[00:00:00]
Rob Sanchez: The real thing is the business. it is actually the day-to-day what the operator is doing. So it you've gotta really decide how much to invest in that.
But I would almost say most systems being used now are under used.
Welcome to Kaya Cast the podcast for cannabis businesses looking to launch, grow, and scale their operations.
Tommy Truong: Most cannabis software was built by people who've never touched the plant. My guest today started as a cultivator, a hash maker before being one of the most sought after cannabis tech consultants in the industry. Rob,
Rob Sanchez: Hey
Tommy Truong: on today.
Rob Sanchez: Thanks for having me, man. Yeah. Happy to be here.
Tommy Truong: So you've implemented software for more than a hundred companies.
What are some first time operators
obsessed over that really don't matter? And what is the, some of the things that they ignore that absolutely does.
Rob Sanchez: Oh man, that's a big question. Yeah, so I think some of the things that [00:01:00] operators may ignore is sometimes is the accessibility, the trainability. Sometimes we have decision makers finding the right software for them, learning about it, but they haven't really leveled that with their team. So a good product.
You know, at, at the leadership level needs to actually feel good down at the teams and in the day to day. Um, that's something I'd always try to get people to think about early because it's not something you wanna realize after you've gone down the road or trained something or started a contract or anything like that.
So that's the one. I think that's the biggest, that operators may skip the one that they're often concerned about. Is gonna be probably like the buzzwords. You know, like we've had some different buzzwords come through the industry, I think now, like ai before it was, uh, more around the reporting or QR codes.
Um, those kinds of things are always big concerns that sometimes boil down to like a little operational uh, just as a box to check. And it's not really an, [00:02:00] a deal breaker, but the way that like our society and everything can sort of impose. It's way on us. Um, you can come into these software conversations looking for like a silver bullet, right?
A, a catchall, but you need to be a little bit decisive and careful about finding the right software for you.
Tommy Truong: It's so true. We run a software company and one of the mandates that we have is make sure that the end users. On one of the demos,
Rob Sanchez: Oh, yes. Bring him in, huh?
Tommy Truong: bring them in. Let's flush this through. Let's make sure that we uncover all of the skeletons, we understand the workflows, and that are we adding value or is this gonna be a nightmare implementation process, which is not great either.
Rob Sanchez: Oh yeah. Nobody wants to do the implementation that never ends. E even if that may be like a benefit for some aspects of the business, it's uncomfortable.
Tommy Truong: Yeah, so that's, I you hit the nail on the [00:03:00] head. I think that's one thing that people should look for is when you're talking, when you're demoing with a, with a platform, is a sales person just ready for the sales order to sign with the decision maker, or do they really explore what your problems are and how they can add value?
Rob Sanchez: Yeah, you want to kind of get, you wanna realize that as you're making that decision with whatever software partner, even if it's just a third party or an integration for your main system, these folks and this team is gonna be. On the inside with you, they are, you know, you're kind of recruiting them to your team as a third party and as a software vendor.
So you want to make sure that their communication style kind of fits with yours. You also want to maybe pry as much as you can into how they solve problems, how they handle urgency or compliance changes, because we are in an industry where things can change very fast. Different software.
Processes can make changes slow to really hit the users. So those are also good things to dig into.
Tommy Truong: [00:04:00] I was gonna ask you that if I was a cannabis operator and I was. Looking at five different POS companies, what are some of the questions that I should ask to validate which company I should go for?
Rob Sanchez: The, or the obvious things, I think are like metric integration, making sure that's two-way inventory management, tracking, making sure you can accurately have all of your inventory managed from end to end, whether that's seed to sale or just on the retail side. But the real differences, the nuances are gonna be in the, like in the workflows.
How do you set up. Discounts. Think about your most complicated campaign that you run, the hard one. That's like buy two, get one of these for a dollar or bundle pricing. Those kind of edge cases can help to. To find the right software for you and also just try to create an item and realize what that is gonna be like because, um, all of these software systems with their fancy tools and nice [00:05:00] branding and things are really just inventory management at its core.
So you wanna make sure you can get that job done. Um, that, and I'd probably level set all your reports. So if you already use analytics in the business, make sure there's a one-to-one or close to that in the application and ask about new reports and new analytics too.
Tommy Truong: It's so funny you say that because I cannot stress enough how important analyzing workflows is. It sounds very simple, but I talk to so many operators and when we dig into, Hey, why did you switch? This POS to this POS or why do you like this? POS, it's the simple things. This one is really easy to do X.
The other one, there's three clicks involved and we do it every day and that
Rob Sanchez: Oh man, those clicks add up, don't they? Yeah. And even things like bringing a customer into the store, making sure that's streamlined, you know, if you have a, an ID scanner, some, uh, way to start a customer queue, making sure that's gonna work with your stores flow and with [00:06:00] your state's regulations.
Um, 'cause. Some software started, um, and this is just the nature of startups. You always start smaller than where you're really gonna scale. So in the cannabis space, what we got is certain businesses started with Colorado as their real nesting ground. Others in California, others on the east coast, which gave them like a a flavor of the cannabis industry that they've had to scale out and slowly add the rest of the flavors as they've gone national.
Companies are very good at this process, but there's always some differences there, depending on where they where they got their seeds or where they started.
Tommy Truong: That's so true. Now that you say it, that's where the specialty comes in. You build your software to optimize a certain process, but processes change as states change.
Rob Sanchez: Yes. And that is where the differences of software companies starts to. It starts to be less. What features are they offering? What workflows can you get done in there? But more like, how does a software company react? [00:07:00] How do they actually communicate with their customers? Or, are they easy to reach?
Can you dial somebody up quickly? If there's a, a show stopper on the floor and you've got a line out the door, those kinds of things.
Tommy Truong: If I was a. An entrepreneur and I'm thinking to myself, okay, I'm gonna have one store today, but maybe I'm gonna have 10 tomorrow. What are some of the things I should look for to know that I can scale this business?
Rob Sanchez: that can be. Also with the nature of startups, as many of those start with single shop, single locations, and then you have to scale up and add multi-location. So I think going into any purchase, if you have even the slightest sense that. You may expand over state lines or want to operate many shops, ask those questions early.
Look to see an instance or an example of a multi-store setup. Make sure that that inventory can be managed on each store. You know, you've got your own instances for like downtown versus out of the city locations or Arizona, Nevada. But also you wanna make sure some of [00:08:00] that data's gonna roll up because to, to really grow your business to.
In MSO, you need analytics and reporting, and you are gonna be looking down at the, at the business side of things and want everything to roll nicely. You can do all of that work on your own, obviously, but that's where software hopefully comes in to solve those problems and just streamline it for you.
Showing you things like product velocity, top selling categories, but sorting it by your locations. And, there's some other aspects in there with multi-location, like managing customers, um, you could ask your. Potential software vendor. What happens if I have a customer that goes to my store in Nevada and then they come to one of my stores in Arizona?
Uh, is that now two customer records In my. Overall demographics or is that universal? So there's some interesting questions you can get into there that, to be honest, not all software companies have solved those problems 'cause they're, they're kind of difficult, but it's where you want to drive the conversation and maybe not get too stuck in [00:09:00] what workflows, what's available in the app.
Tommy Truong: That's a big one, and that's a a precursor to how well they've architected their solution.
Rob Sanchez: Because if they have built it in a way, in an agile way that can respond to change quickly, then you should see those questions lead into like. New features. Maybe they're showing you something that's almost done or showing you something that they've done in that direction.
You always want to try to stump the vendor and I come from the other side of things where I am, I'm like rolling out the red carpet, trying to show the software. And what I value the most is when one of those prospects tries to stump me with a hard questions, really bringing in their, like the, their detailed workflows.
How does this work here? And not just nod and smile through the like 20 minute rollout. Um, I like to think of it kind of like selling a car, uh, or looking at buying a car, right? That you already kind of know the size vehicle you need. [00:10:00] The kind of the roughly the type of vehicle, are you trying to be like outdoorsy with it?
Are you driving it downtown? You wanna go fast? Does that not matter? So you come in with these expectations and the salesman wants to show you all of the bells and whistles and how the whole car works, but sometimes you just need to get in the driver's seat and drive it a little bit and just take it down the street.
Take it around the block a little and just see how it. Kind of more how it feels, um, because those specs are all great and flashy, but they don't really, they don't really seal the deal as it were. And I think that's kind of true on both sides.
Tommy Truong: It is. It's funny you say that because if you were to just have a checklist on features and you were to put companies side by side, everybody will have check mark on all of these features, but the devil's in the details.
Rob Sanchez: yeah, it's in how does the co intercompany work? It could be even like the experience or maybe how close they'll keep. They'll keep your business just the way things scale sometimes [00:11:00] it's a numbers game and you may. Be very close to the business at first with an account manager, but then, you know, as your business scales, it's through going through the support team just because there's only so many people in a software company.
But knowing kind of how those paths work and how to, how to talk with your vendors is, is key. Making sure that you get some transparency there early on, and hopefully some folks who understand your, your business. I think at this point in the industry. It's safe to say that most if not now, all of the software companies have real experience in the cannabis space and have really seen it happen and, have a lot of knowledge and wisdom that they impart.
Just in talking with, with vendors in the early days, it was a little bit, it was a little bit smoke and mirrors at times and some, and some balance across the board with sometimes vendor expectations or business expectations being above and beyond what the software was. Really at, um, because, uh, I think as you, as you mentioned there with, with Kaya [00:12:00] cannabis software initially was tried to it was kind of forced into this space with existing systems things like ERPs, manufacturing solutions and things like that, which they definitely do work, but they came with a significant overhead in that they're ancient.
They're hard to use. Not very easy on the eye, those kinds of things. So it's been a balancing act, and now we're seeing just like beautiful software, like modern Solutions made only for the cannabis space, you know, from the ground up that can really get the business moving fast and provide the tools they need and the understanding they need throughout their, their opening or their scaling.
Tommy Truong: Yeah. I've always, I always think to myself as, as an a tech entrepreneur, how difficult it is to create a POS in the cannabis space. Because if you think about it, the tam's not big.
Rob Sanchez: No, it's not.
Tommy Truong: [00:13:00] It's not big. Very limited. So with the tam that small, it's gonna be really hard for you to execute and raise money.
There's not a lot of investors that are coming in to see the potential of the business, right? So you have to monetize out, you have to figure out a way to monetize accordingly. And states, every state has different regulations. So there's a huge overhead in terms of expanding. It's not a simple problem to solve.
Rob Sanchez: No man, it's, uh, you're asking the, you're asking the real questions there that many folks are trying to ask themselves and solve internally. The way that monetization. Typically works for, for point of sale, at least if we stay on the retail side, would be through like integrations, through ancillary services.
Maybe they have a, a digital menu or a kiosk solution, or integrations with the delivery service or ID scanners. Those can often be where they, where monetization happens that, or [00:14:00] payments as we've seen with. Just the payment industry in general, being bumpy point of sale companies have taken it on themselves to offer payment solutions that most often also profit the for the
Tommy Truong: Yeah, well, it comes from restaurants, right? Toasted it really well. But all the restaurant industry is very different than the cannabis industry in terms of what they can do. You know, so it's hard and it's difficult. The problem is difficult, guys. 'cause if you are, if you have to monetize on different aspects of your platform outside of the core solution, it means that you have to divert resources to solve all the problems.
And now you're going wide instead of going deep. And that's a problem.
Rob Sanchez: And I've seen the shiny object syndrome there where like a new thing and you start, you go wide, but then you get distracted and forget your values or your core. So it's it is a real balancing game and kind of a a bet that you have to make on your product if you're building software in that case.
And [00:15:00] I think, oh yeah, go
Tommy Truong: go ahead.
Rob Sanchez: no, I was gonna say, I think it's, it can be hard for someone buying software to consider all of that. 'cause you're really just looking ah, hey, I just want to open my business and track my employees and. And not get audited by metric. I don't need to get into the details of how you guys are actually working over there, which is, there's a trade off I think.
Tommy Truong: So like with that in mind, if I was a an operator, what are some of the questions that I should ask myself in terms of. So what's really important to me, so is, is
Rob Sanchez: Yes.
Tommy Truong: how can I position my understanding in the business on, in terms of what's important to me, to then use that anchor to pick the right solution?
Rob Sanchez: Yeah, I think that rushing to just choose a solution because you don't have one and not stopping for a minute to really assess things is, is bound to be uncomfortable for somebody. Even if you find a good solution. Maybe there's. There's gonna be gaps there. So it [00:16:00] is good to stop and look at your operation and realize where the pain points are.
Try to, even talk with your employees. Go figure, ask them where the pain points are and see where managers are struggling or where lines are getting long or maybe inventory is off, or you're having some metric issues. That way you really have those, like maybe three or four. Like real issues for you and your store that you want the software to, to solve because, um.
All software companies are willing and ready to solve any problem, but it's, it's much better for you to shop those when you know exactly the problem you're after. If that's metric compliance, then have a few solid examples. Maybe something that went wrong with a lost tag or with a, like a mis recorded inventory quantity so that you can really see how that would be resolved in the app.
Try to bring your. I guess your war stories the tough times you've had, try to turn those into more of, um, like a situation [00:17:00] or scenario that you could explain to the company and see how, how they would help you solve it. Because that's really where, that's really why you're bringing this software into the house.
Even if it's just keeping the lights on when everything's great, it's when things are bad that you need to really rely on the software and the communication with that company.
Tommy Truong: Yeah, and especially stuff usually happens when you're the busiest
Rob Sanchez: Yes. Oh man. Four 20 holiday season. It's just a, it's a tough time if your discounts are suddenly not working or loyalty points are off, or anything like that.
Tommy Truong: If I, how can I avoid as an operator the shiny object syndrome on ai? What I mean by that is AI is an exceptionally powerful tool. We leverage LLMs workflows internally and we are baking it into our product that. Are truly solving certain problems, and what I find is that a lot of [00:18:00] people want that buzzword or want its lipstick on a pig.
And essentially, what are you solving and is the solution ready? Is the technology ready for the problem that you're trying to solve?
Rob Sanchez: And I think that it can get easy to latch onto those buzzwords and say where's the AI in this solution? Without asking the question like, why is the AI actually needed? And that's a question. Software companies are. We're struggling with, we're seeing that across the board, even outside of the industry.
Especially outside, it seems every tech company, every platform or product is adding some AI aspect. Now, the, the product management game the guy back there making the decisions for what they're gonna build, that's where I think this AI thing really falls on. And it's not using the tool or knowing when not to use a tool actually, instead of just using the hammer.
Every time as you build the house, sometimes it's not the right thing. And I [00:19:00] think AI can be one of those because it's, it's flashy, because it's known and the vendors and operators are gonna come in and know about it. So I think for an operator who expects AI or wants to make sure that their software selection is moving in that direction, which they very well should, I think, surface a question about how the company.
Is using AI internally or how AI plays into any of their features. But I wouldn't necessarily use that as a deal breaker if they simply don't have AI in the app. Maybe they are moving to implement it in reporting or maybe they've got a bigger plan for it. I think it's it can, um, create a bad match if you're just looking for that specific feature.
'cause I've seen some AI solutions that are flashy but not actually saving time. Uh, just the smallest example an LLM solution to create product descriptions. So instead of typing your, your, you know, your limb and gelato smells [00:20:00] like x, it typically has these three terpenes dominant, and it comes from these farms and all these things.
You just feed in a certain number of stats to an LLM that creates a description for you. But in that case, you're already gathering the information. You've gotta feed it to the LLM, and then you have to edit what that. System spits out so that you're comfortable putting that on your e-commerce and you know, representing your company.
I think that's an example where, just skip it. Just write your descriptions. And it's hard. It's hard because we all like making our jobs easier, right? If you can use a calculator, you want to use it, and I think AI is like this new form of calculator where you still have to understand the math that you're doing and sometimes it's faster to just.
Do it in your head or get it done instead of go to the calculator and type, okay. Four plus four.
Tommy Truong: It's so true. It's, it's crazy to me because I've never been a part of, there's never been a time where I can rem remember how fast [00:21:00] things are changing. Breakthroughs are happening on a weekly basis, right? So you do have to be on top of what's happening today and where can we apply that internally?
And I'm talking to myself in internally and in our processes, but also be wary of. there's a graph there. How complex is the process? How easy is the pro process, how precise you need to answer or how vague you need to answer. And if it's at the very end of heavy, complex, and heavy, precise, and it might not be ready today,
Rob Sanchez: Yes. Yeah. And it's it can be hard fielding those questions as a software company too. So if as the operators, you know, folks listening, go, you gotta go a little easy on some of the modern companies and startups, especially if they're a startup or smaller. They're already strapped across the board and probably making things work.
So it's hard, it's hard for everyone to. Figure out where that puck is going, but I, I definitely see [00:22:00] it. And over the last three years, it's unbelievable how much LLMs and AI has made its way into this space. I think the where, the place where it really belongs is in analytics and reporting, because when you are faced with a, as an operator with a, a long list of 12 to 30 different reports that are going to help you with the business.
Can you click all of those and understand what all of them do so you can quickly next time, choose exactly the report you want. Definitely you can do that and people make their careers off that. But the reality is that being able to talk with an LLM about your own data, about your reports and analytics is unparalleled.
'cause you can really ask. Like actual questions that while the data may be trying to answer that for you, it's kind of outside of the like functional scope of things. So the LLM would understand things more like my bud tenders are really stressed out a lot on delivery [00:23:00] days and we we often struggle to get all the inventory tracked in time.
So what's my highest selling category? So we can just pull those first. Now that's a question you could answer with. Maybe three different reports, but an LLM or AI service there can really add some juice and also help employees too. 'cause we've seen, as the industry grows, you know, people are moving into positions where they, they haven't been before and they, they have experience, but then now they're suddenly managing a store.
That's where that, that functional solution can help those guys shine and, and just keep doing what they do well.
Tommy Truong: Yeah, the span of knowledge today as an operator is so far sparse, like you. Never before can you have the ability to understand if set up properly different areas in your business?
Rob Sanchez: Oh yeah, it's uh, if you could think of it, you can measure it, and then there's probably a way to [00:24:00] optimize that measurement too. And honestly, that's the way to, to look at the operation. 'cause I don't think you want to just say, I need software. You wanna look at your business and, and find like, where's the waste?
Whether that's time, waste, money, waste effort, waste. That's kind of the lean way of thinking about that. So you find where the biggest sinks are and start looking at how to optimize that. And always consider software, of course, if you don't have a solution. But sometimes it could be. Easier than that.
Sometimes it could just be a conversation or changing a workflow or an SOP those kinds of things.
Tommy Truong: Yeah. You know, you've worked with so many different businesses in so many different countries, from United States to Columbia. What have you found the differences in culture between these two countries? what do people in Columbia get right that people in the US get wrong?
Rob Sanchez: So Columbia lucks out in that they can have massive fields. Of cannabis and they really run the product like a field crop, [00:25:00] which is much different than how most of our indoor guys are doing it in the us. Some very big greenhouses may be the exception if they're like, a million plus square feet.
I think that the other countries, both Columbia and Canada. Where I've done the most work outside of the us they export too. So their, their mode of thinking is a little bit different. They're all GMP from the beginning. They're planning to do foreign exports and trade with these products, and they're really creating bulk, like bulk quantity at still a, a reasonable quality level.
But quality's not really. Not really top of the line there. It's more let's create the bulk biomass and get that sold out to Israel, Spain, Germany, everywhere else.
Tommy Truong: Yeah, so that's a different problem, right?
Rob Sanchez: Yeah. So that becomes just a whole fun game on the software side because now you got currencies, now you've got international shipping and other things there. So they try to get their operation rolling and I think. If the Columbia [00:26:00] side at least didn't focus too much on how does this software really work?
They had, three guys who specialize in that, and then no one else in their company is really touching software. So they're, they just have like a little team managing it. And then their, their office is a whole department of people managing their trade, their customer relationships and things like that.
And they become more the main software users rather than the retail approach that we have in the us. And I think Canada's very similar to the US in that they don't have state, like you can't create a dispensary there. Everything's run by the provinces. So the individual manufacturers and cultivators will sell to the state and then they sell to the consumer.
But at the end of the day, like looking at that as an American coming in, it's this similar system. You go to a dispensary and that dispensary's worrying about all the same things that we're worrying about here. Customer experience time in line is my menu accurate with what I actually have? All of those things are really similar there.
Tommy Truong: Okay. How's the [00:27:00] market over there in terms of maturity?
Rob Sanchez: well, they went federal in, what was it, 2018. So they because they went federal, it allowed big businesses to invest quick and we saw. Massive greenhouses and grows get put in place. Um, the biggest example I saw was in, um, a town called Lemington, which is the tomato capital of the world.
They like make Heinz ketchup and, um, they have these huge greenhouses that you can't see the back of them when you're inside there. And they converted one over to cannabis fully. And the maturity of that operation was, was unparalleled because in their grow. It was fully automated. A machine would come and grab the tray.
It would take the tray out to the workers, and a lid would drop, all the plants would fall in line, down an assembly line. All the workers just do their thing and plants get back in the tray and get moved back into the greenhouse. And it, [00:28:00] it was like a, a science fiction grow at the time when I saw it was like 2019, which was a, um, like on the cutting edge, I think for what ops.
Could have been at the time. And, uh, now I think things have level set. I think the US has matured, like our markets have matured. Individual states have their investors and you know, businesses have had enough time to start moving across lines and get that capital to build up their ops. But it's, um, a little different, I think still across the, across the border with the cannabis culture and, um, and the people.
And I don't know that. Um, the Canadian solution seems to be like bringing in as much of the culture as the Americans solution does, and I'm saying that just as an outsider that's been to Canada a few times, but they still have quite a gray area and, uh, or a gray market and, um, a real like stoner culture that.
Isn't very happy with paying like province taxes and things like [00:29:00] that, kind of like our good old home growers here in the us but I find that we've got like a good blend, you know, of culture and industry.
Tommy Truong: Yeah, it's where, who, where in the world would you be happy with paying those taxes?
Rob Sanchez: Yeah. Right. Nobody wants to pay them. I, but I, I, I do think that there's a trade off there because of the transparency that operators can provide, like COAs, like really understanding the products. That's definitely a service. You know, it's, it's one thing to have a friend who, who grows really fire products, but it's, it's another to know like, okay, these terpenes are specifically measured.
There's no issues in this product and. You know, like for accessibility purposes, people that are trying to heal or sleep or they need pain meds and things like that. You want that transparency and you want to be assured that products are clean and safe. So I think that's the, that's the balance.
Tommy Truong: Yeah. You've done extensive work in our industry consulting with different types of [00:30:00] businesses. What is your most, where do you have the most fun?
Rob Sanchez: Yes, I, so I started way back when as a hash maker and cultivator and just sitting on a bucket doing work, and I have the most fun when I'm working on something that helps those guys. That's, that helps the people on the ground if it's gonna help the budtender who's there all day doing like 150 transactions, if I can take a click off of their plate I love that.
I'm here to solve those problems. And it can be obfuscated or kind of hidden sometimes working on like an integration or working on a metric thing, but it's like always, a way I connect still or like motivate myself to kind of think about who's gonna benefit from this. And those operators there that are really plant touching or like the front lines of the sails with the bud tenders are kinda the situations I like to solve.
But, um, also, I, I like to be stumped, so like, hard problems, complex [00:31:00] issues, multi-location, multi-currency. I'm always happy to try to dig into that too. We've, um, we've seen with the rise of e-commerce, there's all kinds of things with making sure that your inventory is the same in the store as it is on the website, as it is in your kiosks, in your digital menus.
And it's something people can take for granted, but um, can be kind of fun to solve. It's a good puzzle.
Tommy Truong: What are some of the tech companies that you're working with that has impressed you the most?
Rob Sanchez: Yeah, so I've got a long background at cannabis software companies. I've been with, um, 365 Cannabis Viridian Sciences, and then I went over to MJ Freeway, which became Aker, and then Aker bought Trellis, which was a cultivation system, and Ample Organics, which was a point of sale system. And then I was at Blaze, and then to, so I've seen a lot of the space and there are.
Systems in there that I think I wouldn't recommend, but the ones that really impressed me, I think were with TOS [00:32:00] user interface. They designed it from the ground up so that a budtender a, someone with no experience on inventory management software could find their way through it. And they had a really nice design around complex features.
On the flip side of that, the other one I'd recommend would be 365 Cannabis as they had a immensely complex system. But if you're willing to learn a little bit of that complexity, the value you could get out of it being on the Microsoft stack Was really untapped. You could cut into like labor costs and full like production schedules.
You could forecast, if I actually harvest three pounds of this today, what will it be in X? And the system would do a lot of that for them because of its manufacturing origins.
Tommy Truong: Oh wow. So that just takes time to learn. But if you invest into it, set it up properly, you can scale.
Rob Sanchez: Yeah. And then that's where, as an operator, you have to [00:33:00] decide what's your kind of, what's your, uh, interest level here? Do you really wanna learn this software and like have to potentially even take a little class or watch some YouTube videos to maximize it, or do you just want to hit the ground running?
And I think it's like they're both great. They can both be great solutions, but it. If the operator isn't feeling either of those, it's not a good fit. You know, if they want the crunch or if they want to just turn the treadmill on and go.
Tommy Truong: I find that a lot of operators, they, majority of them, do not invest enough time in exploring the true potential of any platform that they
So it's very service level and it'll, the platform will meet the bare minimums of the business. If they just took the time to dig a little bit deeper, they would get so much more on what they're paying.
Rob Sanchez: Yeah, and that, I know this is like kind of a balancing act too, because like I'm all into the software and passionate about solving tech problems and I forget sometimes [00:34:00] that. The real thing is the business. it is actually the day-to-day what the operator is doing. So it you've gotta really decide how much to invest in that.
But I would almost say most systems being used now are under used. There's more potential you could get out of them. There could be more features or reports that could be helpful in your, even like a weekly report that you could just pull and get a little more data. But we're seeing operators mature where.
I've had instances where someone started as a budtender and they're managing multiple stores now, and man, those guys know, they, they know that software and inside and out. So there definitely are operators that are exhausting every click or trying every menu and running into any, any issues they can.
Tommy Truong: Yeah, because there's a bridge there, right? It's the solution is there to help you scale your operations. So it's not there on some corner somewhere. It should help your business in in some aspect.
Rob Sanchez: right. I think that's that can be forgotten as well. [00:35:00] Um, in the, the ERP world, which is where I kind of started in cannabis, is enterprise resource planning. ERPs are used to do manufacturing for like windshields. They'll source rubber and make tires and then sell tires out to all of the auto stores and then, place those.
They're doing like massive. Scale supply chain and manufacturing. And at first, cannabis was a, was a sore fit for that because we were so young that was just over, like way too much, way too much tracking, way too much overhead and data entry and just for not enough value. But I think we're seeing over time a meeting of those worlds where now, like true ERP is being offered by some of these cannabis specific companies.
And even a vanilla ERP. Could be a good fit for certain operators. As long as they have a metric integration. Don't forget about that part. Yeah.
Tommy Truong: Rob, before I let you go, I have to ask Apartment one 13.
Rob Sanchez: Yes. Yeah. So [00:36:00] the, the story here, apartment one 13 is apartment and apartment that I had in Minneapolis. I lived there for about seven years and we had a cool little spot with some rotating roommates. Um, but one in particular, um, shout out Nelson and I would have awesome after parties and events at apartment one 13 and there were many.
Early mornings where I'd find myself sitting in my own house at five in the morning, you know, surrounded by relative strangers and just talking about whatever comes up and chatting about what people do or what's next and what's happening in the world, those kinds of things. So the podcast was built to stimulate those conversations again and have people in the, in the apartment sitting on the couch just talking shop.
Uh, 'cause we have a lot of business conversations in the industry. That I was starting to miss, like the, that personal connection yeah, I love what you're selling and I love your business idea, but like, who are you? Like what kind of, what happened in your life? So [00:37:00] that's the, or the origin of the, of the company there.
But then also we offer product management and writing services and other contract services through it.
Tommy Truong: Ah, that's cool. I love an origin story like that, and it's so true too. I find myself with, in the world of Zoom, our company is work from home, right? We have an office, but. You have employees all over the place and you do lose that personal connection. The water cooler talk.
Rob Sanchez: Yes, it's just, and then, you go to the conferences too, which there's wonderful time to see everybody, but even then the conversation can be like 10 minutes. So the, it's always good to just get someone sit down and talk for 45 minutes. Let's really let the mask drop and talk about life and the cannabis industry as it were.
So we do a lot of like, um, more like cultural critiques and try to bring in people from all areas of the industry, from like accountants to cultivators, to brand builders, to PR people and anybody and [00:38:00] everyone that's keeping us rolling.
Tommy Truong: Yeah, that's cool. I wanna transition to a, a segment that we just adopted called Rolling Loud Rapid Fire Questions.
Rob Sanchez: I heard a few of these. I was preparing some answers. We'll see if I repair the right ones.
Tommy Truong: Are you ready?
Rob Sanchez: right. Let me have it.
Tommy Truong: Are you a daytime person or a nighttime person?
Rob Sanchez: Oh, nighttime
Tommy Truong: Nighttime, flower, edible or vape?
Rob Sanchez: flour for sure.
Tommy Truong: Favorite strain.
Rob Sanchez: Ooh. That's a really hard question. I gotta say ultra Sonia, but it's super, it's difficult to find. So really anything with GMO or cheese and the lineage.
Tommy Truong: Oh, okay. I was gonna ask you why,
Rob Sanchez: Uh, so those, the GMO and the cheese have like a lot, they have that funk to it that I just associate with, uh, with quality. And if you gr if they're grown right and cured right, they can have very complex aromas and flavors that you can just peel back kind of with that connoisseur mindset and [00:39:00] just explore a little deeper.
Tommy Truong: Yeah, first experience with cannabis.
Rob Sanchez: high school. I bought some weed in a little bag out of my basement window 'cause I was afraid to go outside in case my parents caught me. And I, a few moments later I remember leaning against the wall saying, singing something, and my friend looked over at me and he is like, why are you singing that song?
And I just cracked up laughing and realized that wasn't in my head what I was just singing. So yeah, it was the
Tommy Truong: what's your worst experience?
Rob Sanchez: Twofold. I'd say one had a terrible brownie experience where Whitey respect for those brownies. But man, he a buddy of mine really loaded the brownies and we had a lake retreat.
No one even started the boat for about three days. Everyone was just wrecked from the brownies. They were too much.
Tommy Truong: It is always edibles, right?
Rob Sanchez: edibles can sneak up and get you the second worst experience. I'd say. I experiment a lot with moderation and I went just completely off cannabis [00:40:00] for a long while.
Last year I went a hundred days. The year before that I did 180 days, and that 180 was the first time that I'd really moderated. Those early weeks I would count as my worst experience with cannabis. It was just hard to sleep. It was hard to. To balance. Yeah.
Tommy Truong: Well, what's your best memory?
Rob Sanchez: Best memory, I think up there at the top. I went down to Jamaica with Fat Nugs Magazine and helped arrange and judge in the Orange Hill Ganja Cup and Daniel Crawford. Shout out to the terpene whisperer. Over there, Daniel and I judged about 30 strains of Jamaican outdoor flower in a row. And then we sat down and judged concentrates after that.
So we went the distance and, um, it was a long day there in the Jamaican sun, but memorable, without a doubt.
Tommy Truong: how do you do that? Because your first experience, your first time, your first daytime and your last session are very different states.
Rob Sanchez: Yeah, [00:41:00] you, so going into a competition like that, your tolerance is sky high already. I wouldn't recommend it for folks who don't have that tolerance at all. And then also they, we made sure to build the judging scale to value and look at effects a little bit less and make sure we look more at the appearance, the aroma, the flavor, the burn, the mouth feel.
But there are still. Strains that even if you're like 17 deep and you take a few puffs of something that it could sit you down or ch change that. But yeah, it's I wouldn't recommend running fast competitions like that. You need to give your judges time to sit with that product and weigh the effects.
How long do they take those kinds of things?
Tommy Truong: You are a, what is that word, you know? Master Sommelier and Master
Rob Sanchez: ganji? Yeah. Yes.
Tommy Truong: was that experience like? How hard is it to get that certification?
Rob Sanchez: So I really enjoyed it. It was a, um, it's, first of all, it's an online class you take [00:42:00] and it's, um, a whole bunch of lectures on the science the details of cannabis, but then also on like aroma and flavor science. And then it's an in-person test and a little bit of an in-person training as well where you you've gotta answer some questions over the, the study material, but also you have to break down some flour.
And really judge it and compare it. That is something that I think if you don't have a lot of experience with flour can be difficult, but as you smoke more or as you're comfortable with what you like, it's a lot of fun to dig in. And I think that level of connoisseurship and appreciation for the plant is really something I'm trying to advocate for.
And something I hope we get more in the industry over time because, um, we see like high tier cigars, whiskey. Wine, things like that, that you don't need sales on that product. It sells itself at a very high, uh, known value. Uh, that can be appreciated. 'cause you find all those, those flavors, it's a, maybe it's a whiskey that has just like [00:43:00] deep vanilla notes or certain wood notes that are so, so unique to it that you'll pay for that.
I think that we will move that direction with cannabis over time.
Tommy Truong: Yeah, I hope so. I hope that we move away from, I wanna get plastered to the actual
Rob Sanchez: Yeah. we went from like, is the weed purple to, is the weed have high THC to, does the cannabis have high THC? And then now we're saying, what are the terpenes? And I think already we're starting to get that push for what's beyond the terpenes, because there are other things that contribute to those flavors in aromas too.
But I, anyone who wants to to consider themselves a cannabis connoisseur is. I would say the, the steps there is to just consider how that, how that effect really feels. Um, is it behind your eyes? Is it in your head or your shoulders? And then in your, in your smelling and trying to appreciate that aroma.
Keep your mouth open. Find the first flavor that you can kind of note what that is. Maybe it's lemon, then take a breath and relax a minute, and then breathe again. [00:44:00] But try to go past the lemon and find like what's under that. Is it vanilla? Can you determine? Is it something Herby? Um, it just. It's more about having the vocabulary to describe what you're experiencing.
And so it's, it's something you just wanna build up the words and the association so that you can actually explain it. 'cause we all know like, wow, this smells good, but what is that good? You know? And trying to label it. And that's a, it's kind of fun to do. And um, I think over time I hope at least we're gonna see like long cure and more of these brands that can just sell themselves.
As they are and not have to be part of the rotating deals of modernity.
Tommy Truong: Yeah, I hope so. Wouldn't it be just a travesty if the tequila that you love, the taste that you love? That after one sip, you're just plastered and you can't enjoy that anymore. You know? You wanna keep sipping, keep enjoying it, right?
Rob Sanchez: Yeah. So I think that hopefully we see a move towards the Lower potency [00:45:00] products again. Ultra Sonia, who I mentioned in the earlier question, that strain was worked out because it maxed at 16 to 17% THC. So it just didn't have the bite for the market.
But what a comprehensive and beautiful smoke. Yeah, it, when I walked past that plant and flowering, I felt like a cartoon character smelling the pie on the window sill, and my feet go up behind me and I fly to the, the pie. It was beautiful.
Tommy Truong: Yeah. Rob, how can our listeners find you?
Rob Sanchez: So I'm apartment one 13, drops new episodes every Monday. I'm talking with great folks in the space on, I'm on Instagram at APT 1 1 3. The website is apt one one three.com. If you need writing software advice, anything like that, I'm happy to help. And if you're weighing multiple software companies against each other definitely gimme a call.
There's so much we could dig into.
Tommy Truong: Guys, if you are, reach out to Rob. There's not. I've actually never met anybody that has such a diverse background as you. And you [00:46:00] understand the plant and you understand technology, and there's this bridge that that I thought, honestly, that wouldn't be gap, like, you know.
Rob Sanchez: Yay. I am happy to be the go-between. Yeah. Thank you,
Tommy Truong: you so much for joining me today.
Rob Sanchez: thank you.
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