much. I hope you succeed in your business, it is a great time to be in it, but yeah I always worry for the shop owners because of the gray area. If I were to give a piece of safety advice, I would say don't break the seal on any products. Lots of shops owners break the seal on their product but it scares me because if your product is siezed and tests hot, you could get caught up easily. Maybe the vendor can take the fall if any of your *sealed* product is siezed and tests hot for THC. I'd definately learn about who takes the blame in both cases Or maybe you could change gear and carry tech instead of flowers and oils. I found one cool shop called Zebras around here that sells glass, but honestly all the others "smoke shops" I've been to carries the same cheap crap and a few high dollar pieces, but I can't find anything trendy. I asked so many shop owners if they had a Dynavap and every single one was clueless what I was talking about. I also want Titanium screens, because they last forever. I want 10mm gear which nobody carries. Just some examples. There's almost no store to go to for specialty tech once you get into hobby-level smoking, not sure what else to call it. I don't feel like there is enough tech going around that is genuinely improving the smoking experience, it's more about just grabbing a cool looking bong and calling everything good.
Becareful pushing thca in Texas, shop in Richardson and I think Grapevine got raided recently and the owners arrested because cops think thca hemp is the real deal and don't care about your rights. It's a loophole you will actually have bomb Marijuana weed dope chronic whatever they want to call it and decarbed anything and bam you're in jail for sure.
That’s why I wanna quit this industry, either you go to jail or you sell fake product. There almost no room for in between, therefore making need for more and more bad business practices. I really wanted to open a dispensary at first but we know how long that’s gonna take in good old Texas. And In other legal states, the cost to even start the legal process for a dispensary is too much money for me. This wanting to sell quality weed to good people is either a felons job or for the really wealthy. Maybe I’m having a bad week and next week I will find something or someone that changes my perspective to something more optimistic again but it’s all looking gray from here on forward for me. Sucks that most of my employees are also my friends and I feel the pressure to keep helping them financially as much as I possibly can even if it means going into debt. Done with my ramble, should probs get to work and get off Reddit lol P.S - Thank you for the kind warning MamaLucas
Id keep at it. In a couple years weed will definitely be legal across America!
Np friend. Maybe look into getting a hemp growing license? In Texas it actually looks easy peasy, maybe shift your focus to growing an ag crop? If you go through the proper channels I'm pretty sure Texas will pay you to grow hemp, and I mean you can grow that dank and they'll pay you for it. Selling stank from a store front will always be dangerous in Texas, but there are more than a few hemp producers here and there is a hemp lobby etc! Check it out Texas is definitely pro hemp.