This article originally appeared in the August 2018 print issue of Cannabis Business Times. To subscribe, click here.
RD Industries/Rare Dankness founder Scott Reach looks back on the two years since the award-winning story on his company was published in Cannabis Business Times. He dishes on working with family, his company’s price-matching capabilities and its international partnerships with Maricann.
Brian MacIver: It’s been two years since you’ve been on the cover of the magazine. What has changed for you and your business?
Scott Reach: The brand is bigger, more diversified. We have established ourselves as one of the most recognized cannabis brands in the world. The facility is incredible, always evolving into a bigger, more advanced version than I started with.
We also are expanding into a few other markets with strategic partners on projects that allow us to expand market share and potentially franchise into the seed-to-sale model. In Canada, we are working on a verified genetics project with Maricann. In Switzerland, we are working alongside Maricann on a CBD/hemp project as an alternative to tobacco cigarettes.
I recently found an equal share partner for the Colorado grow and dispensary, which cleared me of the debt involved with the construction of the facility and left Rare Dankness, as a brand, untouched and in control and with ownership, so I’ve been sleeping better than I have in years.
MacIver: In the July/August 2016 issue, you said, “If you’re not on the technology side of cannabis, you’re just going to be on the farming side, and there’s not a lot of money on the farming side.” Do you still believe that today?
Reach: I most definitely still believe it. It’s been enjoyable watching all the technology retrofits happening within facilities in our own state. I’m called constantly by competitors for consulting needs on technology. Rare Dankness has been able to step into a fully mature market in Colorado where I was known for high-quality, large-scale production from my former days as a grower for local producers. We actually sculpted out a nice chunk of the market for ourselves while changing how the operators across the country build and run their facilities’ [automation and workflow].
To read the full article in Cannabis Business Times' August 2018 issue, click here.
Top photo courtesy of Phierce Photography
