You’ve seen these holiday ad campaigns: Etsy’s « Where’s Waldo » sketch.
You watch TV, right? Then you’ve seen those holiday ad campaigns: Etsy’s “Where’s Waldo?” sketch. Starbucks’ “Red Cups.” Target’s “weirdly hot,” Santa-like sales guy, “Kris K.” And more.
Hooray for the catchy jingles, the gorgeous product shots, the adorable polar bears and twinkly lights. But where oh where is cannabis? demands Ricardo Baca. “My biggest gripe is that most cannabis brands are not taking full advantage of the opportunities presented to them,” complains Baca, founder and CEO of Grasslands, the Denver-based cannabis and psychedelics integrated marketing/pr agency.
“I’m very surprised every holiday season when the holidays come and go,”Baca explained in a recent interview, “and I rarely see either dispensaries or brands taking advantage of the opportunity to latch on to the holidays and the marketing tool that they are.
“So I am a little frustrated with cannabis brands.”
Certainly, cannabis businesses have their challenges, Baca acknowledges. There’s THC products’ Schedule I federal status – grouping them with heroin and LSD, no less. And that fact, apart from websites, puts the brakes on national advertising.
Then there are the budget constraints these companies face because they’re so new and so legally strait-jacketed.
“Foremost of course, all these plant-touching brands are getting their butts kicked by 280E.” Baca points out, citing the federal prohibition against marijuana concerns deducting business expenses. Yet: “That’s all the more reason they should be doing these kinds of [holiday] things” beyond 4/20 and Green Wednesday, Baca argues.
What then, does the executive have in mind? He suggests four strategies:
· Holiday-themed packaging. “Packaging is a major pain point in the industry,” says Baca, who spends considerable time in dispensaries surveying products.
