What Every Marijuana Retailer Should

Know About Building a Thriving

Canna-Business In Washington

Ben Curren

Who is Ben Curren?

A Family Man

A Nerd

An Entrepreneur & Engineer

Mission: Help online businesses thrive in a connected world.

CTO and Founder

Raised $11 Million in Capital from Top Tier investors

Grew from 2 employees to 50 in 4 years

800,000 small business still using the product

Sold to Go Daddy in 2012

I worked with the best mentors

Marc Andreessen – CoFounder of Netscape

Bryan Schreier- Partner @ Sequoia; Dropbox board of directors; Google

Rob Hayes – Partner @ First Round Capital; Mint.com investor

Mark Goines – Angel Investor; Everything small business

Ravi Mohan – Partner / Founder Shasta Ventures; Nest Investor

This is what

I learned

A successful business is a money printing

machine

How big can your business grow?

How fast can you feed your business cash?

How much time before money comes out?

What is the ratio of cash in and cash out?

Cash In Cash Out

Time

Your job as an entrepreneur is to build a

“machine” that fits your goals.

Lifestyle business.

Boutique business.

Large enterprise.

How to find a successful business model

Key Performance

Indicator (KPI)

Programs and

Processes

Business Model

Goals(should not change often)

Example Business Model

Goal: Replace my income of $60,000 / year. Meet new people. Control my

destiny and don’t work for “the man”.

Model: Hire 3 people. Sell $66,000 of product. Margin of 30%.

Example Key Performance Indicators

Choose 5 – 6 KPIs, key performance indicators, to work on at a time.

Margin

Transactions per month

Average amount per sale

Average customer rating of 80%

Track your KPI’s over time

KPI Jan 2015 Dec 2014 Nov 2014

Margin 28% 31% 29%

Sales 527 724 805

Average amount per sale $35.67 $47.56 $44.26

Customer rating N/A 93% 87%

Programs Jan 2015 Dec 2014 Nov 2014

Leafly Premium Listing No Yes Yes

Incentive to spend > $50 No No Yes

Collect customer survey No Yes Yes

Implement programs to improve

Key Performance

Indicator (KPI)

Programs and

Processes

Business Model

Goals(should not change often)

Be a scientist. Hypothesis,

experiment, analyze.

Time to change it up. Let’s get i502 retail specific.

CEO and Founder of Green Bits

The Point of Sale Designed for i502 Retail Stores

Benefits

Traceability happens automatically

Generate reports to help make critical decisions

Blazing fast checkouts with iPad based cash registers

Track all your inventory with ease

Robust auditing tools to help prevent theft

Green Bits Story

Founded May 18th, 2014

Launched with 3 Washington stores in July 2014

5 person team – most came with me from Outright

40+ i502 retail stores in Washington

Best Practices We’ve Seen

Automate traceability

Empower your bud tenders

Optimize your vendors and products

Automate Traceability

WSLCB Traceability Overview

The following actions must submit the product lot

number:

Receive Marijuana

Sell Marijuana

Adjust Quantity On Hand

Pickup Manifest

Submit once a month

Submit Excise Tax Obligations

Rules of Lot Numbers

All products with the

same lot number must

be at the same location.

Same product will have

multiple lot numbers.

Enable computers to track lot numbers

Make sure all product is bar coded with a lot number.

Bud tenders pick an item and scan it. No lists.

Inventory management should allow lot number tracking.

Let computers do the mundane tracking not humans.

Empower your bud tenders

Create a employee purchase program

Bud tenders must know your products to sell them effectively.

1. Ask processors to provide low cost “Samples” to the store.

2. The store sells the “Samples” to employees near cost.

3. Employees write an internal evaluation of the product.

4. Share data with vendors so they can improve their products.

5. Bud tenders can intelligently discuss your products.

Increase bud tender sales

Create a sales competition to improve your KPI’s

Sales amount per week

Average amount per sale

Post progress in the employee break room.

Create a bonus or prize for the winner.

Make it a big deal to win.

Optimize your vendors and products

Grade your vendors

Create a score card for your vendors based on their

performance.

Do products come bar coded?

Do shipments arrive on time?

Do shipments have accurate counts and labels?

Share this data with the vendor so they know where they

stand.

Determine the products that drive sales

Rank your sales by each product.

Normalize by dividing space taken up on shelf. More space

should drive more sales.

Promote top sellers with better real estate and more

space.

Champion versus challenger

Provide a way for new products to displace older products.

Allocate 5% of your shelf space for testing new products.

Add product for a limited time to collect sales data.

Calculate sales and compare to main products.

Promote the products that win, demote the products that

loose.

Questions?

The Point of Sale Designed for i502 Retail Stores

Visit Green Bits at Booth #241

Try it yourself

Over $500 in savings with a deposit at CannaCon