I’ve been doing recreational cannabis for the last 5 years.

This year it’ll be a $24 Billion dollar industry.

Here are 5 BIG opportunities I see in cannabis right now.

Spoiler alert: None of em are growing or selling weed.

Mark Twain famously said:

“When everyone is looking for gold, it’s a good time to be in the pick and shovel business.”

"Picks & shovels" is the strategy of selling services and derivative goods to an industry.

Don’t mine the gold, help others mine it.

Cannabis is our gold.

Did you know Wells Fargo was formed by 2 guys who saw an opportunity to ship money, mail, and supplies to and from the gold miners out wests and the east coast.

Related: Levi Strauss moved to California to sell dry goods to gold miners.

You get the idea.

Let’s be clear: I’ve spent 5 years building consumer weed brands (mining the gold) and I’m not going anywhere.

But if I was starting from scratch right now, or looking for a new venture:

Picks and shovels in cannabis has TONS of opportunity.

Another bonus: no licenses required

A company called C Cell has taken the derivative goods approach here, and become the defacto vape cartridge of cannabis. They’re private, I don’t know they’re numbers but they crush.

They also spent years innovating physical hardware.

That's not what I'm going to suggest.

The premise simple:

Take damn near any business services concept, and niche down to be the cannabis focused provider.

Literally that’s it.

Following the lead of @sweatystartup - we’re not looking for sexy.

Here are 5 big opportunities in the cannabis industry RIGHT NOW:

1 - Security Install and Monitoring

Security systems are the core of every canna co's compliance. It's IP cameras, basic networking, and low voltage wiring.

Then you outsource the monitoring and upsell for recurring rev.

Be the cannabis security company. Not bodies, systems.

2 - Bookkeeping and Accounting

For every big Pubco w/ armies of accountants, you've got smaller unsophisticated operators who aren't big enough for full time accounting team member.

Read up on the joys of 280E and then close recurring contracts as THE weed accountants.

3 - Contractors

This is getting repetitive....

If I need a grow buildout, and can choose between a contractor and a cannabis specialized contractor, I choose the specialist every time.

Even if it's to put in a bathroom. It won't be their first rodeo in a weed facility.

4 - Creative and Marketing Services

There are specific sets of rules around all packaging, advertising, social media, etc for cannabis.

Read up and niche down. Be the cannabis creatives in your market.

Your clients will know not a second of billable is wasted on you learning.

5 - Lawyer

Lawyer's always specialize. I won't name any names but I've watched THE cannabis lawyer in my city more than double their rates over the last few years.

They did it by showing up and saying

"I'm THE cannabis lawyer!"

I bet tons of the work is easy biz stuff too.

See a theme? Niche down. That's it.

There are 100 different angles to be had. They all have the same growth potential as the massive US cannabis market and none of the red tape. If you can provide a B2B service, niche it down into cannabis.

Own local, then state, then naty.

TLDR -

I've been building cannabis brands for 5 years, and if I was starting from scratch tomorrow looking for huge upside, it's in a B2B services business in the cannabis niche

- No licenses
- No agriculture
- No brick and mortar

But all the upside.

I write about business and the recreational cannabis business. I'm dropping threads everyday this week.

Later this week I've got the 100+ pt "how to launch a consumer brand" checklist dropping

Follow me! We have fun around here

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