Hi there, and welcome to The Dealers Diary - my musings on the cannabis industry, California, and building Halara.
If you missed past emails, I recommend checking out the Dealers page where you can see the past emails I sent.
In today's entry: A confused bartender | A buyer pattern | A text I'd rather show you | The Foy crew | $1,000 still unclaimed
The Dealers Desk
I bribed Nick to drop the first mystery strain hint just for the Dealers Diary crew. It's hiding in the Quick Hits at the bottom. Worth the scroll.
Nick with a jar of live rosin
The bartender at the Governor Tavern had no idea why her Tuesday night was so packed.
It was Hudson, New York. Small upstate town. Quietest weeknight of his year, normally. And suddenly every table was buyers, brands, distributors, because Revelry Upstate was in town and nobody had told him. Watching her try to make sense of it without context was the funniest thirty minutes of the trip.
That tavern scene was the tell. We just did the best show Halara has ever done, and not by a small margin.
____
Hey Dealers,
The setup mattered. Main hall, tables right next to each other, no walls. Hall of Flowers puts every brand in a semi-walled-off room. Revelry put everyone in the same aisle. Twelve feet from our table was Foy, the edible crew run by Moose and Jan, who turned out to be some of the most fun people we've spent two days next to in a long time. (More on them below.)
Total planning cost: a table, our product, a folder of order forms. We came home with about eight orders on the spot and a stack of follow-ups we're working through this week. So if you're in New York, expect Halara on a lot more shelves over the next couple months.
The math is what's going to shape the rest of our year. A table costs a fraction of a booth build. Hudson is cheaper than Ventura on every line item. The conversion was better, not worse, for being a smaller room with less infrastructure. We may be quietly rethinking how we pick events.
The longer version is on the blog: Tuesday-night-bartender, the California crew flying in, the table-vs-booth math, all of it.
Onwards and upwards,
-Malcolm
What We're Seeing
Buyers in NY are not behaving like buyers in CA. Buyers in Ventura asked smart questions about margins. Buyers in Hudson asked smart questions and then placed orders at the table. Same intelligence, different urgency. If you're in this industry on either coast, that gap is worth thinking about.
California brands are flying east for regional shows. After dinner Tuesday we ended up at the hotel bar with the Artist Tree crew (shoutout to Taylor) and a handful of other California folks who'd taken the cross-country trip to be in Hudson. Two years ago that wasn't happening. Now it is, which tells you exactly where the energy went.
Revelry Upstate is next week. May 13th, Basilica Hudson, noon to 6pm. If you're in New York cannabis and you've been meaning to actually meet us, this is the room. Nick, Travis, and I are all going to be there, which is rare. We have a first-order promotion we're holding back exclusively for new accounts we meet at the show. Reply if you want the details ahead of time.
The "vapes overtook flower" headline is starting to look permanent. Three months ago I would have called it a 420 spike. Headset's latest data has vapes still leading the category in California well after the holiday traffic settled. The shift isn't seasonal. It's structural. Worth thinking about for any of you on the retail side planning Q3 buys.
Strain Spotlight
This week: King Fatso (Resin Sauce AIO)
Saturday afternoon, this text landed on Nick's phone. I'm going to let the customer do this one for him.
That came in unprompted, from somebody who'd picked up a King Fatso resin AIO and felt strongly enough about it to text the founder. We get versions of this more often than you'd think.
The reason it's possible: Nick's actual cell phone number is printed on the back of every Halara package. Not a support line, not a chatbot. His number. If you've got the product in your hand and you've got something to say (good or bad), he wants to hear it.
So if you've never tried King Fatso, it's a good place to start in the Resin Sauce line. 83% THC indica, deep earthy front, sweet hash-like finish, the kind of cart that earns a Saturday-afternoon text. And if you do try it, you can do exactly what this person did. Just text him.
Where to find it: California dispensaries. Find a shop here.
Dealers Choice
This is what a no-walls trade show actually looks like. The Foy banner on the left is the table I keep talking about. Every table is twelve feet from someone you have to meet. That's the whole point.
Quick Hits
Mystery strain — still unclaimed. $1,000 still on the table. Hint #2, from Nick: It is not a mixture of two current Halara strains. He's ruling things out now. Take it for what it is. The QR code on the bag is the only way to enter. Find it on Weedmaps.
Foy, in New York. Edibles done with real care. Moose and Jan are the kind of operators you immediately want to root for, with a line worth borrowing: Better Ingredients. Better High. And if you want a fun cameo, Grok just gave them a shoutout (you can see it on their feed). Find them on Instagram.
The full Revelry write-up is on the blog. Including the take I left out of this newsletter: small regional shows might be the most interesting thing happening in cannabis events right now. Read it.
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Halara · Emerald Triangle, CA
P.S - My Weekly Bops
P.S. Two from the road this week. Both have been on heavy repeat. Sharing so they can live in your head too.
