Kanha Edibles on a Thai Beach: Global Strategy & Personalized Cannabinoid Therapy with Cameron Clarke

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Cameron Clarke: We just announced our partnership with The Beach Samui, which is a hotel — a beautiful resort on Koh Samui Island — that is a cannabis resort where you can consume comfortably on their premises. You can get treatments, cannabis treatments, everything from sound baths to massages to wellness treatments to sleep management therapy. Bryan Fields: What's up, guys, welcome back to another episode of The Dime. I'm Bryan Fields, and with me as always is Kellen. This week we've got a very special guest, Cameron Clarke, CEO of Kanha. Cameron, thanks for taking the time. How you doing today? Cameron Clarke: Doing great, happy to be with you guys. Bryan Fields: Yeah, excited to have you here. Kellen, how are you doing? Kellen: I'm doing really well, really thrilled to talk to Cameron today. I know he's been in the industry for a while building brands, so really excited to learn the whole story behind Cameron and Kanha. How are you doing today, Bryan? Bryan Fields: Yeah, I'm stoked, and I think it's important to note that Cameron lives on the West Coast, but he's had a lot of fun and been to the East Coast a few times too. And in my math, Kellen, four times is more than one time. So Cameron, we've got a little East Coast/West Coast battle — you gotta put yourself on the map. Where are you gonna put yourself? Cameron Clarke: Absolutely. You know, it's actually funny — when Keith and I, my buddy from college, started Kanha back in 2014-2015, I was willing to move anywhere to start this business. We canvassed the entire US market — I looked at everything, Colorado, everywhere — and wondered where I should go live, where I should start this business. We basically said, you know what, let's just do it in California, because if we can win in California, we can win anywhere. It's the grandfather of cannabis markets. Little did we know you could actually get licenses in Pennsylvania and sell them for hundreds of millions of dollars within a few years — it would've been a lot easier to start on the East Coast — but we're thrilled to have built one of the biggest brands in the industry and be successful. Bryan Fields: I think we should start in those early days with you and Keith. Do you remember the conversation? Take us through those first steps of collaborating and thinking about starting the business, and where it went from there. Cameron Clarke: You guys are looking for fun stories, so here's a fun one about how this whole endeavor started. I was actually doing self-study molecular biology — if you can believe that — trying to start a small biotech company in San Diego. I was growing algae in my backyard, trying to engineer algae to produce high-value compounds. The way you crack the cell of the algae is with CO2, so I was actually building my own CO2 extractor with scuba tanks in my backyard to get the compounds out of the algae. A relatively new friend of mine came into my house and showed me a picture of this tool he'd bought. I said, 'That looks like an extractor — what are you doing with an extractor, you're a stoner?' He said, 'I've got 100 pounds of weed in my car and I'm going to extract oil out of it.' And I went, ding — I love cannabis, I love plant medicines, but I never wanted to be a farmer, and once I realized you could extract the oil out of cannabis and then make anything you want, I called my best friend Keith and said, 'We've been going to Burning Man for a decade — we love alternative plant medicines, you've been a cannabis consumer your whole life, why are we not in this industry?' He said, 'You know what, that's right.' So we started Kanha, and it's been a lot of hard work ever since. Bryan Fields: Were there any other product iterations from that first extraction run, or did you know right away you wanted to do edibles? Cameron Clarke: That's a funny story too. We bought an Apeks extractor, set it up, and had a consultant come in the very first day to teach us how to use it. At the end of the day he said, 'By the way, I've got this small gummy company, you want to buy it?' I said, 'How much?' He said, '$50,000.' I said, 'What do I get for $50,000?' He said, 'I'll teach you how to make it.' I said, 'How many customers do you have?' He said, '35.' I did the math — 35 customers for $50K — and I shook his hand immediately and said, deal. That's how we got into the edibles industry, though I'm pretty sure we would have gotten there anyway, because I'm not a huge smoker but I love plant medicines, and I really believe edibles are a fantastic format for people who don't want to smoke, and for patients who can't smoke because of their condition. We also got into tinctures at that time, and we were the very first company in the industry, in 2015, to launch a nanotechnology tincture — which in my mind is basically inevitable, to be honest. I had the science background, and I was impatient, and I knew a lot of people were overdosing because they'd take something, not feel anything, and take another. I wanted to compress the time between consumption and feeling the effect, so we were the first company in the industry to launch nanotechnology back in 2015, and it's been part of our offering ever since. Bryan Fields: What other products did you guys initially try from an edibles perspective — gummies, tinctures? Talk us through that experimentation process with the consultant. Did he have one product line he was pushing? Cameron Clarke: He was making low-end gummies the old-fashioned way, by hand. I immediately changed everything he taught me — automated some of it, simplified and standardized it. I bought an HPLC, a device to measure potency and cannabinoids, and we started testing our products and our competitors' products. We realized pretty much 100% of the products in the industry were mislabeled, so we wanted to be the first brand that actually put out products where what was on the label was actually in the product. We focused a lot on gummies, and they just took off. We also launched a vape line and a tincture line called Nano5, a liposomal nanotechnology, and later used nanotechnology in our gummies too. Recently we got into chocolate because we see a lot of opportunity there, and we launched a new product called Minis, kind of in an M&M format, which is generating a tremendous amount of excitement here in California. We've tried a bunch of things — sometimes they work, sometimes they don't. We've wiped out a few times, but meeting that guy and buying the edibles company for 50K was a huge win. Kellen: Did you ever use the homemade CO2 extractor for algae on cannabis before you bought your Apeks? Cameron Clarke: I never finished it — once I saw his, I realized his was homemade too and actually really dangerous, so we never tested either. We just bought an Apeks and launched in late 2015, early 2016, full steam ahead ever since. We did get out of the extraction business two years later — I couldn't wait to get out of it. The only reason we did extraction was to guarantee the supply chain of good quality oil, and once we didn't need that anymore, we focused on finished goods, which is really who we've become. Bryan Fields: One of the challenges with edibles is onset and delivery time. Before the nanotechnology, did you struggle to dial in the recipe and dose for a consistent taste and feel every time? Cameron Clarke: Absolutely — it's been a long journey, starting with me and evolving to a team of thousands over the years. Constant improvement, constant refinement. I've been a huge plant medicine and nutrition person for decades, and I've had a lot of experience down in the Amazon and other places doing interesting plant medicine journeys. With edibles, you have to wait, and that wait causes anxiety, so the more you can compress the time to effect, the more you relieve that anxiety. The industry grew up around inhaling cannabis, where the effect is rapid, so from the beginning I wanted to make the edible effect more like smoking — hits faster, avoids the liver conversion to 11-hydroxy-THC. We tested a variety of nanotechnologies and chose two that were full pharmaceutical grade, used safely in the pharma industry for decades. We believe we have the best nanotechnology implementation of any cannabis company, and it's a constant journey — we're about to launch new nanotech that I think will be exciting for the industry. Kellen: How much does the extraction type — CO2, ethanol, water — affect the end product? Do you work with only one type, and how does that affect expansion into multiple states? Cameron Clarke: Really good question. We're all about consistency and reliability — if a consumer buys a gummy today in LA and buys another a year from now in Boston, we want them to have the exact same experience. So we're very rigorous in our manufacturing process, and we don't license our technology or our brand, because we know it's hard enough making great, reliable, consistent products ourselves — we always manufacture in-house in every location. We've tested all kinds of oils and cannabinoids over the years, and different extraction styles and potencies absolutely affect flavor, especially once you add nanotechnology, which a lot of people in this industry say creates a bitter product. We've worked very hard to have consistency and great flavor that actually works. That said, it took us a while to get into live rosin because we also wanted to apply nanotechnology to it, and we struggled — we recently launched something in our vape carts that's fantastic, and we're launching a brand-new rosin product in the coming months that tastes amazing. We're a little behind some competitors there because we're more interested in getting it right than being first to market. Bryan Fields: Let's talk about the R&D process. Do you start with an end product in mind and work backward through the recipe and supply chain, or does it come from the cultivator or processor side first? Cameron Clarke: Honestly, it's all of the above, which drives my team crazy sometimes because I'm very creative and want to drive innovation. If you look at our website you'll see a ton of different SKUs for different market segments. Sometimes I have a dream in the middle of the night and call the R&D team; sometimes they come to me with an idea. We did a s'mores product about a year ago — our first foray into chocolate, with graham cracker — it tasted amazing, we did it as a limited-time offer because it was hard to make, and that idea came from R&D itself. We're doing a better job now of having marketing and product management work more closely with R&D to identify gaps in the market and build a plan before handing it to R&D. We also launched Minis recently in California — basically an M&M format with 4 milligrams of THC and 2 milligrams of minor cannabinoids. The melting point is over 130 degrees, so it's the first chocolate product on the market that doesn't really melt at normal temperatures. That product took two years of R&D — we specifically wanted to tackle one of the hardest products in the industry to make, since everybody else is stuck at M&M's level of chocolate quality. Kellen: From an R&D perspective, you're selectively launching in California. How do you determine when to take a product to other states, and what do you typically lead with? Cameron Clarke: We made the mistake of launching things in California ahead of other states and ended up with too much SKU creep there. A market like Nevada, maybe a billion dollars with only a hundred-some stores, can't support that much variety. But we found that once we'd launch cool new products in California and put them on the website, consumers in Massachusetts would go to stores asking for them, creating FOMO in other markets. So now we're working to launch products in all markets at the same time — our next launch will be one master marketing campaign across all states simultaneously. Honestly, this points to the single biggest point of failure in this entire industry in the US: you can't ship across state lines. You've got a hundred-billion-dollar cannabis market divided between licensed, illicit, and hemp markets, with artificial barriers to the free flow of goods and capital. Consumers in Texas want the same products we sell in California — why shouldn't they have them? Bryan Fields: Spinning up operations in sixteen different states, plus 280E on top — does that make the process easier or harder? Cameron Clarke: It's a nightmare. I'll tell you — the decision for me to go to Thailand was incredibly easy. I have an international trading background and have traveled extensively. Thailand blew the doors wide open on cannabis tourism. The biggest decision for me was: one location, sell all over Thailand, export all over the world. Thailand has a big background exporting nutraceuticals globally — it's one of the Five Tigers of Asia — so it was a perfect opportunity to plant a flag there and sell globally, something we haven't been able to do from the US. We did launch in Canada years ago and our partner was supposed to export our products worldwide, but they ran into problems — we all know what happened in Canada — so when that didn't pan out, we focused on Thailand. Kellen: Did you always know you wanted to go to Thailand? How long from idea to boots on the ground? Cameron Clarke: If you'd asked me six years ago whether I'd own a global cannabis brand, I would've told you to take a hike. The opportunity came about three years ago — I was watching Thailand open its doors, and through a relationship I met some people, and it took about five minutes to say I'm on board. I booked a flight to Thailand and took another five minutes there to decide to set up my own manufacturing operation with our partner and export worldwide. We built a facility there that's top-notch, made to GMP standards just like our US facilities. What I didn't know was that our products had already been in Thailand for a few years through the illicit market — I was shocked when I went over, but consumers already knew our products and were happy to get them more inexpensively once we launched officially. It shows there are consumers all over the globe demanding these products. Bryan Fields: With the international expansion, you get to use the same packaging — are there other operational benefits to expanding internationally? Cameron Clarke: For sure — in Thailand we can make products at a fraction of the cost compared to California, without the rigorous and expensive tax and regulatory burdens we have here. They'll probably put some minor regulations in place in the coming months, including more of a medical system, but I'm confident we'll still be able to sell at a good cost structure and fair price. Manufacturing in one place and selling worldwide is really where we're headed. Kellen: Is there a market that reminded you of Thailand from a licensing and infrastructure standpoint? Cameron Clarke: No, Thailand was completely different — they basically descheduled the plant entirely and didn't put heavy regulations in place. It was the wild west: don't sell to anyone under 21, don't give it to pregnant women, sign up for a license that's basically a form on your phone. The doors blew wide open — there are bars and restaurants where you can buy and smoke a joint. We just announced our partnership with The Beach Samui, a beautiful resort on Koh Samui Island — a cannabis resort where you can consume comfortably and get treatments from sound baths to massages to wellness treatments to sleep management therapy. I think it's the first hotel in the world that's hyper cannabis-friendly like that, and it's a very exciting time for the industry, because it's what a lot of us in the US have wanted for years — free access to this incredible plant medicine. Bryan Fields: How does that partnership work — did your team seek them out, or vice versa? Cameron Clarke: It was just an introduction — they reached out, or we met at a conference, and they bought some of our products. I went over there and our sales rep mentioned this hotel selling our products. I said, let me meet the owners, and within five minutes we agreed to work together, because it's a great opportunity and a great story. People can consume cannabis for whatever reason — I'm a full advocate of that — but I came into this industry because cannabis is a wellness tool that improves people's lives. I don't really see a difference between the medical and recreational industries, because whether you're using cannabis for pain or sleep, or going out with friends at a concert, it's all wellness — socialization is important for longevity too, and this plant is really good at bringing people together. Kellen: That partnership seems like it could spread fast — once people experience an edible on the beach, there's no better pairing. Cameron Clarke: Absolutely, and we know the alcohol industry is taking a hit right now because people are dialing back drinking and consuming more cannabis instead. As more cannabis beverages come on stream and stigma continues to fade, this is just going to keep growing, because it's much better for you than the toxin that is alcohol. Bryan Fields: Would you consider creating a specific product for this partnership, and would you push it out to other hotels, or is it exclusive? Cameron Clarke: Not exclusive at all — this is just the first story, and I want this all over the world. We're supporting and sponsoring their programs, and we're helping them tell their story with our megaphone as one of the bigger edibles brands. These kinds of innovations are developing in Thailand because it's not over-regulated there, allowing for testing of new implementations. I do think we'll do these kinds of programs in other resorts, maybe even elsewhere in Thailand — we're still in a test phase, seeing what the demand and acceptance look like. We're also launching, and I'll announce it here first, a Kanha clinic in Bangkok, where consumers can get treatment from traditional Thai medicine doctors — treating conditions with cannabis, cupping therapy, and other modalities — a full medical facility, and we're developing new products to sell through it and other markets, delivering products globally into the cannabis wellness market. Kellen: How big do you think the minor cannabinoid market is going to be? Do you think there will be standalone minor cannabinoid products that thrive? Cameron Clarke: I absolutely think standalone minor cannabinoid products will thrive, and I think they're crucial. We've been working with minor cannabinoids for about eight years, starting with CBN — we had a CBN sleep tincture back then. It's been frustrating that there was a lot of anecdotal evidence about CBN helping sleep without real science, until just recently, when a study or two confirmed it. As more research comes out on THCV, CBG, and others, we'll see more of that — we already work with THCV, CBN, CBG, and CBC in our products. It's not only about THC — we've bred a lot of these other minors out of super high-THC plants, which are great for some people but not everyone, so remixing minors back in creates more of a full-spectrum experience, like you'd feel from rosin. It's also about consistency, which requires measured amounts of these compounds, plus terpenes and other co-actives — we use green tea extract, damiana extract, honey, tryptophan, and more, and we're constantly evolving. Look at our FX functional line, launched about a year ago — energy, romance, sleep formulas — and we'll continue driving that, often led more by minors than by THC itself. Kellen: Are there any functional or new products you've been chasing that you haven't been able to dial in yet? Cameron Clarke: We have a number in the development queue I probably shouldn't talk about — but think about day-to-day issues like stress. We don't want to just slap a label on a product and call it good for stress; we want to test it and make sure it works, which is why we have three doctors involved in our development process — a PhD organic chemist heading R&D, plus two medical doctors who teach cannabis courses and run university programs, and who help make sure we develop products that actually work. Bryan Fields: Do you have a personal favorite ratio of cannabinoids in a product? Cameron Clarke: That's a deep question because everyone's body is different. I've been a lightweight cannabis consumer most of my life, while my partner Keith has been a moderate consumer who finds it energizing; too much THC for me and I go into the corner and get antisocial. One reason I got into this industry is that once you can extract and filter out compounds, you can remix them to work for everybody. For me, a 1:1 CBN-to-THC ratio works really well, and I also like THCV for energy — those are my go-to products. Kellen: Do you ever dream of a world of personalized cannabinoid medicine for each individual? Cameron Clarke: Yes, absolutely — that's a whole other conversation. We worked with a company called EndoCanna Health, run by a guy named Len May, who's been driving personalized cannabis for many years. We launched tincture products three years ago based on a DNA test that would recommend products based on your genetics. I believed in it and still do, but shelf space is very expensive in the licensed cannabis industry, and it's hard for new product types to gain traction fast enough to justify that shelf space, so that project got tabled. I still believe personalized cannabis will evolve and grow, blended with other compounds and plant medicines to create personalized medicine for each of us. Bryan Fields: How did the DNA testing actually work? Cameron Clarke: They tested a number of SNPs — like 23andMe or Ancestry — and their doctors identified which SNPs were related to cannabis response, quite a few of them, and based on that research made recommendations on ratios and terpenes. They backed their claims with linked scientific research, which I think is important and something a lot of other DNA-testing companies in the industry haven't done. The hard part was creating highly personalized products economically in a licensed market — that's the struggle we ran into. Kellen: Did they couple the DNA test with gene expression to see how active those genes were, and potentially measure blood endocannabinoid levels to create a more holistic picture of exactly which cannabinoids someone needs for optimal endocannabinoid health? Cameron Clarke: You've clearly done your homework — good nerd. I think that's where it's going, though it never got that far. You need that feedback loop — most of the research in this industry has been done in Israel; it's finally starting to happen in the US, but we're way behind and it'll take a while to catch up. I do believe it will flow into personalized medicine, understanding what's actually happening genetically when you consume cannabis or other plant medicines. You see some of this discussed in longevity circles, but it has to happen — you have to understand how these plants impact your genetics. Kellen: I think that research will likely be spearheaded by clinics like the ones you've partnered with in Thailand, since a lot of this research isn't allowed in the US currently — Costa Rica has some too, with retreats focused on personalized medicine. Cameron Clarke: Absolutely, and that's another benefit of Thailand for me — we can actually do clinical studies there at a fraction of the US cost. I've been talking about partnering with local hospitals there; we haven't gotten it off the ground yet, but we will, because you need science to back all this up — you can't just guess. Bryan Fields: Which of your products do you think is underrated? Cameron Clarke: Who's doing the rating? I think our CBG product, Restore, is amazing — it's a 2:1 CBG-to-THC ratio, and CBG is a really interesting compound that works well for a lot of people. But honestly, I'd point to our Minis — they're underrated just because they're new and a lot of people haven't tried them yet, but they're incredible. We're getting amazing feedback from bud tenders — fast-acting, taste great, fit in your pocket, have the minor cannabinoids in them. We've had to teach people about compounds like CBC, and I think as the product gets out there more, we'll see more excitement. Kellen: We were fortunate enough to try them last weekend — they're delicious. The biggest challenge for me was not continuing to pop them into my mouth because they tasted so good. Cameron Clarke: I totally agree, and that was actually a big internal conversation — how many do we put in a bottle, and how does it fit in your pocket. It's tricky, but a challenge I'll learn to deal with. Bryan Fields: Tell me something that is true that nobody agrees with you on. Cameron Clarke: I wouldn't say nobody, but one thing we feel strongly about is not licensing our products. You cannot build a brand without consistency — consumers want the same experience every time, whether they share it with friends or buy it in different locations, and inconsistency damages trust. A brand is really not much more than trust between you and the consumer. We've fought hard to manufacture all of our own products, either in our partners' facilities or ourselves, and we think that's really important. A lot of brands are growing quickly by licensing, but we don't think that's a great model right now because it's really hard to make good quality cannabis products, and we just don't see the world that way. Bryan Fields: What question do you wish more people asked you? Cameron Clarke: I think the industry has done a poor job growing the consumer base overall. During COVID a lot of people started taking sleep products that worked, but we need to do a much better job getting people to understand how these products can help them in their lives. Wherever I go, people have their hand out wanting to try something, but I don't hear enough people asking, 'I have this situation, I've never tried it before, how do I implement this in my life to make it better?' — like, how do I stop drinking so much and poisoning myself and bring this incredible plant medicine into my life instead. Cannabis isn't going to solve all of our problems, but it can solve quite a few, and the world would be a much better place if more people consumed plant medicines. Kellen: Amen. Prediction time, Cameron — how do you envision the intersection of health and wellness activities with cannabis? Cameron Clarke: It's a no-brainer — people have consumed cannabis to improve their lives for decades. One misconception is that cannabis alone is the product to consume; I think cannabis is an ingredient that, combined with other things, can create incredible treatments for all kinds of conditions, and sometimes cannabis alone is enough. As the industry moves past the revolutionary fight for legalization, those of us building products need to help people understand the wellness and life-improvement side of this plant, blending more with the overall health and wellness industry. My prediction is that these compounds will be used in a variety of ratios with other compounds to create optimized health and wellness treatments. Kellen: I'd agree and add that cannabinoid research is going to have a rippling effect across all of medicine, because the endocannabinoid system isn't taught in medical school — Western medicine has been missing this puzzle piece. Cannabinoids affect hunger, sleep, and other core aspects of homeostasis, and medicine has been trying to restore homeostasis without understanding this system. Over the next decade I think we'll see massive changes across the medical system as they realize how these ingredients complement other treatments — misdiagnosis is one of the leading causes of death in America, partly because doctors have been working with one hand tied behind their back. What do you think, Bryan? Cameron Clarke: I love everything you just said — I totally agree, and thank you for making that point about the endocannabinoid system driving this industry forward. Bryan Fields: I think the easiest illustration is: if you get a massage and take cannabis with it, it makes the massage a million times better, and I don't think anyone can disagree with that. If you're hesitant, take a really low dose and I think your mind will be blown by how much better you feel — it's the easiest entry point into relaxation, health, and wellness with cannabis. Cameron Clarke: Even for sexual health — cannabis is amazing for relationships, it's fantastic. Bryan Fields: Perfectly said. Cameron, for our listeners who want to get in touch or buy Kanha products, where can they find you? Cameron Clarke: They can go to KanhaBliss.com, Kanha Bliss on Instagram, and if they're not in any of our licensed states, they can go to Kanha Life, where they can buy hemp products — same exact quality, same products, now available with hemp products in something like 36 or 38 states. Bryan Fields: Amazing, we'll link it up in the show notes. Thanks for taking the time, this was a lot of fun. Cameron Clarke: All right, thanks guys.