N.B. Pot Startup Eyes Ontario Market
BOUCTOUCHE – It was an all-out push for Greg Claroni to get his cannabis products to market in New Brunswick in time for Christmas. Now, the owner of Greenherb Farms has his sights set on a round of product testing he’s meant to do for months.
Greenherb Farms is based in St. Joseph-de-Kent. The government cleared the company to sell its Greenherb Rosin, hashish, and pre-rolled joints in late November.
“It took us about eight months to get through that process but that was because there was a limited number of people working and we had to spread things out–because we were in the field, doing stuff,” Claroni told Huddle.
Seeing Greenherb products on Cannabis NB shelves is an exciting milestone for Claroni because it’s the culmination of a years-in-the-making process. He said Cannabis NB was a great partner that helped get his products to market quickly.
“This has been a long time coming. When we started getting our license we were always saying, ‘it’ll be a few months,’ and now, almost six years down the line, we’re finally able to put our product on shelves,” Claroni said.
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“There have been a lot of setbacks, with [Covid-19] and financing and everything in between, but we’re grateful for all the opportunities we have.”
Claroni said the permission for Greenherb to sell its products is the payoff of a process that began in 2020 and saw the cannabis cultivator navigate “arduous” provincial and federal cannabis regulations.
He said the federal government in particular has a plethora of quality control packing and record-keeping requirements to prevent contamination and protect consumers – and that those slowed things down.
“It’s time-consuming and a lot of back-and-forth; they’ll request documentation and we’ll submit documentation and then, after reviewing it, they’ll request more documentation,” he said.
Greenherb is also registered with Blue Cross and is taking on medical patients online. The company will release another product at the end of January.
While the Canadian cannabis market is competitive, Claroni said he’s confident Greenherb has an edge, with its ability to produce material inexpensively and on-site in rural New Brunswick.
“We’re excited to see what customers and our research patients think of our products,” he said.
Testing
Greenherb wanted to start product testing in 2020 but will instead begin its first round later this month. Claroni thought he could start product testing right away but learned he had to wait until he received specific permission from the government.
“Now that we have to position it for retail, basically, before we can test it, we’ll probably be testing it a whole lot less,” Claroni said. “It’s just going to be a small group from the original group of people who applied and we’ll kind of see how it goes.”
Claroni said he has room for about 20 people and that about five of them have officially registered.
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In June, Claroni’s original plan was to narrow down the best out of 60 different potential strains. He was encouraging people to make the trek out to St. Joseph-de-Kent for testing.
“I’ll be sending out more emails, just to see who else we can pull in,” he said.
FarmGate
Claroni’s operation is about 45 minutes north of Moncton, near the community of Bouctouche. Greenherb sells several products but not fresh flowers.
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Selling fresh flower cannabis will have to wait until the province greenlights Greenherb’s FarmGate store.
To accomplish this, Claroni will be carrying out renovations to the farm where he and his three staff operate. Those renovations are still in the planning stage.
Claroni told Huddle he’s waiting until retail and medical sales create some cash flow before he sets renovation plans in motion.
“We’re actually focusing on getting some sale and getting our product from the field, processed, and out the door,” he said.
Greenherb is located at the former Herve J. Michaud Farm and uses about four of the farm’s 52 acres to grow cannabis.
Claroni noted Greenherb can produce as much as 10 to 50 kilos of concentrate per month.
“We don’t have that much material in our freezer right now, so we only make it as we need it. If we know that orders are coming through, we’ll make it,” he said.
“Otherwise, we don’t really want it sitting around. We want to keep it as fresh as possible. We have the capability of doing large quantities here. We have the equipment and everything.”
New Horizons
It won’t just be at Cannabis NB locations that sell Greenherb cannabis and products. Claroni has plans to sell cannabis products in Ontario this summer.
His plans to sell cannabis products in his home province, where he originally launched his business, will take planning and clearing of stricter regulatory hurdles than those of New Brunswick, Claroni said.
“They have a lengthy process compared to New Brunswick because they have a larger volume of people coming through on a regular basis,” he said.
“They put a tender out for requests for different products, and we submitted a couple of different products, that includes or pre-rolls, which we anticipate they’ll be interested in.”
Claroni said his main focus at this time is selling products in New Brunswick, before building sales volumes in Ontario.
Sam Macdonald is a Huddle reporter in Moncton. Send him your feedback and story ideas: [email protected].