A chain for Mary Jane
Big Pot
By TIMOTHY EGAN, NYT
They assembled on the 40th floor of the tallest building in Seattle last week, the ex-Mexican president and the businessman who wants to be known as the Bill Gates of Bud. On the table: a pie bigger than the sky. It would involve drugs, suppliers and retailers, and laser-targeted marketing for buyers willing to pay a premium.
The would-be mogul, Jamen Shively, is trying to make the leap from Microsoft to marijuana. He’s not shy. He wants to plant the first brand-name retail chain in the United States in a market worth upward of $100 billion. “Yes, we are Big Marijuana,” he said as cameras clicked.
The ex-president, Vicente Fox, has seen his country suffer decades of carnage and corruption, all in service of this same market — the one that exists now, run by gangsters, drug lords and sketchy characters on city corners. To go legal, big and capitalistic, said Fox, who has no financial stake in Shively’s operation, would be “a game changer” for Mexico.
Starbucks is a role model, as is Kentucky bourbon. “There’s a land rush going on now,” Shively said in an interview. “Not for real estate, but for brands.”
(More here.)
By TIMOTHY EGAN, NYT
They assembled on the 40th floor of the tallest building in Seattle last week, the ex-Mexican president and the businessman who wants to be known as the Bill Gates of Bud. On the table: a pie bigger than the sky. It would involve drugs, suppliers and retailers, and laser-targeted marketing for buyers willing to pay a premium.
The would-be mogul, Jamen Shively, is trying to make the leap from Microsoft to marijuana. He’s not shy. He wants to plant the first brand-name retail chain in the United States in a market worth upward of $100 billion. “Yes, we are Big Marijuana,” he said as cameras clicked.
The ex-president, Vicente Fox, has seen his country suffer decades of carnage and corruption, all in service of this same market — the one that exists now, run by gangsters, drug lords and sketchy characters on city corners. To go legal, big and capitalistic, said Fox, who has no financial stake in Shively’s operation, would be “a game changer” for Mexico.
Starbucks is a role model, as is Kentucky bourbon. “There’s a land rush going on now,” Shively said in an interview. “Not for real estate, but for brands.”
(More here.)
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