
In roughly four months, more than 3,000 prospective and established cannabis cultivators, retailers, brands, and extraction professionals, as well as university professors, consultants, and technology and solutions providers, will gather at Cannabis Conference for high-level education, exclusive networking opportunities and expo.
This event comes at a critical time for the industry. Over the last several months, many U.S. cannabis companies and multistate operators have had to cut a percentage of their workforce, close facilities, and engage in other cutting-cost efforts as the market downturn deepens.
Cannabis Conference's high-level education program is carefully curated to meet the needs of plant-touching businesses, and focuses on essential industry topics, including how to survive this downturn. It will also provide attendees with the necessary education, information, and resources to navigate persistent industry challenges.
Here, Claudio Miranda, co-founder and CEO of Guild Enterprises, a brand management company that oversees a family of cannabis brands, and Cannabis Conference 2023 Advisory Board member, shares some of his key takeaways and lessons learned from Cannabis Conference 2022 and why operators should attend this year.
1. What features did you like best about the Cannabis Conference 2022 event experience?
My favorite aspect of the Cannabis Conference is the intimacy of the event and the ease with which I am able to make meaningful connections with other cannabis operators. Last year was particularly impactful because the quality of the attendees allowed me to meet people who faced business challenges or presented opportunities that were directly relevant to my business. Most other conferences are either too large and broad in scope or too specialized in order for me to connect with the right people and walk away with tangible value that touches upon multiple sides of my business needs. Moreover, the lessons learned from the sessions are more directly translatable to my day-to-day operations, so I'm able to readily put my connections and learnings into action and measure my return on investment.
2. What are some actionable takeaways you learned at Cannabis Conference that you've incorporated into your businesses' operations?
Two sessions stood out in terms of takeaways that I immediately put into action.
The first was the session on retail merchandising. Although I'm not a retailer, it was super insightful for me to understand how retailers think about optimizing things like their visual merchandising, promotional strategies, sell-through rates, etc. As a brand, it's crucial for me to understand the needs, priorities, and success metrics of a retailer, given that they are my primary customer, so knowing how they think about these things allowed me to work with my team on developing a more effective approach to our field marketing efforts.
The other main takeaway came from the session on using data to boost sales. Our brand is constantly developing new products to stay relevant and serve the evolving needs of our end users. Without direct access to consumers, it's often hard to keep our finger on the pulse of their purchasing behavior and emerging trends, so this session helped us get a good sense of which products and demographics are generating the most sales and how to fine-tune our product strategy to capture new revenue opportunities.
3. Why should plant-touching businesses attend Cannabis Conference this year?
Times are really tough in the cannabis industry right now, and it's really easy to cut expenses that don't directly contribute to sustaining daily operations. But it's equally easy to lose perspective and feel defeated if you don't get out of the facility, talk with your peers, and tap our collective wisdom to find creative and inspiring solutions to our challenges. The universe presents opportunities and good fortune for those who actively seek it out, so it is imperative that we all find ways to share our experiences with like-minded operators to explore synergies and opportunities to collaborate. Cannabis Conference offers a way to do this through a very focused, intimate, and impactful experience that is sure to inform and reinvigorate your cannabis journey.
Editor's note: Join us this year at the Paris Las Vegas Hotel & Casino for Cannabis Conference, the leading education and expo event for plant-touching businesses.