Potent Podcast Intro: Looking at the Intersection of Cannabis & Immersive Entertainment
Illustration by @max_gps
Potent Podcast Ep. 1 Info:
Attorney's Bryan Bergman and Wendy Heimann Nunes tee-up their new podcast exploring the opportunities and challenges emerging at the intersection of Cannabis, and out-of-home and immersive experiences. Bryan has served the burgeoning cannabis industry, state-by-state, where he has developed an unmatched legal expertise. Bryan speaks regularly on industry-related topics and educates operators and other professionals. Wendy is the force behind Nolan Heimann's reputation for being the premiere law practice serving the location based and immersive entertainment industry worldwide. Her entire 30-year career has been solely dedicated to this unique vertical. Get a taste for whats to come when you listen to future Potent Episodes.
Podcast Transcript:
Bryan Bergman
Hello, everyone, and welcome to Nolan Heimann dot com’s first of many podcasts on the intersection of cannabis and entertainment. Location based to be exact. We're very excited to be bringing you a deep dive series of podcasts as we look at what is going on in both the location based and immersive entertainment world, and industry, and also with the cannabis industry, and how the two industries are starting to intersect and all the crazy and exciting opportunities that are here to come. My name is Bryan Bergman and I'm here with my partner, Wendy Heimann, and we're really excited to start this podcast, which today is going to focus on just an intro to what we're seeing. So, Wendy, why don't you tell us a little bit about yourself?
Wendy Heimann Nunes
Sure. Thank you, Bryan. First of all, I wanted to let everyone know that Bryan and I hope to have a lot of fun with these podcasts. So even though we're lawyers and sometimes people dread the thought of listening to lawyers, I want to dispel you of that notion because Bryan and I are a heck of a lot of fun. I mean, after all, he's a cannabis guy and I'm an entertainment person. So how much more fun can you be?
Anyhow, so my background is entirely - I'm an old lady, unlike Bryan, I've spent 30 years in location based and immersive entertainment. In fact, I've been using the word immersive before it passed spell check. And what that is, a lot of people don't really fully understand what LBE and immersive even means. And basically, I just characterize it as any form of entertainment that requires you to leave your house. So you can imagine how my life has been in the last couple of years with the pandemic and what my clients have been dealing with. But it's any form of entertainment that has a site associated with it, and because it has a site associated with it, it allows people to be completely immersed in the experience, immersed in the story, immersed in the narrative, immersed in the experience.
So, for example, some of my clients are theme parks. Some of my clients are immersive experiences where all you’re experiencing is a projection mapped environment. We do touring exhibits, museum exhibits, pop-up events, branded experiences, any form of entertainment where the guest is physically present and is immersed in a story.
And what's really cool about that vertical is because I've been in it for 30 years, I've watched the technology become more available, less expensive. So projection mapping, augmented reality, things like that. I've watched consumers want more experiences and less stuff, and that's the result of social media. People love being able to talk about their experiences. They take pride in it more now than sometimes the stuff they collect. And then also what we're seeing in the real estate area is a lot of shops are going away and retail sites need content.
And so we're seeing a growing demand and need for immersive and location based content. So all roads are leading to very exciting opportunities there, and I'm very excited at the intersection with cannabis and those opportunities that cannabis affords us. So on that note, I'm going to turn it over to Bryan to talk about his area, cannabis.
Bryan Bergman
Thanks, Wendy, and you know, you're joking around calling yourself old when you're clearly not at 30 years of practicing a particular area of law. I may have only been working with cannabis companies specifically since about 2015, but because so much changes, I always joke that the cannabis industry feels like dog years to me. So my six or seven years has got to equal or not surpass your 30 years.
Wendy Heimann Nunes
Probably, probably. So it is rather a shame that this is a podcast and not a video cast, because dare I say, no one would guess that I’ve practicing for 30 years.
Bryan Bergman
I would agree completely.
Wendy Heimann Nunes
Thank you.
Bryan Bergman
We all know what cannabis is, it’s a commodity, and we all know that cannabis has a variety of legal issues that are surrounding it. And just to kind of briefly touch upon just a couple of the major points for this series is number one. Of course, it's still federally illegal. It is still regulated on a state-by-state basis, which I'm not going to bore anybody with the reasons why.
But it is possible for states to regulate their own internal border operations and dealings with the cannabis industry. And it's because it's federally illegal, we are still dealing with a patchwork of laws and regulations, depending upon the location of the business in which you're wanting to operate. And if you're a multistate operator, then it becomes even a little bit more complicated.
But what right now, people are going to ask me, what is the outcome and what are we looking for? And what's the projections for federal legalization and I would say cloudy, please ask again and another six months. And the reason for that is there are definitely things that could be done and could be changing, but that also the political winds at the federal level seem to be right now that policymakers are trying to get wholesale reforms and changes as opposed to piecemeal changes.
And as a result, there's a lot more red tape to be getting through and a lot less positive outlooks that we're going to be seeing some form of overall federal legalization in the near future. I could be wrong, but from what I've been seeing and what I'm expecting, I think that we're still a ways off from a full on federal regulatory scheme. So right now, it's to keep watching what's happening federally and know your state laws. And so everything that we talk about is really, well, how does it work within a particular state because everybody else has particular things.
But the way I see the cannabis industry and why I'm so excited to be here today is because there's really, in my mind, three major phases to this industry's growth. We've already kind of worked our way through a lot of that on the West Coast and on the East Coast, the middle of the country is starting to come together as well. With this idea of, well, how do we get a legal business and getting that legal business means following the rules and regulations to be permitted to operate, and that is happening more and more.
And I think a lot of businesses are getting past that. And now it's becoming a question of how do I survive in this market? How do I make sure that I have something to sell and that I'm going to be differentiating myself in branding or otherwise, so that I can pass any sort of fluctuations in the market? For instance, in California, there's an oversupply issue right now.
Wendy Heimann Nunes
You’re not smoking enough, Bryan.
Bryan Bergman
Well, but all the same. You know, there's a lack of retail right now in California, so the market's kind of having some problems with the supply chain, but hopefully that will change soon.
But you know, you want to be, as a business, able to get past those bumps in the markets, and that means moving beyond just being a commodity trader. And to that end, that's where we're really excited and bullish is that third phase is the mature cannabis industry working with other industries, such as location based entertainment industry. And doing things that intersect with other people's needs and wants.
And like Wendy said, when you consume cannabis, it's a very different situation and experience from when you consume, say, alcohol or you go out for a meal. You may want different types of entertainment afterwards than you would after having a couple of drinks.
And another issue to really be thinking about is also the difference is that with alcohol, you can turn over multiple drinks within an hour, potentially, or you can base your business model on turning over sales of alcohol. In cannabis, the user is not going to want to be just sitting there buying bowl after bowl or edible after edible or drink or whatever, because once they've consumed and they've gotten to the experience they want, what's next, what keeps them there?
The idea being, is the experiences that come and that you want to do after you've consumed is where it gets exciting. The idea of intersecting the notions of going to concerts, sporting events, or doing tourism or going to tours of a cultivation facility and doing tastings similar to a winery. These are all very exciting opportunities. That is exactly what we're talking about the intersection of location based entertainment and cannabis. Think of what Wendy just said about real estate development. Another thing that could be very interesting to do is if you use a cannabis business like a lounge, a consumption lounge as your anchor and then you have a lot of entertainment options surrounding it, those entertainment options can be open to everybody. But for those that want to heighten that experience by consuming first, this will keep them there in the area and the businesses around it. And that's exciting.
Wendy Heimann Nunes
And I actually wanted to speak about a personal experience that I had that speaks to this exact point. So in my world, I am always working with my clients to maximize, obviously the return on investment, speed it up and increase the margins, and pricing is obviously a major issue. How much can we charge for a certain experience? What do we need to charge in order to increase our margins and whatnot?
I had an interesting experience recently where I attended an immersive experience with a friend and we laughed and we talked about the ticket price and I felt the ticket price was more appropriate than the individual I was with. And we isolated it down to, dare I say I am a cannabis user, and I had used cannabis. And so my experience in that environment was different. And as a result, I had a different experience that was deeper, richer. And I was willing to pay more, and that was a really interesting thought from my perspective outside of the cannabis business, per say, but looking at it just from an immersive experience producer, the opportunities to increase the type of experience by introducing relationships with various cannabis partners.
The other thing I wanted to underscore on this podcast so that people understood what Bryan and I are talking about, is as the cannabis industry matures, we don't view it as, when Bryan talks about it in terms of it used to be a commodity right, its a plant. It's a chemical compound of some sort–Bryan knows these things, I don't. But really, from my vantage point, it's a lifestyle, and our firm focuses very much on using lifestyle as a way to build brands and monetize intellectual properties and create those relationships that are powerful.
And so, for example, we're seeing a lot of movement in the immersive space with music IPs- use now. There are some music entities or IPs that are so closely related and perfect for an intersection of the cannabis experience. These are the types of things that we're working on, but I want to underscore that we're taking cannabis outside of just focusing on the weed business and thinking about it in terms of additives. So, for example, we don't see the opportunity just always needing a license or always meaning you're going to consume on site.
It could be an experience that's next to a licensed entity or that's integrated with a licensed entity, but that because of its association, because of its strategic partnership, because of its mere proximity, it has its advantages.
So long term, we're talking about placemaking and having places where maybe you consume. And then when you're done consuming, where do you go to be entertained?
Bryan Bergman
Yeah, Wendy and that's a great point, and definitely something that really is a case-by-case basis of a decision to make and has to be looked into really carefully. Some situations where on site consumption will occur, there will be licenses needed. And you know, some of the things that are you have to look at the state you're in to make sure that anything that's done or if there are any agreements in place that has a profit sharing component that may also need to be disclosed to the state, even if there's no direct correlation with the consumption happening on site or not. So really, that's why I started my conversation with the idea of we have to look at the state's laws to make sure we know what's required to make the deal work.
But I couldn't agree more that the idea of being here is that, yeah, you do need to know what cannabis laws and regulations are for your business. If it's going to involve that, or if you're going to be tangentially related to it and or providing an ancillary service, there may still be some disclosure points. But you're right, there are absolutely ways to do this where it is more about the experience after that does not have to be related or disclosed with the other business that is a cannabis business, depending on how it's set up.
Sometimes you do want that interaction depending on the deal or the opportunity you're looking for. So it really just sort of depends. But the idea being is you don't have to just think of cannabis as just a commodity. And similarly, with location based experiences, you don't just have to think of it as just a location experience, it could be something that is combined.
What’s exciting, though for me and for cannabis businesses is it's hard to navigate your day to day life, there's a lot of bureaucratic red tape, especially in the West Coast states. There’s a lot, and the East Coast too I believe, there's a lot of different rules and regulations you have to pay attention to. There are excessive taxes that affect your business and other penalties and high rates that may affect everything that you're doing, or rules that you have to follow that other businesses don't, and it's really hard to keep track of that all. And maybe if you have multiple entities, just do your tax planning, that could even add more to it. So obviously, we're not talking about trying to tell cannabis businesses or LBE businesses that like, “Hey, this is, you know, let's have something brand new that we just don't have the time or the inclination to do.” Far from it, we see this as an opportunity for brand strategy and for brand monetization and for doing things that you're already doing and just finding new avenues for revenue within those activities that you're already doing.
I mean, the extreme example, of course, is always Amazon. They were an online bookseller, but then they realized they had the infrastructure for a whole lot more. And it really exploded from there into an online marketplace. Now that's a kind of an extreme example and not exactly on point. But the idea is the same. You may be doing a lot of different things every day. It may be very exciting for consumers to see how plant genetics are put together and what it's like to get their plant from seed to sale. And that story behind it and what that story is and who is it for and who are you trying to help from an equity or a diversity and or a nonprofit perspective? And you really want to get that story out to consumers.
This could be by creating these experiences and these opportunities, you could find new ways to do that. And to me, that's where the sky's the limit, Wendy, I just, you know, there's a lot of different ways to look at this situation and find an opportunity.
Wendy Heimann Nunes
Well, absolutely. And the reason that an intellectual property entertainment firm was so excited to bring you, Bryan, and your practice group on board, is because we saw how important understanding the nuts and bolts of a highly regulated industry that is fraught with landmines is.
We need that expertise in order to help our clients who want to capitalize on the growing interest in the cannabis and psychedelics world: how they take advantage of that, how they bring it into their initiatives, how they create strategic plans with respect to the growing interest but do it in a way grounded in law. Grounded in a way that's going to keep them out of trouble. And so that's what's exciting about our firm in the fact that we have this combined expertise of Bryan, who in dog years has aged himself being on the frontline of a really rough, regulated, tough industry that is clearly emerging at an increasing rate.
The trajectory is only speeding up and how you intersect that with a really growing complementary trajectory in the form of out-of-home immersive entertainment. And so it's just very exciting to explore those areas. Personally, I miss the Pink Floyd laser light show at the Observatory, and so I'm just very excited about the opportunity to create places and
things and experiences that I want to enjoy, whether consumption occurs on site or not. But I think there's tremendous opportunity and if our listeners, if we captured their interest and intrigue as to the opportunities that we see because we are always forward looking both on the regulatory, the political, the consumer vantage point on the cannabis
side and then on in entertainment IP, immersive LBE side, the trends in that market, we're always going to be looking on behalf of our clients for how do we maximize your business opportunities? And so if we've intrigued you enough about the potential for that intersection and the intersection in a safe way where you can leap off of it with vigor and not fear, what is the expression you like to say, Bryan?
Bryan Bergman
I love to say, navigating the fear of leaving the known.
Wendy Heimann Nunes
So if you are interested in letting go of a little bit of your fear and leaving your unknown and exploring the space that Bryan and I are really bullish about.
Tune in to our podcast because we're going to do a deeper dive into various areas. Sometimes they may be more regulatory, sometimes they may be more creative, but we assure you they will be interesting nonetheless and informative. We promise you that.
So thank you for listening. Yes, thank you for being on this adventure with me. It's very exciting. And if you are out there listening and you have an interest in how to maximize the opportunity brought to you from whatever vantage point you're at by the intersection of out-of -home immersive entertainment and cannabis and, dare I say, cannabis two point zero because there are other things coming. Please tune in for more and-
Bryan Bergman
And I can’t wait to talk about this more with you, Wendy. I like that we're keeping this one short and sweet and just introducing the issues and can't wait to really share with all of our listeners all the different things will be deep diving over the next few months.