4 Questions For 4 Years: An Interview with HERBL CEO & Founder, Mike Beaudry
What inspired you to begin HERBL?
“The inspiration started from my long relationship with cannabis combined with my background in large-scale supply chains. It seemed like the perfect combination to inspire my entrepreneurial appetite. I felt that with a legacy industry changing to a more traditional supply chain, my background would be well-suited to be part of the movement and be a part of helping shape the new legal framework through a company that put people first.”
Tell us about one of your most memorable accomplishments at HERBL.
“I believe that one of my greatest and most memorable accomplishments was to put together a world-class team of like-minded and passionate individuals who believed in my vision of the future of cannabis. HERBL was my idea, but make no mistake that it was built from the ground up by many current and former dedicated team members. HERBL is a great example of a company whose founder had the vision but everyone contributed their ideas and expertise to build it collectively. In our case, it really did “take a village” not only to get the business initially off the ground, but respond and iterate as we grew extremely fast in the first 3 years, and refine and adjust as we continue to build the company and culture.”
What is one major challenge you’ve faced since you’ve begun?
“Narrowing it to one is a challenge! I would have to say that carving out a role as a distributor in the middle of the supply chain has been pretty difficult. For decades, the industry thrived without classic wholesale distributors so it has been an ongoing process for brands to transition to our platform and trust their brand to a third party. No one had a crystal ball and could have predicted how long it would take the industry to settle, but man, we still see some of the same challenges and hurdles we faced four years ago when we started. Brands still experience the challenges of an oversaturated and volatile market, retailers still work with countless suppliers, further fragmenting their supply chains, taxes and the unregulated market impact the whole chain. And HERBL is right in the middle of it all. Luckily this team loves challenges!”
How does HERBL stand out from other cannabis distributors?
“HERBL is foundationally a family and extended family business and really a hybrid mix of legacy and supply chain pros. Cannabis has been part of my life since I was a teen and we have a significant amount of folks on our team that have been part of the legacy business for decades, most of them from California. By hybrid, I mean that when you combine that legacy with the many folks, including myself, that have decades of high-growth, high-volume supply chain experience, HERBL’s north star is a professional supply chain with a constant dose of legacy influence. We have been viewed by some as large, corporate, or even as a company made up of people from other industry backgrounds. Really, we are a company made up of passionate individuals from incredible and applicable backgrounds and experience, that care about the impact and integrity of this industry.”
