Hall of Flowers marks the start of the annual business convention season this week. 

It’s kind of like Hurricane Season, in the sense it will last half the year. Tons of business will be done in the build-up to people getting their crops in the ground next year. While the time frame of perpetual harvests varies from strain to strain these days, the start of the business season has traditionally been marked by the start of October for decades. 

Better known as Croptober on the hill, it’s when the money started to fly as the full-term harvest began to finish drying and curing. Croptober is not worth what it once was to legacy farming communities on both sides of the market. Moms and pops that went legal have to deal with the flood of product from people that were allowed to stack cultivation permits, while those still operating in the traditional underground market are dealing with the same flood of product entering their space when it doesn’t sell legally. Only the absolute titans of heat remain unaffected by this and that number is probably less than 40 brands. 

Starting this week, brands will get the opportunity to show why they are able to float on top of the devistation of the California marketplace that has seen so many fail since the implementation of Prop 64. But the whole process doesn’t come without its controversy. 

Some small farmers would claim these kinds of business-to-business style corporate trade show events favor the big-money operators. But a lot of smaller entities seem to do well at these things. It’s hard in this moment to be a little guy and flex when so many of your neighbors aren’t making it. That’s not just for the sake of not sounding like a jerk, but also for personal security. 

So in the best light at these events, the little guys create value for themselves. In the darkest corners, the chads chad as they attempt to break the record for cheapest boof packs. Regardless of winners and losers, there is plenty to learn about the market at all this stuff. 

Hall of Flowers will be people’s first chance to let us know this year what is going to hold up against the pack. Most of the best flowers you’re going to see will be indoor and deps. Then in a month, the industry will head to Vegas for MJBizCon. There, we’ll start to see the first wave of sungrown full-term flower, but the real mother load will be at the Emerald Cup’s Harvest Ball in December. 

The timing of the Emerald Cup Harvest Ball lines it up with the golden zone for those outdoor plants harvested over a couple of months before the ball, in addition to some of those awesome indoor late fall and winter runs. The ball also marks the start of the cup’s competition window and serves as a major source of genetics for the year ahead. 

The Emerald Cup champs at Fig Farms aren’t the first name that comes to mind when you think B2B stuff, you’re more likely to find them at a cup. Fig Farm’s COO Michael Doten told L.A. Weekly they’ve tended to find themselves more intertwined with the events based in the culture, but they’ll be taking part in Hall of Flowers. 

“In the past, we had shied away from doing events, unless it was those more cultural events, as opposed to business events,” Doten said. “Now we are expanding into other states and trying to take on new opportunities. So an event like this has a lot more value for us now to be able to meet with people like that. And honestly, seeing all our friends is a big part of it, and just participating.”

We asked Doten if eyeballing what the competition was up to was a factor. He said sure, but the team is more focused on those personal experiences they’re going to have with buyers and then the public on day two of Hall of Flowers. 

“Really, just servicing the people that come through. I’m going to be standing at that booth looking across from everybody that comes up and they don’t want to talk to me, they want to talk to the brand,” Doten said. ”Because they have in their heads things they’ve wanted to say to the brand, and they say it to me because I’m wearing a shirt and hat.”

Doten noted you can expect a full spread of new heat from Fig Farms this week. 

 

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