Happy Monday Canna Fam. This week I want to talk about persistence, and how important it has been for me while working in the cannabis industry. In 2016, while starting work at a cannabis conference, I would have never imagined I would be where I am today. Now four years later I have been working under my own LLC and building a larger presence for Green Planet Nutrients USA in the process. While this journey has been incredible and one of the most rewarding careers I have ever gotten to be a part of, it has definitely had its challenges and there have been several times I felt like calling it quits. Chasing your dreams can be tough, but with patience and perseverance, it tends to pay off.
While working at a cannabis conference, I had no idea how lucky I was to be in such an amazing position for networking. My job was booth and sponsorship sales, so beyond cold calling, I spent a lot of time attending events and spending my time networking with other companies. Now having this kind of position in the industry was invaluable, because I was able to meet several owners of companies and be offered some really amazing positions. When it comes to sales, people tend to forget that beyond the products you are selling, you should always be “selling yourself”. I chose to make sure this was always a goal of mine, and after selling Green Planet a sponsorship at CCC, a year later I was now their sole sales representative of Green Planet in the US. Sometimes throughout the madness of being a rep, I forget how cool my position really is, but this is an example where hard work is finally paying off after two years of grinding.
No matter what part of the industry we are all a part of, it is pretty much guaranteed you deal with competition. For me specifically, in the fertilizer world there is A LOT of other brands. Not to mention, there are 100 different things that can cause a grower to switch nutrient brands. This is where persistence comes in, and no unfortunately for you I am not here to give all of my tricks away LOL. But I do highly recommend not giving up on a grower. There have been a few times I swore I lost an account, and after the 6th ignored text, I walk away with my head held high (kind of), just to end up getting an order from them a month later. You never know when the hard work you are doing is paying off, but good things come to those who wait right? Not to mention, if you are blessed enough to have a territory like I do, there are new legal markets popping up all of the time. It is honestly a really exciting time to be in an industry like ours, and to stick out the challenges, so that when it does get easier, it feels that much more rewarding.
It also probably does not hurt getting to do sales across the USA and have my cute fluff of a dog, Copper, on the road with me. My miniature Aussie seemed to have a direct impact on my sales increasing when I started bringing him into stores with me. It is funny for a lot of us within the cannabis industry of how much we really do not like people. A lot of those among us are used to being with their plants, and in the privacy of their farms. Dogs seem to fit into this lifestyle quite well, so having Copper on the road with me has definitely come at an advantage. Now if I do not bring him, I have stores disappointed, which makes me question if this is really about the nutrients after all….just kidding! But it has been a very nice plus to my position on the road getting to do it with my best friend.
In my opinion, I feel like if you want to be good at something and see positive results, you really do have to give your everything. Sometimes it takes making sacrifices away from things that are important to you. Sometimes it means that you end up putting in 10 hour plus days, seven days a week. You sometimes end up seeing your family less and the people you work with more. It is about having the persistence and drive to want something so bad, that you are willing to lose sleep over it. It is about balance, and learning what that looks like in the process. Hard work is just that, it is HARD. It challenges you, and makes you question everything that you are doing sometimes. But after two and a half years, and a lot of sleepless nights, I finally feel accomplished. I feel like I am making a difference, and it feels insanely rewarding. I genuinely don’t think it would feel half this good if I got it any sooner either. There is something about persistence paying off that will always feel better than instant gratification.
I am sure for some of you, you will continue to find a million reasons why you should give up instead of why you should keep kicking ass at whatever it is you are doing with your life. It is really hard to dedicate a majority of your time and not be able to visually see big things happening in return. I have often struggled with this myself when I do not see Green Planet in a store I have been to several times. The funny thing about the world though that I have learned over time is you cannot win them all. You can definitely try all you want though. For me, I like to find small wins in all of my losses, it tends to keep me moving. That way, I can somehow celebrate even in a shitty situation. For example, walking into a hydro store that has never heard of Green Planet can feel like an instant loss some days. However, when I have the right attitude about it, I realize that I am in control of their first experience with Green Planet, and that is pretty powerful. This is exactly why I try to stay positive in everything I do. At the end of the day, most of us are trying to work our asses off and represent a good product, but it is also the person behind the product and the amount of persistence and patience along the way that really changes the game.
Please send any topics, comments, suggestions, or questions to ch*********@gm***.com. Everything will remain confidential, unless otherwise agree upon.
