The Cole Memo

In this episode, Cole sits down with Phillip, a fellow advocate, and the organizer of the Melt Market, a unique cannabis farmers market in Illinois. Together, they explore the challenges and rewards of organizing underground cannabis events, discuss the importance of community involvement, and reflect on the evolving cannabis landscape in the state. Tune in to learn how the Melt Market is pushing boundaries and fostering a new era of cannabis culture.

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Links mentioned during show

• https://thecolememo.com/history/
• Statement that I read from Curaleaf was based on this post: https://twitter.com/jfberke/status/1821304059724267533
• https://chicago.suntimes.com/cannabis/2022/6/7/23157087/cannabis-pot-parties-marijuana-smoking-buddha-pilsen-mushrooms-cpd-police-department

The auto-generated transcript is available below.

I’m excited to announce that this episode of the coal memo is brought to you by the folks at River Bluff collective in case you didn’t know River Bluff is a licensed social Equity cannabis business in the state of Illinois owned by three siblings they invested their life savings to apply for a dispensary license and ultimately won a social Equity Lottery ball which allowed them to build up their business with the help of an investment team they’ve also leaned into hemp to finance their operation you can enjoy they’re amazing hemp derived products like Edibles tinctures and beverages which can be delivered straight to your door absolutely legally from riverbluff collective.com I’ve also thrown that link in the episode description for your convenience many of you might already know that the River Bluff punch pop is one of my absolute favorite cannabis products I have ever tried with a whopping 50 milligram of THC per can delivers great effect almost instantaneous instantaneously but I realize that this dosage is a little bit high for most people so for those looking for lower do beverages they also offer the bluff punch pops and 10 mgram form factors and they even have lower dose beverages that are suitable for all tolerances right so right now I got my hands on some of their lemon seltzers uh they’ve also got this strawberry lemonade Seltzer and there’s just 4 milligrams of THC per can for both of these drinks perfect for people that are cannabis curious so if you’re a cannabis veteran you might consider trying something like 50 milligrams but if you’re new to it or just have a lower lower tolerance you might consider trying some of the lower dose drinks and if you’re thinking of trying these drinks this is the month to do it for the entire month of August 2024 you can enjoy a 40% discount account on four packs of the 10 mgram or 50 MGR River Bluff sodas no need for a discount code the savings are automatically applied at checkout so don’t miss out explore their website at riverbluff collective.com to find those amazing deals on these amazing products folks you must be 21 plus to purchase and please consume responsibly I want to be very clear these have derived products are not sold in dispensaries if you’d like to find a place to purchase them once again the best place to go is riverbluff collective.com but if you’re really looking for it in store at the bottom of riverbluff collective.com you’ll find the store locator and that’s where you can find a River Bluff Collective store near you off the top of my head I know there’s one in East debuk Illinois so check that out have fun enjoy the products responsibly and enjoy this episode of The Cult [Music] memo so thank you for sitting down back down with me today Mr melt Market that’s what I’ll call you I want to just flash this up on the show really quick I always just display it for a moment why is the show called The Cole memo you can pause it and check it out um thank you for sitting back down with me welcome Phillip how’s it going going good hell yeah we’re gonna be talking melt market today but before we do that Phil what you smoking on is it from Illinois no it’s from Michigan it’s some uh some punch cake from Lake life Farms hell yeah hell yeah and uh melt Market welcome back to the show what are you smoking on so tonight I got some Larry OG and some Nepali Oz Kush amazing amazing oh blueberry Z I forgot it’s right there as well there you go smoking a syona Farms Jack 47 somebody asked me is that a cross between Jack herrer and AK-47 I said I don’t know probably maybe that sounds about right that does sound about right yeah yeah it’s a good guess um has that exact Cross of Jack here aka47 and I know a lot of people like have started out Nirvana seeds so it could be a possibility that you know it’s Nirvana Seed selection of Jack 47 yeah hell yeah well um again thank you for sitting back down with me Phil uh is a good friend of mine and he listened to our podcast together um and we both uh you know as we told you last time we’re really huge fans of the concept um but we wanted to have you back on um to continue to talk about it and like more about like how it’s set up and you know uh if you know the risks really is one of the conversations that that I wanted to talk about again you know um but Phil I kind of wanted to give you the space you listened to the podcast we had um what are some thoughts or or I guess questions that you had when you listened well my thoughts about the general event is that I love it like I love that people are doing it in Illinois I would like to go to the next one I think you said it’s going to be in Aurora yeah November 9th right yeah um I just like and I I know like hearing you talk about it you’ve gotten kind of approval from like local law enforcement and uh I’m just worried for you because there’s a lot of greedy [ __ ] people in this state and like you know I don’t know I mean I’ve I’ve had people comment on things that I’ve posted on redddit being like this group has ratted out these events or you know there’s just like there’s people that aren’t all about Positive Vibes and wanting people to get good weed from good people that is my number one worry so with that being said I’ve invited every other event promoter I’ve invited the dispensary shops to come out and promote their shops I’m like look why don’t you guys just say what we want you guys to be like like we’re telling you what we want from you guys you guys aren’t listening and if you want to come out and see what people are into come out to these events so I’ve openly invited all like the people that would supposedly be competition by doing other events around the same time period or inviting other companies that are against like the same scene so I had a rise Representatives at the last Mount Market two of the other their local dispensaries came out and checked it out I invited them they’re like we don’t want to have a booth there we’ll come and check it out and one of them was like look it’s pretty sad that you know the flower here was much cheaper and much better than what we offer in the shop so I’ve invited them and I’ve been open with them because I that if I am not friendly with them I do run across the fact that they might try to get me in trouble or the vendor in trouble so I do want to everybody right and I’m I’m definitely interested to hear that you’ve like engaged with them on that level and you said people from arise were there yeah that’s interesting yeah yeah um like he said I you know want to come to the next one um but one of the things one of the points that Phil had kind of made when we were talking is like I just you know cracked this it’s a perfect time to bring up the fact that this episode is brought to you by a river River Bluff punch pops you can get them online uh but you know they’re trying to shut this [ __ ] down and this is federally legal you know um so that’s I think well and you know like things never change like nothing you know cannabis laws weren’t going to change unless tons of people broke the cannabis laws yeah so like there yeah there needs to be someone like pushing the envelope because truly like in the future some kind of cannabis Farmers Market I I do think it’s just so inherent to the thing that it’s this plant that grows and you want to get it fresh and it just seems like such a common sense thing to offer that type of event that like I’m happy someone is doing it but I just think this state is so awful in regards to this that I’m I’m just scared for like people that are involved like you I mean there’s other people doing it around here as well um one of the things that I I’m a little bit different that I’m a lot more open about it and I uh I put out the address and a lot of people will say you know Address given out a ticket purchase and I feel it makes people feel also safer and when people look at like my page and they see that they’re like okay he’s more transparent he’s not really hiding things so I think that gives a completely different vibe when it’s a little bit more hidden and in the shadows you invite a sketchier crowd to come to the event and you alienate a lot of people that would normally come out to it so the there’s already enough events that are trying to be in the shadows so by bringing it to the light I think a lot of people come out and feel safer as well yeah that is that is a good point but like CU I shared I was talking to someone on Reddit about the event and I just shared like I was like I know we want to think this is all like cool and dandy but like two years ago in the city in Chicago there was a smoke shop that was doing like a vendor event and they were like raided by the CPD and the vendors were charged with whatever they were like had on them you know I think um but but I just like there’s just people that are not on this level I don’t know I just wonder I just wonder what kind of influence they have to like get somebody to crack down on this I mean I’ve been I’ve been respectful to the cities that we’ve done it in like I’ve been able to do it to in a row before and now I want to do it here again of they had real problems and then like in the city of St Charles one of the things that they really appreciated was the fact that you know their area got like a booming little business in the restaurants like the local mountain pops Downtown St Charles they saw a huge influx in sales they’re like you know some of the new customers we got smelled a little skunky but they bought a lot of snacks so they were happy like you know the people of St Charles thought it was cool to see that and K show up buy a bunch of food and leave quickly and they’ve done events there in the before at homegrown supplies and they get like 50 vendors there and they you know hang out have food vendors eat walk around and zero problems ever in the city yeah which which like does bode well for the events and like for you like doing it in a good way and you would hope like if anyone ever raised any hell about it that like that would be the other side of the coin being like no he’s fine like this is good for the city so at the last we were going to do the Easter eggs and I was going to hide little tickets inside the egg and it would have the booth name and then you have to go and find the booth it goes to I had posted the uh like you know the post on social media someone saw they called the city and complain that I was advertising the children they didn’t care the second and third call came in and then they cared because it was enough like calls bothering them so then they let me know hey don’t do the Easter egg hunt because it looks like you’re advertising a children so I just didn’t do that anymore and they let me know about the complaints that were coming in and the only thing that people were UPS about was the fact that I used the imagery of Easter eggs that was the most offensive thing about the last event I mean it’s cool they have a back and forth with you like that they just wanted to make sure that basically there was no violence uh there’s no hard drugs and that’s all they really cared about I’m I’m more I’m just worried about like ISP like the Illinois State Police cuz like don’t they have jurisdiction over the whole state yeah and like they suck they’re just so bad like lobbying against cannabis stuff and stuff like that like you know I mean if anyone if there was any enforcement against this kind of event I would hope that like cannabis users Statewide would kind of Raise Hell and be like what the [ __ ] are you doing yeah you know but I I post like articles all the time on Reddit just to remind people you know I think I think three of the last four or five things I shared were different articles about people getting arrested and felony charges for different kind of possession limit violations like one guy had 11 pounds one person got a felony charge for having over a hundred grams you know it’s like I I feel like it’s like just this weird like luck area some people are just unlucky and some people are lucky there’s there’s a little luck to it I think but I think then I don’t know man you gota be you gotta have good relationships with the cities you’re trying to work with and I said in the last time like when I talk to these people I’m not going to wear this shirt I’m not gonna like smell the way I smell right now I’m gonna show up respectful to the way they want be talked to and I think they don’t want to know what’s happening they don’t want to see it and I explain to them and they really don’t want to hear it and they just tell me hey you know as long as you don’t advertise the name of the city you don’t advertise heavly on pushed ads on social media clean up after yourselves make sure no there’s no violence the big thing is the garbage that’s what they always complain about is there’s a lot of garbage from Stoners and it’s from rapping uh blunt guts myars things like that a lot of pop and the last one in the parking lot the first day the biggest thing in the garbage was a lot of uh beer cans those are like the most secret beard drinkers ever had any event so yeah you wouldn’t think that no well if you need volunteer if you need volunteer garbage collectors put out a call on Reddit I’m sure you’ll get some people yeah I got a great group of volunteers that came out and they just killed it that was awesome that’s good nice did you say you sneak beer drinkers is that did I catch that right oh yeah they go outside to the parking lot hide behind the car slam six the cans underneath the car and then walk back to the event like like all the Cannabis users used to have to do at drinking events exactly that’s funny that’s funny yeah um yeah like Phil said that you know that’s really and you know I had asked you about that last time but I feel like I you know sort of glossed over it a bit because I am enamored enamored by the idea you know and I don’t know like I feel like one of the reasons I wanted to have you back on and and on so quickly is because I feel like you know on one hand obviously I want you to keep doing what you’re doing and I’m going to be there and uh we’re gonna you know maybe even do a live podcast or something we’ll figure it out but um uh yeah I feel like I’d be remiss if I didn’t have you back on and like had an honest conversation about like just like Phil said you know we read these stories all the time it’s like the point of my my upcoming mini documentary you know and like I really was I really like what you’re doing and um it’s like it’s such a conflict of interest like even releasing our last conversation like I was like I felt conflicted about it because I’m like man you know I don’t want to like release this and blow it up and then all of a sudden you know because like Illinois cannabis Regulators watch my show from time to time you know so like yeah well but also people were so happy with the event they’re posting about it left and right on Reddit so right I mean it’s industry know about it like oh everybody knows yeah I mean very people are very happy about it still talking about it you know so I I wanted to create mainly an event that it was something that I would want to go to and it’s almost there I’m almost at the event where I would want to go to if I read about it i’ be like hell yeah and and um yeah dude like going to like the different events in Michigan going to Amsterdam working over there um yeah dude like reading like different books about Northern California in the 80s and the 90s like what was happening like all those things are like Inspirations to like make the event better and to create something here that people would be like damn I didn’t have to read about it I got to go to it so well and you’re talking about like pushing the envelope right yeah like yeah like like kind of forcing progress on this state I mean that’s you know I have a ton of respect for you for doing this and being as open about it as you are because I do think it is the it is the future in my opinion of some cannabis buying um but I mean I’ve heard about this St like this these events happen in Michigan I think I’ve heard about cannabis farmers markets happening in Massachusetts too okay like very similar events um and I know you know they’re like a I don’t think Massachusetts has a caregiver program or anything like that so you know there’s a it it’s h it’s happening elsewhere you’re just talking about it yeah yeah like I was saying like there’s been a lot of secret ones and places that won’t give you the address or tell you where it’s going to be at until you buy the ticket or the day of the event because they’re scared so I totally get it like yeah yeah and I wanted to share like a very short clip just uh on Phil’s point of like why I think what you’re doing is awesome but it’s also like right in line with what we’ve and I’m just saying like we is a broad brush I’m talking about like kind of cannabis Advocates have been trying to shoot for this whole time like I said this is just a brief clip I will play we continue to grow marijuana against the biggest organized longest standing domestic law enforcement operation in this country and public policy has changed as a consequence of our efforts we so low volume there but good thing there are captions um yeah well and like um you know like in Michigan for example these events exist because the Grassroots movement in favor of cannabis has just been more strong over there you know like they have uh they have that hash bash every year in April but cor but going along with that they have the mon Street Fair which is just this huge farmers market for cannabis and shrooms and you know like the cops know exactly what’s going on they’re not hassling people they’re just trying to manage the crowds and clean up the garbage and I mean it’s pretty crazy when you think about the history of hash bash like John Lenin came out there to protest like they it woke up a lot of people I mean johnon Clair’s over there giving them what two joints for the undercover detectives or something like that yeah now we got hash bash what was like 120,000 people game together first Saturday of April every year now I don’t think it’s quite that many but it is a lot okay I was there couple years like over 10 years ago and it was pretty wild know and it I mean it still goes on you know because even post legalization there’s still a reason to be demonstrating for that kind of to freedom because you’re still not totally free even in a place like Michigan right right well said yeah I’m looking for this old poster I have from a hash bash back in the day it’s been going on for quite a while and it inspired hash Wednesday which is something that everybody should know about in Illinois I’ll tell you how to find out about that in just a moment thought I had the hash bash poster anyways though yeah keep pushing the envelope that’s the whole point and like Phil just said it’s the reason that this stuff still ex you know there’s still a fight to be had I guess is what I’m saying so and you know I you see what my vendors are doing for the most part everything that I see them doing are things that I agree with so I want people like if you see my vendors I agree with what they’re doing I so yeah no one there is doing anything too while they’re crazy yeah yeah so anyways hash Wednesday you can learn about it at coal memo.com hisory I’ve got a whole freeo view photo archive uh with newspaper clippings and stuff uh you can see you know students from the University of Illinois back in the day getting arrested for smoking weed on the quad I interviewed some I interviewed some of these students as well um can view those interviews on that website I just mentioned coal memo.com hisory you can see this newspaper clipping was from Wednesday April 20th 1988 or 20 baby blaze it yeah I was I’m just I was I’m just wanted to talk about it again I’m interested to hear that some like licensed operators came and checked out the event because like I I do think part of this like the problem with the system is like people that would be about the Bel Market are not going to dispensaries so you know and so like and they’re most of the they’re going to buy most of the Cannabis like people like myself people like Cole like I’m not going to an Illinois dispensary to buy cannabis um and I just feel like if those companies could realize that it’s actually like in their interest to kind of embrace a thing like this to try to reach out to that Community like I’m thrilled to hear that arise came and checked out the event am I going to go buy their cannabis tomorrow probably not but it gives me a slightly better opinion of them right so they actually uh reached out and asked me if I would help them with one of their events coming up and I told them like you know you guys should reach out to these small upcoming companies like they’re not Growers or anything like that or hash makers but they’re like people that are making these like um like hash tools and things like that and like different small companies I’m like reach out locally to these smaller companies they don’t have to be what you guys think they are just like reach out to these smaller Counter Culture companies get them involved and pay them for their time get local food vendors that aren’t popular get unpopular food vendors create good relationships with these people because then they’re going to be loyal to you they’re going to talk really good about you if you get someone that’s popular they’re going to think you only got them because they’re popular so that was my advice to them well and that’s that’s kind of like these licensed operators problem I mean not that they have a problem they’re making a bunch of money but uh like they’ve I feel like the licensed operators in Illinois have like not tried to engage with the community because they know they exist in this little like Walled Garden where they can just sell to the people that will choose to come to them so you know yeah I mean I would I would hope some of these companies would on board you guys deal a lot with like the medical patients right Cole like a lot of the things that you talk about are from the medical side uh I would say like more from like just Criminal Justice Reform you know kind of everything where Phil’s coming from right now like the reason he’s on a lot is like I mean this is all we talk about you know what I mean so like this is why these events are so fascinating I don’t know if that answered your question well the biggest people that reach out for the event are actual medical patients who say they can’t find the type of medicine that they’re looking for a lot of these like shops and dispensaries so when they come they ask me very specific questions and I try to guide them to like my best possible answer like I think you should check this place out or go up here to this corner and talk to them but I was shocked to find out that it was maybe 40% medical patients that were popping up and asking questions right away because they wanted to know certain things for what they were looking for and said the same answer they’re not fting it in the dispensary there’s helping them and as you said last time um and Phil if you wanted to you just have made these events very accessible that’s that’s all I had to say so I mean like that goes a long way I think you know like these dispensaries there’s not they’re not very accessible there are 55 in the state you know um but you have to go there medical medical yeah um so just not very probably someone with a med card in the state is going to be someone who consumes more it’s maybe a little more informed consumer true yeah you know so that’s that’s why I would think they’re showing up to an event like this yeah hell yeah how’s the smoke man is it hidden it’s fantastic this is some Larry OG with some pink Z has right on time damn that sounds really good that sounds you got cat you got cat I got a cat you got cats at home yeah got two that’s awesome by the legendary cat crap Milwaukee that’s awesome you know one thing about Mark is that uh I will say I’ve been really lucky get some really great talent uh some of the people that come out have now become world famous and they still come to the event and I couldn’t have been more thankful to them for coming out every time I’ve invited them yeah I will say you know some of these companies I’ve always said that they should embrace homeg grow because they could look at it as Talent acquisition they should embrace these events and uh you know AC Talent it’s similar to beer you know yeah oh yeah like the like the craft beer craft beer really took off after home brewing was legalized yeah I don’t think that’s like a coincidence right but how many people are still Brewing at home I know one yeah see they’re scared of all these hom Growers popping up but they need to let them pop up and get tired of it because it’s going to be easier for a lot of these people to just go to a dispensary and still buy at the end of the day so I think a grower might grow two or three years before they get tired of it as they have more kids as they get older and you know their back hurts they don’t want to carry buckets of water and dirt up and downstairs so they’re like you know what I’m just going to go and pick something up really quickly and the shops need to realize that just say you’re for the hom grow you’ll get a lot more respect and probably a lot more customers because no matter what people get older well yeah I mean I trimmed weed once and I knew I would never grow my own weed yeah I just downsize my hom grow like I’m still hom growing but like I definitely downsized it because like you said I went like crazy and it’s fun and it’s really cool but it takes a lot of I don’t mean to like over complicate it by any means you can do it super low effort but if you want to do it right you know there’s just it’s stressful so um like you say uh you know I’ll probably just grow like one or two plants a year but for the most part I’m going to The Dispensary now is it in Illinois you know I’ll plead the fifth on that no I’m joking but like no because the prices are just outrageous you know it’s well prices options options as well yeah even if the prices were yeah cheaper it’s not a great yeah option yeah not only not only like the choices we’ve made this point at nauseum but not only the choices slim but like when you support those choices like I just feel yucky you know like ah these people lobbied against hom grow like why am I smoking their weed you know so this shirt is for this group called Roy cannabis club and uh we would have these monthly Gatherings and stuff and we started to get quite a big little following locally and New Era reached out I was gonna say I’ve heard about you because of a new era yeah yeah out and uh I had asked my attorney if he could like you know find some information about them and he’s like yeah yeah no problem so he pulls up like the money they Lobby and where it went to and what it was for and he like basically broke down the uh legal language that I I didn’t understand and basically they had already put up like 600,000 against homeg growing in the years that wasn’t this new era yeah it was them yeah but yeah we had never heard about that we didn’t know anything about that yeah they’re one of the big they’re one of like the main funders of the Cannabis Business Association too like ongoing so we had ask them like if you guys you know because they wanted us to basically use their extra space and their dispensary set up Gatherings there uh and just basically talk about cannabis and promote their shop but they all wanted because they were offering money and I’m like no we don’t want no money can you guys put down W and that you guys support homegrown and they refuse to do that that’s insane they’ rather just pay us to have meetings there it’s interesting yeah you know I mean I I I haven’t seen it you know cannabis companies and you know you think about it I don’t feel like any other company will Lobby for like you know things that actually help people they only Lobby for things that like help them you know what I mean yeah I mean when you really think about it it’s not like were you gonna say something Phil I I mean it makes sense but like yeah God you would just think eventually some company in the space would be like you know this really doesn’t benefit us I mean I guess it does benefit that’s the problem I guess like they could drum up a bunch of Goodwill with people by being like hey we support homow hey we support medical patients being to buy at all dispensaries hey we support uh removing possession limits like I’ve always thought like if you put like um something as simple on your packaging that says like a proceed of this obviously you would have to back this up to somehow but like a proceed of this purchase went towards lobbying towards all those things you said Phil like like I would feel good about purchasing a product again if they could back that up um if that said that you know that was truly the case but we exist in the state of Illinois where even a normal chapter Chicago normal is advocating for the Banning of him so like I don’t know nothing in the makes sense it’s like everyone’s in it for their own profits yeah so I like how you said they have to back it up and show some proof of what they were doing so for the first M Market that’s why I didn’t want to take any donations I just had the people donate directly to any animal shelter or Rescue of their choice to show the proof because I didn’t want people turning around saying well where’s all the proof and I want to Here show all these receipts from different people so it was easier to have the he just donate and you know what instead of people donating just $20 for a ticket a lot of people would donate 25 30 40 to their favorite animal shelter rescue so it was really cool to see some of the people that were donating like a $100 for like these different rescues and I was shocked to find out that the chicken rescue was a big donor they got a lot of money so people apparently love chickens [ __ ] yeah dude hell yeah yeah I don’t know if I said this but I just learned um you know because I always thought the five plant limit is silly for homeg grow and I still think it’s silly there should be no plant limit as I’ve learned from a home grower as a hom grower even growing just five plants is challenging so like I wouldn’t dream of growing tin plants you know but if you can handle it why not um anyways uh I am high and for oh uh I almost forgot what I was going to say uh five plant count limit right I also found out in this this town that my parents live in they have a five chicken count limit my parents said [ __ ] the law and they have seven chickens what a bunch of badasses I know right and they also didn’t get a permit for these chickens so they’re also really skirting the law um but anyways I just I didn’t know I I thought the you know I think all these numbers are arbitrary but it’s interesting to hear it in something as normal as chickens so what about the places where we can only have two dogs and two cats or just one dog and one cat yeah I was also reading I don’t know maybe it was a meme or something the idea that you can even be charged an extra fee if you live somewhere because you have animals like that’s an interesting concept you know like a luxury tax yeah yeah I mean I get it if it’s like maintenance of the house but like really is there I don’t know anyways the meme said it much better than I just did um so yeah the Melt Market man uh what was it on November November 9th downtown and uh I will say that this will be probably be one of the uh most interesting ones for sure uh the location itself is a very cool VI so I’m very excited it used to be an old uh luxury car like mechanic Workshop so they’re going to open up these old school badass garage doors uh the ventilation system they’re going to be using for the Melt Market is one of the reasons why the vendor fees are more expensive for this melt Market um I wanted to get the best ventilation system for anyone who has asthma or any medical needs we want to clear everything out of there as soon as possible it’s going to be filtered and uh it should be safe for medical patients as well as a recreational user to be inside there and walk around and not be choked out oh yeah handicap accessible as well all the Melt markets are handicap accessible for the medical patient very nice Phil uh any other thoughts or questions on the Melt Market no I mean I’m definitely going to try to get to the next one [ __ ] yeah [ __ ] yeah dude definitely come out um yeah like uh I think I’m G to I’m pretty I’m pretty sure Cole and I both intend to yes I think I’m Gonna Keep if I can I’m gonna do it for two more years keep doing it I think if I enjoy myself I’ll keep coming for two more years sounds sounds like a a plan we’ll make it like a hash bash for Illinois oh yeah man two years of M Market I’m G to run for local office so hopefully I can be on here talking about changes the local community hell yeah it’ll be cool to look back at that I uh no I’m you’re laughing I’m I I feel it man I feel it you know you’re I mean you need some um you need Canabis people to run for office right know I mean that doesn’t have to be the only thing you’re going to be concerned with when you’re in office but like you need people in government who know about weed know what people want and what they don’t want like because the the laws and regulations are just [ __ ] stupid straight up like the chicken count we were just talking about like I feel like it takes you to be like high to be like what the [ __ ] are we why why limit the chickens you know sometimes though sometimes you know what though I just want to throw this out there too one of the things that you’re gonna notice at the mail Mark is the variety of things even from the artist I I try to make sure that there’s not two of the same same type of booths in the mount Market everyone is going to be slightly different from one another and so you’re not going to be stuck seeing two of the same thing and some of the artists that come out from Glass artists to painters to sculpts to fabric artists and clothing designers are all really badass in their themselves too so I’m glad that people stopped by and looked at them and support the artist uh this one uh painter was saying she’s never sold as many paintings as she has that day which is really cool to hear and got people that say you know this was like an average market and I’m like damn you sold a lot and they’re like yeah I always do I’m like well that’s awesome to hear and then we had vendors that came out for the first time and blew people’s mind we had kind candy and I didn’t realize people how much they just love regular Cayenne candies they were just lining up left and right for cayenne candy so people were excited and then freeze dried snacks of all types of varieties always a big hit and so there was two groups of people just doing different types of freeze-dried snacks and yeah yeah one guy doing sweets and one guy doing Savory and you know it’s exciting like I think people really like the variety and that’s what makes people interested to walk around take their time look at the vendors and stop and get some food the food is pretty awesome too um I I unfortunately don’t get the chance to eat because if I eat anything during the event I just sit down and crash and go to sleep and I’m just like running around back and forth going to the parking lot guiding the cars to tra like parking properly uh so there’s a Panic Room at the last one around the corner and it was pretty awesome to see that groups of people were done with the Melt Market would go to the Panic Room and you know supporting the local businesses right there so that was pretty cool to see but no I hope you guys come and see the variety and just get blown away by the fact that every booth and vendor is different from one another so I hope you don’t get bored and I hope you walk around and leave with like a bunch of w and want to come back well and it it’s uh I didn’t think about it um but it’s cool to hear that you include a lot of other types of vendors not just cannabis guys like there’s like artists and food and all kinds of [ __ ] going on so it’s really kind of more like a regular farmers market so there’s a fermit maker around here and he sells ferments to this farmer and I had the farmer come out and bring his vegetables and I had never tried a candy tomato it tasted like a starburst it was amazing and he was selling those for an absorbing amount but they sold out he sold out of all his Tomatoes his Peppers his corn everything so now I know I need more vegetable Farmers because that was a huge hit so people were excited to see that as well as they said they’re like usually we don’t get to see a lot of like these types of vendors but I wanted it to be a big variety I wanted to have that type of farmers market feel and I’m looking for more like food vendors because a lot of infused companies request to be a vendor but I don’t want like they all do the same type of infused treats so I only need one in infused vendor but non infused food vendors they’re always booked on the weekend so it’s kind of that’s been the more harder thing to find is a good food vendor and then have one that uh is licensed in the county um has insurance and everything so that’s what I look for as well well I would even I would even think just like regular food vendors would make a killing sometimes they do sometimes they don’t I’ve had a few food vendors that say they think the events were going to be uh lackluster so they weren’t prepared for it so they only brought very little very little bit so yeah yeah it’s interesting yeah no I’m looking forward to it it sounds like everything I uh want it to be yeah it it it’d be cool to see a little Crossover with the the actual Farmers Market because you know one of the things that hemp has going for it right now I can’t remember remember where I read this but you know there’s there’s a large sub subsection of farmers that just like you know regular everyday Farmers that are now in hemp and uh that’s a big lobbying group you know well I wonder I wonder if you could get um like a hemp company or two to come out there too I do I have had uh hemp companies at both events already oh okay cool yeah very cool they uh reached out right away um peaceful Pine Farms and they’re like hey how can we be involved uh they wanted to be a sponsor so you know I said let’s do something let’s put you guys out right in front and yeah we put them right in front and they became an event sponsor um yeah we’ve had a few other companies reach out to me some questionable uh some of them heard that they get their uh their product from China that they don’t grow it themselves so I’m just I leave those on R yeah I I found out what I was referring to so Boris Jordan who is the somebody high up in Cur Leaf most people already know who I’m probably talking about at this point but in case I think he’s the CEO yeah thank you yeah CEO yeah that sounds right um I was very close to him last year at benzinga took some photos of him but uh was not able to get a chat with him anyways though apparently on his last call he um not only said April was quote extraordinary extraordinarily low um the figures that they got in April because of too much discounting around 420 that’s what he was saying um but he um you know cure Leaf has recently launched a hemp company I think it’s called The Hemp company uh in abbreviation THC which is actually pretty clever um on this call he said instead of fighting the hemp industry we should work together he said the um that was a quote U this is a loose quote he said Farmers have a huge Lobby have the ear of Republicans um not hemp product producers but hemp farmers who he says have political power so it seems like and I mean curea is a pretty big cannabis company you know that’s a pretty powerful statement I think you know with regard to just hemp and I mean they literally have a partnership with d DH that’s another thing that came out of this cure Leaf earnings call which a lot of people have been talking about anyways because they’re just getting Edibles and drinks from curea delivered to their door um you know it’s like wow this company’s also in the dispensary but well and that’s like you know something our legislature needs to wake up to is like you guys are so slow and bad at this stuff that like these companies are finding entire workarounds right to this like crta system you want to be like the gold standard it’s like well now I can just get on door Dash and Order Cur Leaf hemp products to my door because you guys aren’t offering people what they want or setting up a means for people to get what they want yeah it’s crazy it really is crazy and then to try to you know clamp down on that is is even more insane because it’s so easy to shut something down but God they’ve been trying to figure out delivery for years haven’t they and here it is right here it [ __ ] is and it’s like maybe just let it go you know or or if you want if you’re really worried and you want stay testing let everybody go through it let everybody try to pass it you know that’s the way I look at this like if you don’t pass honestly even if you’re a homeg grower if you’re from the Melt market like if you want to put something on the Shelf at a dispensary if you don’t pass testing then you can’t put it on the Shelf if you pass testing then you can put it on the Shelf like I feel like that’s pretty simple you know and people are always asking like do you know how to get our stuff tested that we grow at home we want to get lab results you want to see what’s in the stuff that we’re producing how good is it compared to the dispensary stuff and I think they should make access to the testing for a lot of hom Growers a lot more accessible yeah you know I just got I had a conversation with somebody on Reddit to U within the last week or so and they said the same thing and I I said like well as far as I know some home uh Labs were offering tests for exactly that and they were like no I mean I’ve called several and uh they’re not doing this anymore and I was like huh it’s just kind of interesting um because yeah again there were used to be a few companies that definitely would let you do that well there was that company like Oro Labs correct right I wonder if they just didn’t have like enough interest if there isn’t enough of a homeg grower Community wanting to get tests done if I bet it was exp I’m going to speculate that they were involved in the Chicago Sun Times investigation and it everybody agrees in the testing industry that we’re not going to like let people check ourselves against each other oh interesting yeah because it was interesting how like they popped up and then suddenly they got bought out and weren’t around anymore yeah and I’m not again I’m just speculating um because you can look up on Chicago Sun in that Chicago sometimes investigation they published an interview and they’re clearly in orgo labs and I say that because I’ve been there and I feel like it’s easy to say that too because they’ve made videos too so like it didn’t seem to they weren’t like hiding it um yeah that’s interesting yeah so then you have this state lab that I’m currently actually in a conversation with the uh Illinois Department of Agriculture I’ve seen this lab um it wasn’t finished when I saw it it sounds like it’s still not finished but um anyways that is not going to be used and will not be used for those purposes because that’s what this one person ultimately asked me in this back and forth they were like well if if we can’t test it ourselves if we can’t even access Cannabis Testing ourselves as hom Growers or people that are just curious is this product safe will we be able to use this state based lab and I’m going to go ahead and say the answer is no because I interviewed David Lakeman and I asked will this lab be used as like a sort of audit and he very clearly said no um and I can try to link that in the show notes it’s a very short interview and I actually just re recently reposted it um but I’ll have it in the show notes in case you’re watching this at a later date um anyways though isn’t it kind of wild just for a second like that the state is restricting access to Cannabis Testing and I don’t mean to say that the state is because that wouldn’t be an accurate statement but it feels like there is not ready access to Cannabis Testing which the main problem is probably that testing is kind of [ __ ] right yeah yeah like I don’t look at it I’ve never considered testing when smoking weed right well and that’s the other thing I not to keep talking about debates I’ve gotten into online but you know somebody uh asked me about Cannabis Testing and I was just saying yeah kind of what you just said Phil and they were like are you suggesting that you know like we shouldn’t have testing at all I’m like no I’m just saying maybe it should be a little bit better but let’s also like acknowledge too that testing has never stopped me from buying weed or kind of even really been involved in that conversation like and if you go back a bit further when paraquat was an issue like the government was literally spraying a chemical on weed did people stop smoking weed no they they knew that it’s like the idea of grow your own that’s when that really became popular um or know your grower you know don’t just buy random weed that’s when that got really popular from According to the people that I’ve talked to that grew up in that time um so it’s just I say that all to say I got kind of longwinded that testing like it’s welcome it’s cool but it’s never really been something that I’ve leaned on or it’s been part of the equation do you agree with that Phil and Mr melt Market Phil do you want to go first well just that there there’s no standard like you’ve had someone on the show recently who talked about how there’s no standardization in it so it’s like if you have no standardization in the testing what does does it matter yeah because the numbers don’t mean anything really so I mean for me the only thing that I want to know my testing is like what’s ey that’s bad I don’t care about the numbers in the THC or the CBD I want to know if there’s anything in the flower like mold or some chemical residue from maybe some cross like wind like contamination that’s more what I’m curious about and as I’m training like trying out different fol years I want to know if any res do is left on the flower before I go to try it out and I know it’s not a big deal because I’m sure I’ve smoked terrible flower before in the past but I just want to try to produce like the best flower that I can and and as far as the numbers some of the varieties that hit me the hardest are like 133% THC and 8% CBD very low THC and pretty high CBD so there’s that yeah hell yeah any other thoughts on that Phil NOP cool well yeah um thanks for that was a little therapeutic there at the end um gotta talk about some a little different topics there so um cool well um check out the Melt Market I want to thank Phil and uh you m the next melt Market is November November 9th November 9th in Aurora mark your calendars I will do that um right now as we close and uh I just wanted to thank you both for staying on so late with me on a Friday night so hey I want to apologize for ring late I got Ducks today so I had to get some duck stuff ready for them dude that don’t apologize yeah that’s cool as [ __ ] what how many how many ducks are you limited to uh I don’t know but I got four Swedish ducks for the uh chicken to play with there you go yeah very cool no no problem and as always uh you know platform is always yours uh we’ll be there on November 9th and uh hope we see you there folks um keep fighting the good fight dude thank you for coming tonight hey thank you for having me yep all right have a good night everybody take care peace