CANNABIS CULTURE – After agreeing over forward-thinking business ethics, a craftbeer master has joined the team of Colorado’s first craft cannabis company.
“I had been looking for opportunities in the space for several years,” says Dale Katechis, founder of Oskar Blues Brewing, which went from a 90’s cellar operation into an American craft beer pillar.
“I really wanted to join a good company and hopefully add some value to my past experiences in business. And through the years of looking at some of the companies here in Colorado, I had almost given up my search,” says Katechis, who was looking for a company with an ethos of professionalism and accountability.
“Luckily, a childhood friend of mine was a banker and was helping Veritas try to find a new partner,” says Katechis whobegan talks with CEO, Mike Liebowitz, and the leadership team at Veritas Fine Cannabis, a company that reminded Katechis of the early stages of Oskar Blues.
Katechis was impressed from day one with the Veritas culture, saying they are a solid company with the makings of exponential growth. “And I believe that maybe I can help keep them from stepping in some of the potholes I did, just in the in the business world.”
“We’ve been talking for a while about what we wanted this company to be as a group,” says Jon Spadafora, Partner and head of marketing and sales. “One thing that was always very important to Mike, and he’s instilled it throughout the entire company, and we’ve got a team of people I think that believe in, is that we want to continue to expand in a way that allows us to be who we are.”
“One thing that we’ve noticed as markets mature, the consumer palate will mature,” says Spadafora. “We don’t want to be too focused on hitting a production goal where we have to make quality control decisions that we aren’t happy with.”
“We’ve already started one project that should be released, certainly within the next three to four months. I can’t quite talk about it yet, because we’re still in the kind of early stages of it,” says Katechis after it was announced he was joining Veritas.“When you’ve got like-minded groups, and people that are willing to work together, and everyone check their ego at the door, you can have a lot of fun in those meetings, and they can go a lot of different ways.”
“I remember when [Oskar Blues] started, we were the only people out there doing it with the big guys and they wouldn’t return our phone calls. And so, we had to figure it out on our own,” says Katechis. “I believe that Veritas will continue to take the high road and help the industry as a whole and not necessarily trying to box people out.”
“I think that large companies coming in to produce cannabis at scale just provides more access to cannabis,” says Spadafora.“And I think as those taste buds mature, just like they did inbeer. There’ll be a higher demand for products that are produced properly. “
Katechis was also interested in Veritas’ aggressive approach to R&D and innovation while still building the business in an accountable manner, which was contrary to anything else that he’d seen in the market.
Veritas has an extensive genetic library and are getting ready to launch a new line of strains collaborating with different breeders around Colorado. “You know, ours process is a little different. We seek to create the exact same environment at all times by growing indoor and we really just focus on high, high quality and consistent products,” says Spadafora.
“We focus on anything we can do throughout the process,specifically post-production, of how do we maintain the best quality and the highest terpene content that we can inside theflower,” says Spadafora. “It’s a very, very difficult product market here and we’re very fortunate to be in a good place in it. And I think we’re there because of how tough we’ve been on making sure that we adhere to producing the best all the time.”
“We’re working to go through and share as much information as we can about who bred the strains and what makes the strainunique, all the way down to the pheno-hunting process, and why different pheno’s are different and why we’ve chosen the ones we selected,” says Spadafora. “There’s so many great strains of cannabis out there right now, and so many amazing flavors and effects. And I think that’s just getting started. You know, we don’t look at other companies necessarily as competition, we’re all doing this together.”
Although Katechis is working on an upcoming project with Veritas, it may be some time until there is a collaboration with Oskar Blues Brewing. “I think both of us obviously exist in a very highly regulated industry. So, nothing right now and nothing for a while,” says Spadafora who wants Veritas to focus on what they are great at. “But obviously, Dale adds an incredible new skillset to our business that we would be stupid to not explore. So, I think that anything is potential in the future.”
“I’ve always felt that if you focus on the things that that are important not only to the internal makings of the company, but to the consumer I think it translates to the bottom-line taking care of itself.” says Katechis.
