#68 - Jared Simon @ Manitoba Harvest

Episode Recap:

ReGen Brands Recap #68 - The Regen Strategy For North America’s Leading Hemp Food Brand - (RECAP LINK)

Episode Transcript:

Kyle Krull - 00:00:15
Welcome to The ReGen Brands Podcast. This is a place for consumers operators and investors to learn about the consumer brands, supporting regenerative agriculture, and how they're changing the world. This is your host, Kyle, joined by my Coves, AC, gonna take us into the episode.

Anthony Corsaro - 00:00:33
On this episode, we have Jared Simon, who is the CEO at Manitoba Harvest. Manitoba Harvest is North America's leading hemp food brand and they're supporting regenerative agriculture with their recently released regenerative organic certified hemp hearts. In this episode, Jared breaks down how hemp has grown and some of the agronomic differences between conventional, organic, and regenerative organic cultivation. He also shares how Manitoba Harvest is developing their commercial strategy around regenerative and what this means for both their branded business and B2B ingredient business. Jared was super engaging and insightful, and we really enjoyed gleaning his insights on how a legacy, scaled brand like Manitoba Harvest starts prioritizing regenerative, opportunities he sees in the broader regen movement, and how their work is influencing the larger publicly traded parent company that they sit within. Excited to share this one with you all. Let's go. What's up, everybody? Welcome back to another episode of The ReGen Brands Podcast.

Anthony Corsaro - 00:01:24
Very excited today to have Jared from Manitoba Harvest joining us. So welcome, Jared. Thank you.

Jared Simon - 00:01:39
Thanks for having me.

Kyle Krull - 00:01:41
Yeah. Absolutely, man. You know, I, way back when I used to sell bars. That was the only thing I did, and there was always like the battle of the bars. And I believe Manitoba, you you all had some hemp bars. Like, we did. We're talking about 10 years ago. Is that right?

Jared Simon - 00:01:54
Yeah. We did. We don't have them anymore, but we did. Yes.

Kyle Krull - 00:01:57
Right. I remember those days, and they did well, and they were good bars. Man, these guys are doing good stuff. But for for give us a quick, like, lay the land. For those who are unfamiliar with the brand as I am because of my previous battles in the bar section, what is it that you produce today? Where can people find your stuff? You know, give us the high level.

Jared Simon - 00:02:15
Yeah. Thanks. So Manitoba Harvest is the leading hemp food manufacturer in North American, probably around the world. We've been around since 1998. We really were the pioneer in the hemp food industry. And hemp continues to be a product that grows year after year. More and more consumers discover it. And because of that, you can find hemp in so many places today, both in the US and Canada and Internationally. You know, if we take the US market, which is where we are today here, You know, you can find us everywhere from your natural independence to Whole Foods all the way to Walmart. I mean, hemp has gotten that pervasive in the marketplace and there's that much interest that know, we really can be marketed and sold in in really any channel and and, you know, hit consumers, you know, anywhere that they're they're shopping at retail.

Jared Simon - 00:02:51
We have a big online business as well. So, you know, really nice business, you know, DTC and and and Amazon. So hemp is out there. It's just, waiting to be discovered.

Anthony Corsaro - 00:03:14
Yeah. I was I was sharing with Jared before we started that I'm the consumer of the giant Costco hemp hearts bag for Manitoba. So that's that's my go to on the hemp side. And, you know, Jared, this is a really unique episode for us. I think it's the 1st, you know, publicly traded brand that we've had on, and y'all are part of a bigger org there Tilray. This is a brand that's been around for a long time. It's been through a couple of transactions. So I think our origin story question is a little bit different for you where it's like, hey, share that with us also, but kinda bring us to present day in the current context that you operate in because I think it's unique and a first time for our listeners.

Jared Simon - 00:03:52
Yeah. Let me let me take a step back. So Manitoba Harvest was founded in 1998. We just celebrated our 25th anniversary last

Kyle Krull - 00:04:01
year. Congrats.

Jared Simon - 00:04:02
Thank you. Thank you. It was a it was a big deal and and really amazing to see, you know, what this organization has evolved into over that 25 year span, but it was founded in 1998 by Mike FATA, up in Manitoba in Winnipeg. Know, and Mike really started this company with a personal mission and a personal journey to, improve his health. You know, he had had, you know, some some challenges, you know, health wise and and weight wise and and he really found hemp as this super food that he could rely on, depend on, to eat well, eat healthy, plant based. You know, we can talk about all the benefits of hemp as we go on. But his mission was to go out there and share this wonderful super food that he found, you know, with with as many retailers as possible. So started as a Canadian business, kinda grew up right in Manitoba and then spread throughout Canada, you know, in the late 90s into the early 2000s.

Jared Simon - 00:04:47
Fortunately, at the time, have been not been allowed in the US market up until the late nineties, but farm bills back in the late nineties allowed hemp for import for food based purposes. Yeah. And Mike with his organization did a lot of work to make sure hemp was recognized as a food ingredient, food stuff, grass approval because it was still very much an unknown food stuff in in the US. You know, and and hemp We can talk about this too, you know, often gets miscategorized with cannabis. So there's a lot of confusion amongst consumers, retailers, regulators, But the brand did grow up, you know, through the early 2000s, you know, in in Canada and the US, you know, and continue pick up momentum as it got, you know, one retail chain after another as consumers showed this real interest in buying hemp and and incorporating it into their diets. You know, the brand, sometime in in in, you know, the the early 2000s, actually merged with another brand called Hemp Oil Canada, started by Sean Crew, also in Manitoba.

Jared Simon - 00:05:48
They're just down the road and and still today, those organizations are what make up Manitoba Harvest, the old hemp oil Canada organization, which was more of an ingredient sales company and Manitoba Harvest. And then to your point, Manitoba Harvest, was sold to Tilray, about 5 years ago. And and Tilray for those, you know, who are listening who don't know, Tilray is a global CPG company, that's highly focused in really three areas. Cannabis started as a cannabis company, particularly in the Canadian recreational market and the European medical markets. That's where it services the cannabis consumer. Beer and spirits company.

Jared Simon - 00:06:31
It's made some acquisitions in beer and spirits over the last few years. And then there's this wellness division, which is really led by Manitoba Harvest. And, again, being the sister plant to cannabis, you know, there was some real opportunity, you know, to share knowledge and synergize, you know, those 2 verticals with within the company. So so that's where we are today. We are part of Tilray. Tilray is a NASDAQ listed publicly traded company you know, we're one of the divisions, that's based here in in North America within the company.

Jared Simon - 00:07:03
And that sets up a lot of interesting opportunities, which, I'm happy to share as as we go through the conversation today.

Kyle Krull - 00:07:19
Super cool. You know, I I'm really wanna, like, kinda dive into the difference between the cannabis plant and the hemp plant. What you utilize out of the hemp plant. And then, like, what products you're you're turning that into? You know, what does Manitoba Harvest actually sell from, like, a SKU perspective?

Jared Simon - 00:07:33
Yeah. Great. So, let me start with the the plant itself. So the hemp plant, is in the same family. They're really sisters, you know, cannabis and and hemp are really sister plants. They have a lot of the same genetics. The difference between hemp and cannabis really comes down to the cannabinoid level many ways where cannabis is really grown to optimize cannabinoids, whether that be Cbd, Cbd, CBM, or THC. Hemp in many ways has been grown to optimize other parts of the plant, whether it be the fibers or whether it be the seed for food. You can get flour, from hemp and actually some of that flower if you grow varieties that are more flower forward can be used for CBD. There's a fairly, you know, robust hemp based CBD market, you know, here in the US.

Jared Simon - 00:08:18
But primarily hemp is grown today, you know, for its industrial uses on the fiber side, and its food uses on the seed side. We don't play in the fiber market, but it's an incredibly interesting market and one that's growing rapidly. Hemp fiber, which is really the stock primarily if you think of, you know, what a big hemp plant looks like. Hemp fiber can be used and things as simple as, you know, pet bedding, all the way to, you know, more complex, you know, textiles, or even items like him which is basically a concrete substitute because the fibers are that strong. Grand fiber is mixed with other compounds to make a very strong building material, which is, which is super cool and a great way to have, you know, a carbon sink. If you think about, like, all the carbon hem takes in, so that part of the plant goes more towards industrial use, you know, on on the fiber side.

Jared Simon - 00:09:10
What we harvest as Manitoba Harvest, is the seed. And the hemp plant generates a lot of seed. And, and that seed, comes with, you know, a hole around the heart. And that heart in the middle of the hall is what most consumers would be familiar with when eating him. That's the, you know, classic hemp part that we sell in market still makes up, you know, a very big part of our portfolio. And what you would find in a lot of other products, whether that be granolas or cereals or or even, you know, the bars that we were talking about earlier.

Jared Simon - 00:09:45
There's a lot of other applications of hemp. We also produce hemp oil and hemp protein. All of those also can be made from that seed. And those are also used in various ingredients, you know, for for boosting all kinds of nutrition, nutritionals, and we'll we'll talk about that in a second. You know, and and I think that's really interesting to us too is, like, where else do we go with different components of the hemp plant. Maybe a little later I can talk about an innovation that we're we're doing right now in the fiber space with our hemp hulls. Which is just about to ask.

Jared Simon - 00:10:18
Can you

Anthony Corsaro - 00:10:26
do anything with the holes?

3 - 00:10:27
I was

Anthony Corsaro - 00:10:27
literally just about

Jared Simon - 00:10:28
to ask. For a long time, don't wanna say they were a waste product, but they were a lower value product. They were typically working their way back into animal feeding streams. You know, or they would just be used, you know, to put back on field and and its fertilization. But, a super cool development over the last year, we we partnered with a company called Bright Seed. And they're, out of California, if you're familiar with them, they have some really cool AI technology forager app. And and what they actually discovered serendipitously as they were doing some of their work is that there are some bioactive compounds that are really important for gut health and and they are unique in many ways to the hemp plant, in particular, the hemp hull. Like the highest concentrations of these bioactive compounds happen to be in the hemp hole. So we read about the work they were doing. We call them up.

Jared Simon - 00:11:12
And within months, we had a project going. And literally 2 months ago, we just released a bioactive fiber. We just launched it at Whole Foods globally. 2 months ago. And it's this really cool story about an upcycle of product, right? This was like a waste from the screen in some ways.

Jared Simon - 00:11:33
In what we were doing, but now you've got this great upcycled food that's incredibly nutritious, and really something that is you know, revolutionary for what has been a relatively sleepy category when you think about, you know, fiber and fiber products, you know, in in the supplement aisle. That's that's a pretty cool story. And you have this all overhand. Like, hip is one of these plants because, you know, for many years, it was put on the burner, you know, it wasn't grown the way, you know, corn or rice or soy, you know, were grown. It's just in the last 20 years, we're discovering all of the different things that hemp can do and all the benefits of hemp. And each year, we seem to discover something new. So it's it's pretty exciting.

Jared Simon - 00:12:18
It's an exciting time to be in hemp, and it's exciting time to be innovating in hemp as well.

Anthony Corsaro - 00:12:26
Yeah. It's it's crazy to think how like, little long ago, you know, how such a short time ago, you couldn't even like, it wasn't legal to even sell this or buy it. Like, here in the in the States, especially. And I love kind of the call it on the fiber product. I saw that on the website, but I didn't know the story. You don't find it, and the research that went into it. And I think Colin are both pretty bullish on the fact that, like, regenerative brands had shown that they're a great way for us to commercialize.

Anthony Corsaro - 00:12:46
Better crop rotations and better crop, you know, you know, setups. But layering in that scientific opponent powers that innovation is a really cool story. And I think we need a ton more of that in this space to figure out, you know, what what are those specific nutrients, vital nutrients, whatever it may be, and what what end product can we is there a real market opportunity to kind of get them into?

Jared Simon - 00:13:17
Yeah. Absolutely. Yeah.

Kyle Krull - 00:13:18
And I really wanna make sure I understand this new product because it sounds fascinating. And it I'm looking at it on the website right now, seems almost like, similar to, like, a sil Selenium husk. I always say the word wrong, but is it is that, like, the same category?

Jared Simon - 00:13:30
Yeah. So so what we did is we took actually It's a, it's a blended fiber solution. So we actually have Cillian Muske in the product. So it's a blend between hemp fiber, and Cillium fiber. The Cillium brings that soluble fiber, which is really important for regularity and moving things through the system. And that's your soluble fiber. Hemp, fiber is more of an insoluble fiber. And when you blend them together, they pair really well to give you this complete fiber solution. And then the cherry on top are these bioactive compounds that are inherent within the hemp hull, which is where we're getting that insoluble fiber.

Jared Simon - 00:13:57
You know, that are just now starting to get their, you know, moment in the sun in terms of what they can do for gut health and regularity and satiety. And I think there's even more to come here. We're we're doing some some clinical studies right now with bright seed, you know, just to go and further prove what what these bio of compounds can do. And, and hopefully in the future, you know, even have some more, concrete claims that we can make, to the consumer on what this product can do.

Kyle Krull - 00:14:33
Super cool. It sounds like a fantastic product. You know, I think I I I know myself and and a handful of other, like, health focused folks have, Selim Heska and their pantries. This feels like a more complete version with some additional benefits. So to me, it's a no brainer to trade up. Really excited about this product. Really cool.

Jared Simon - 00:14:49
Yeah. Thanks. Thanks. We are too.

Anthony Corsaro - 00:14:51
Thank you. Jared, a question popped into my mind when you were kinda going through the overall work set And can you describe how vertically integrated and, like, is there processing on the, the name is escaping. We have the sister company. Like, Are y'all taking seed all the way to end products? Are you receiving a process version of that? Like, is there a process component here? Like, what does that look like?

Jared Simon - 00:15:14
Yeah. So so let me are you talking just in Manitoba Harvest in general?

Anthony Corsaro - 00:15:18
Yeah. Yeah.

Jared Simon - 00:15:19
Yeah. So let me let me talk you through how how we operate. We are almost vertically integrated. We we don't own any of our farmland, and we don't do the farming ourselves, but we have long standing farming partnerships, that we've developed over the last 20, 25 years. We have an agronomy team in house that goes out and works with the farmers, really optimizing the varietals of hemp that they're growing, giving them tips, you know, on some of the growing practices that we're learning about, you know, best practices, you know, sharing them from farm to farm. We grow most of our hemp still today up in Canada. Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Alberta, and Quebec being the 4 provinces that we primarily source our hemp from. We do have some farmer and partners in the US. And occasionally we will go to the European market, but most of what we still grow today, is in Canada.

Jared Simon - 00:16:03
So we don't do the growing, but what I what we do do, is we help, work with some of the companies that are developing the genetics on the seed. So we're involved there. I guess they were involved in the agronomy. And then once the hemp is harvested, we're taking it the rest of the way. You know, it will go to it will go to a seed cleaner, you know, off the farm and then we're taking it in house. We've got 2 manufacturing facilities up in Manitoba.

Jared Simon - 00:16:35
That do everything from heat treating the seed for safety, de hauling the seed, taking that hull off of that nutritious heart, And then we're turning it into either hemp hearts, hemp Boyle, hemp fiber, hemp protein, in our facilities or value added products like granola's or hot cereals, or things like that. And then, obviously, we're doing the packaging and the marketing and bringing it to retail. So it's pretty neat to be involved in in a organization that has built up that level of expertise, you know, in almost every part of the supply chain.

Kyle Krull - 00:17:12
That's super cool. And I'm curious, like, you mentioned agronomy in that sort of assistance for farmers. I'm really curious from, an agronomy of, like, how has him grown? You know, you you talked about corn. You talked about soy and how it's, like, essentially giant monocrop. It sounds like a wiper crop. Is it after an existing cash crop, like a secondary cash crop? Walk you through the the hemp growing process.

Jared Simon - 00:17:31
Absolutely. So hemp has grown, outdoors. So cannabis is more indoor grow. Hemp has grown outdoors It's it's grown in many ways, like a traditional row crop. The the the differences though are number 1, the way it grows, because hemp is such an aggressive grower and it grows so quickly, it's quite, I don't want to say it's easy to grow, but it, but it, it requires less input than a lot of other props. Even our conventional hemp, because we do some conventional hemp and then we do organic and then we do regen. Doesn't need any herbicides or pesticides because it's such an aggressive grower, right? And you don't have that competition, you know, it outcompetes the other week.

Anthony Corsaro - 00:18:15
You know,

Jared Simon - 00:18:15
on the field. So that's number 1. That's that's what's great about how it's grown. Mo most farmers, are growing this in a rotation. And they're moving it around from year to year on a 3 year cycle. So a lot of our farmers in the Canadian prairies, you know, they're growing hemp 1 year, you know, maybe they're putting in, you know, a nitrogen fixing crop, you know, a year after. And then maybe they're going to a traditional grain crop like a barley or something like that. It really varies. Every farm is is a little bit different. But that was a huge advantage for us when we knew we wanted to move into Regen is we had so many farmers who just got it.

Jared Simon - 00:18:46
Like, they were already doing so many of the great things of agriculture that they said, okay. Yeah. You know, to meet a certification process, we can do that and and we can work with you to get there. And ultimately, that is how we got there on our ROC certified product that we released last year. So that is how it's grown. You know, the hemp plant gets pretty big.

Jared Simon - 00:19:12
You know, it's pretty neat to see a hemp field in in August or or September, you know, that

Kyle Krull - 00:19:19
We're talking like 6 feet high, 10 feet high, like, give us give us some specifics.

Jared Simon - 00:19:23
It's they they get to, you know, most of the ones, the varieties we grow get to 5 or 6 feet high. There are ones that get hired. But then they become a little bit harder to process. You know, and and the combines can't handle them if they get too big. So 5 or 6 is kind of the optimal size where you get a great yield of seed. But you're you're also, you know, able to harvest it in a way that it's not problematic. So it's it's pretty neat. And then and then when harvest comes, what what happens is, you know, the hemp seed gets harvested some of the farms will then sell, you know, the fiber to another player in the marketplace who's converting that fiber into you know, whatever it may be, low value products like bedding or higher value products.

Jared Simon - 00:19:51
Some farmers are reworking that biomass into the soil. You know, or leaving it on the fields over to winter, you know, over winter to protect the soil, and then allowing that to be, you know, the basis for what they're growing upon the next year. It really varies depending on the farmer, what what they're gonna do with the biomass when all is said and done.

Kyle Krull - 00:20:30
That's amazing. I love the fact that there's so many different and revenue streams for the farmers. I think that's really cool and super important, especially for our regenerative product. Like, how do we make sure that this makes sense for for those who are producing on the ground?

Jared Simon - 00:20:42
Yeah.

Kyle Krull - 00:20:43
You sort of alluded to this earlier, like you do conventional, organic, and regenerative. Quickly, if you can, without, like, you know, saying that Obviously, conventional has the most opportunity to improve, and we don't wanna, like, say that it's bad. But what are the differences from an agronomy perspective between those 3 differences

Jared Simon - 00:20:59
Yeah. So I'd say, you know, really, the biggest difference is is just some of the, you know, the practices. I I think so starting with conventional versus organic, I think it is fertilization. And, you know, the conventional farmer might supplementing some fertilizers, within their crops that are non organic fertilizers, right, and using some fertilization, that doesn't get them to organic. Other than that, you're doing a lot of the same good things, you know, from a land management, land stewardship, you know, that you would see a typical organic farmer doing. And again, some of that is just the nature of this crop. It doesn't get a lot of pests, you know, it doesn't have, you know, the, competition with weeds. You don't really need to treat it in a way that you would, you know, with a conventional crop, that might be a different type of crop.

Jared Simon - 00:21:42
Organic, of course, is is, you know, complying with all the USDA organic or Canadian organic standards. So you know, there, there, there's a little bit more there, you know, in terms of how they're fertilizing the crop and, and how they're getting that crop started. And then obviously with with with Regen, you know, there's the criteria, you know, and and we've chosen ROC. So there's the criteria set forth by ROC. You know, to manage it as, as a regen crop. But, but like I said, it wasn't a big leap for some of our organic farmers to get from what they were doing today.

Jared Simon - 00:22:16
To get to ROC certification because they were already doing, you know, 90% of what ROC would have required. And, and there were a few main practices here and there. And, you know, that they may have needed to shift, but, but it wasn't necessarily a huge lift. And and that to us is really promising in that, you know, as this ROC or this regenerative market in general gets bigger, we think there's more acres we can bring online. Which which is really exciting to us.

Anthony Corsaro - 00:22:52
Yeah. Jared, I'd love for you to share a little bit more about the kind of regenerative journey, what that's been like, how y'all have audit that why you've made the decisions you've made. It it does seem like the majority of the legacy brands that have scaled to some significant capacity that now have you know, regenerative skews, they had this latent supply that they knew they could turn on pretty quickly or just wasn't certified or it was really close to being certified. So it seems like it's been kind of a a supply chain analysis opportunity. It's like, hey. We already have the supplier really close, and we're bullish on the marketing side. Commercially, you know, let's let's do something here.

Anthony Corsaro - 00:23:19
But give us the details on how, you know, that came together on on y'all's end.

Jared Simon - 00:23:29
Yeah. I I then I think it came from a few different directions. I think it came from, you know, our team of agronomists and and the farmers themselves who were starting to explore, you know, what does regenerative mean as, you know, regenerative started to get more notability in the marketplace and and and a better understanding. So there were some bottoms up, you know, farmers asking about it and our agronomy team engaging them on it. And and then bringing it back to, you know, the sales and marketing team within my organization. At the same time, of course, you know, we were there a few years ago looking at the marketplace and really admiring the brands who were moving, you know, early in in this regenerative space and saying, this is a great movement. How do we become a partner in this movement? Because, you know, we've we've always pride ourselves as being, you know, a pioneer, you know, on on sustainability, and so there was this, you know, conversation about what could we do?

Jared Simon - 00:24:14
How fast can we do it? What would the premium be? How would we package it up? Who would be the right launch partner? All those conversations commercially to triangulate, okay, let's go then commit to it for this year crop. Let's go get seed in the ground.

Jared Simon - 00:24:31
Let's do everything we need to do so that we have enough acres online to go and launch commercially, at some scale. That was a decision we made, you know, back in 2022, 2021 so that we could start growing the crop in 2020 2, ROC certified. And then after the harvest in November and the processing, we could get something in market early 2023. And that is when we launched in the market. The finished product.

Kyle Krull - 00:25:07
And give us, like I think is it right now there's one rock skew at the moment? It's the hemp hearts. Yes. What what does the plan look like? Because you all do supplements, granolas, like the pro protein. There's all sorts of different, like, skews and lines. Like, how Is does the integration plan oil? What's the integration plan for rock look like from, I guess, quote an innovation perspective, if you will, or just like a line penetration perspective, however you wanna

Jared Simon - 00:25:32
So I think that that's a great question. I I think, you know, we're looking at where do we wanna go next with rock. The simplest place to go would be, you know, an oil or a protein, a single ingredient. But I think Right. You know, and and we make very well go there, but those are still relatively small businesses, small impact compares to the heart. So I think priority number 1 is get rock hearts in more locations Right now, we've got all foods nationally, fortunately. We've got some other great partners, you know, in the natural channel. We have some conventional retailers or more conventional retailers starting to come online, in this upcoming year.

Jared Simon - 00:26:01
So that's really exciting. Like, they're seeing it out in the market in 2023 and, you know, and and they're saying, hey, how do we I wanna

Kyle Krull - 00:26:17
pause it real quick. Are they getting more excited because this product is now rock certified, or are they just generally excited about the brand and it happens to be rock certified?

Jared Simon - 00:26:26
Both. These partners that already carry hemp hearts and carry the brand that say, hey. We've seen you go into rock in the natural channel how do we bring that to, you know, the mainstream channel or the conventional channel in terms of retail? And let's bring in a SKU to supplement what we have here today, you know, in your on organic mix. Another place we're pushing pretty aggressively in rock. We do have an ingredient sales business. So 80% of our company is branded Manitoba Harvest, but another 20%, you know, we do sell ingredients to lots of other players you know, great CPG companies, you know, who are using hemp in their products, you know, whether it be in cereals or bars or meals and or whatever else. And rock is now, you know, on the the list, so to speak, in terms of what we're presenting to our customers.

Jared Simon - 00:27:07
And we're telling them, you know, about you know, the importance of rock. We're telling them about the success that we're seeing with rock on the branded side, and we're getting them interested because that's where this thing really takes off is you know, Manitoba Harvest hemp, you know, great that we've got, you know, that in in rock certification now. But some of these other players who are starting to integrate hemp into their recipes. How do you get, you know, rock certification hemp? You know, as as part of their mix too. And what are the things they're thinking about in terms of products that could integrate it.

Jared Simon - 00:27:39
So, yeah, it's kind of a a multipronged approach that we're taking.

Anthony Corsaro - 00:27:48
That's a that's a huge theme that that we're seeing across a lot of these enterprises is a couple of things. You have to be vertically integrated to some degree, to get the unit economics where they need to be and to have kind of the the touch points in the relationships with farmers to make all this stuff work commercially. Yep. And you have to have some sort of, b to b presence, not not always, but it's usually very helpful to support the branded business to build that scale for the unit economics and kind of the the grower offtake and those things. So super interesting to hear you speak to that. You know, I'm curious on on the rock side. And this is this is a Kyle question because he's the one selling to retailers all the time, Yeah. How has the feedback been on the pricing?

Anthony Corsaro - 00:28:22
Like, online, I can see the the rock impacts are 1999 and the regular organic is 1599. Like, Yeah. How has that price architecture conversation been?

Jared Simon - 00:28:37
Yeah. I mean, I think it's been understood. I think it's not dissimilar to conversations I've had throughout my career on, you know, why pay a premium for organic versus conventional on on some brands. You know, here it's why pay the additional preview premium on rock. What does that do? You know, what does it give the farmer? What does it allow them to do? You know, from a consumer perspective, you know, the consumer ultimately, you know, we'll we'll vote with their pocketbook, so to speak, and you know, so far we've seen, you know, a number of consumers willing to make that extra investment in rock because they know the importance it has you know, on on the land and they know the importance it has from a sustainability standpoint.

Jared Simon - 00:28:57
You know, and I think there's also perceived, you know, benefiting in quality. And and, you know, the more care you put into growing anything, the better and more pure product you're gonna have at the end of the day, so I think consumers understand that implicitly as well. So, you know, so far so far, I think we've seen the consumer respond or or or a portion of consumers I think in the long term, right, and this this is, you know, what I have faced many times in my career with organic tools, how do you narrow that premium? Right? We're always working on how do you bring the natural and organic premium,

3 - 00:29:51
you

Jared Simon - 00:29:51
know, closer together? So it's not a big jump for for consumers. I think the same thing's going on in in rock today is, you know, how do you get more farmers doing it? How do you get more scale? How do you make it where you know, rock is almost the default over time that it can narrow that gap. You know, and there's still some benefit passed on to the farmer, but but it's also getting easier for the consumer to enter into rock products.

Kyle Krull - 00:30:15
Yeah. Yeah. That's definitely the hope. Right? You know, I think right now, we're in sort of that early adopter phase where there's gonna have to be a premium until we reach economies and this becomes, like, you know, practiced across the board. You mentioned the consumer adoption piece a little bit, and I really wanna drill into this. Yeah. How are you all messaging rock benefits to your consumers. You you talked a little bit about perceived quality and taste. Have you done any nutritional density studies comparing like rock versus conventional?

Kyle Krull - 00:30:32
You know, how are you all thinking about this and what seems to be resonating with your consumer group so far?

Jared Simon - 00:30:46
Yeah. I think education is a big piece and and we have spent a lot of time and energy talking about, you know, regenerative. And and you're talking about this regularly on the podcast here, you know, there's there's still is such a big opportunity to educate the consumers at large on REGENER. You know, there there's there's great number of consumers who are in the know, and that's wonderful. And and every day, you know, that number gets bigger, but there's still a much bigger majority that are not in the know on on regenerative. It's like, how do you capture them at shelf? How do you capture them online so that they can start learning and and start investing some time into understanding what regenerative is all about? I will say, you know, Whole Foods was a great launch partner because they are very vested in this.

Jared Simon - 00:31:25
You know, from day 1, when we launch with them, we actually had shelf signage up in store, you know, danglers pulling people to the shelf and explaining, you know, the benefit of regenerative, like, you know, and and and and you know, calling out this this new product launch, me being the hemp product there. You know, we've done some digital campaigns, whether that be, you know, direct to consumer through Amazon that also have highlighted, you know, regenerative and and, you know, what the benefits of regenerative are for, you know, for the environment, you know, for the farmer. We certainly do a lot of messaging, you know, in our CRM. In reaching out to consumers, like, like, right now, we've got our, you know, Earth Month campaign going on sitting here in April. And and part of the messaging that's going out there is A, the sustainability of hemp, which has a great sustainability story in and of itself, but then also some of the efforts and initiatives we're doing, you know, on regenerative, that go beyond just base organic. And I think that's that's what, you know, we need to continue to plug away and do.

Jared Simon - 00:32:30
It's it's that education and you know, it's it's the education on pack too that when the consumer finally does go and purchase the product, they can sit, bring it home, and maybe read a little bit more you know, on backup pack of regenerative and and what we're doing. And, you know, maybe it introduces them to ROC and they go to the ROC website and and then they learn even more. So, yeah, education's a big, big piece of this. And, you know, it's it's something that, you know, we continue to invest behind.

Anthony Corsaro - 00:33:02
Yeah. And for those that are just just listening and not watching, we'll link it in the show notes, but the actual product packaging itself has the rock logo very big on the front. It has farming for a better future kind of tagline on the front. And then there's a very large portion of the back of pack dedicated to kind of educating on what this is, what it means with the tagline kind of at the bottom of all that, better for you, better for the earth, better for the farmers. So significant investment on the storytelling side on the packaging side, which I think we need across the board from all these kind of Moderna brands and Moderna SKUs because we're gonna have to get eyeballs on these things at retail. To really create some sort of resonance that really drives purchase. I I wanna ask one more question on the price architecture, Jared, is just our retailers seeing this as, hey, we would love for these rock hemp hearts to eventually just be your organic hemp art offering, or are they looking at as, like, a better bet where they want them side by side to really establish, hey, there's a difference here and, you know, the different or, like, what what are you seeing feedback wise from retailers there?

Jared Simon - 00:34:06
Thus far, I think it's more the latter, where it's like a good, better, best, right, your your conventional, your organic, you know, your your rock. But it's interesting. Over time, could it evolve where, you know, rock is, you know, if it's one or the other and hopefully, we're choosing maybe rock in that environment because it, it adds even more benefit, to the consumer and that price gap has narrowed. I think in in some retailers, you know, with a more limited shelf set, more limited SKU count, it could evolve into that, where maybe it is a you know, conventional, and then it's a, you know, rock, you know, which is organic and regenerative together in in in one offering. So I don't know. It's still early days and and, you know, we've got only a few test cases out there at real scale. So, you know, the interest to have this conversation, you know, 18, 24 months from now, because because I do wonder where, you know, some of the big retailers as we get them into this and maybe they have a little bit more limited shelf space, you know, on a skew like hemp where they ultimately don't.

Kyle Krull - 00:35:10
Yeah. I know from just to just to kinda echo some of for killing fire, you know, all biggest barrier. Like, we and I'm assuming it's the same for you all, like, it's supply chain. There are not enough regenerative bones for us to transition our supply chain right now, and retailers seem to be very understanding when you say that. And I'm I'm assuming he's probably saying both for you. If you all wanna say, hey. We're entering everything to rock tomorrow. It's like, hold on.

Kyle Krull - 00:35:24
That's gonna take some time. You know, let's, you know, prove that this is gonna work except the premium for now, and then it'll kinda trickle down. And that's, like, conversations I've I've had with retailers. Does that seem kinda similar for you, Jared?

Jared Simon - 00:35:42
Yeah. Yeah. Yes. I I we've had a couple of those conversations on what would the lead time need to be. And and, you know, hemp is a once a year growing cycle. You planted, you know, in April when you harvest it in September, October. So there is a degree of planning that needs to happen with our Hold on

Kyle Krull - 00:35:58
real quick real quick. Did you say you're planting hemp in April in Canada? Do you not have to worry about frost?

Jared Simon - 00:36:04
April, May. It depends. Quebec is maybe a little bit more April. May is probably when we're getting it in in the prairies. And then it does grow, you know, through September because you also have a shortened season on the end. So it's it's once you can get in, we do. So, yes, we're just starting to get to some of our earliest plantings now. And then, yeah, probably May is probably bigger season that we

Kyle Krull - 00:36:28
don't have. I live in Bend, Oregon. I can't start planting in the ground. Apparently, my plant date is May 12th because of the frost. So the fact that you're able to plant before that in, like, Canada. To me just is is crazy, but, you know,

Jared Simon - 00:36:40
I'm not. More southern parts you can. But, yeah, I mean, you know, And and I I might have been just really I think one of the cool things about hemp too is, it is a pretty resilient and hardy crop and

Anthony Corsaro - 00:36:52
Yeah.

Jared Simon - 00:36:53
You know, once it gets going and it takes it takes hold, it's it's a pretty strong roller. And, you know, we've even seen in years when there's been drought instead of the debt So hemp has a very deep tap root. That's another reason why it's just such a great plan for a sustainability standpoint and why, you know, it fits into a regenerative rotation because of that detached root. But in the years where there's drought and less water, you see the roots actually spread out more then go deep. It's just super interesting from kind of, a growing standpoint because it don't adapt to the climate in place. So, yeah, it's pretty hard to crop and you know, it's it's pretty fascinating to watch.

Kyle Krull - 00:37:31
Yeah. I've I've heard that there are 2 crops in particular that seem to be doing really well for Like, they're almost I don't I don't wanna diminish, like, what you all are doing, but these crops are tend to be more inherently regenerative, and that's hemp and buckwheat And it really feels like those two crops have this huge opportunity to develop, like, real regenerative markets. And because they have so many different applications, they can penetrate so many different areas whereas, like, you know, beef is beef. You get, like, turn beef into a chip. I mean, I guess you potentially But, you know, there's somebody's doing it with chicken. Right? There's chicken chips out there. But Yeah. Yeah.

Kyle Krull - 00:37:55
You know, I think he has been so cool because it is inherent currently so great for the planet and so versatile so that that's a really great opportunity.

Jared Simon - 00:38:11
Yeah. And and that's where, you know, I talked a little bit about protein, which is still a very, very, you know, small part of our business, but one that we see becoming a very big part of our business over time. I mean, you think about plant based protein and and that great lead that's out there for the planet. He could play a really important role in that. And, to your point, that may be I don't wanna say the easiest, but one of the best ways to get regenerative protein into the marketplace, because hemp is such a great plan for regenerative growing practices because of its innate properties.

Anthony Corsaro - 00:38:45
Right. Yeah. Jared, it's super inspiring to your level of knowledge on the agronomy piece and how tapped in you are to that as the CEO. Because I think we need way more of that on the CPG side. It it's very clear that there's like a extreme business case for why you would need to be behind this brand, but I just think it's it's really cool. And I would love to hear you speak to kind of, like, you're a classically trained CPG person. You've worked at Kraft. You've worked at Hain Celestial. Like, how do you view the regenerative movement and regen overall as an opportunity as someone that, like, this is not your first rodeo in in CPG at this point?

Anthony Corsaro - 00:39:12
Yeah.

Kyle Krull - 00:39:21
And one one additional question on a layer in there. When did you first hear about regenerative? What was your inception point there?

Jared Simon - 00:39:27
Oh, that's a great question too. Yeah, I mean, yeah, my journey is more of a classically trained CPG, you know, brand management track, right, where where I did start at Kraft Foods and I worked on you know, more conventional products and, you know, beverages and and coffee and, you know, and then, you know, going to Hain Celestial, you know, that 10 years into my career, you know, was really for me, you know, the game changer and really understanding organic more deeply, I had admired it and I had used organic products you know, as as a consumer, but then being at a company that was so deep with so many of the brands inorganic, you know, helped me understand that I'd say, you know, Regina started registering for me prior to even coming to, Manitoba Harvest. And I joined Manitoba Harvest in in in 2021. You know, while I was was even still at Enhanced Celestial, I was certainly looking at some of the real you know, innovators in this space. And I was thinking about, you know, how do different types of products you know, navigate the space, you know, especially the ones that are multi ingredient, because I worked on a lot of multi ingredient products and, not just kinda single, single ingredient. And and that's interesting, right? Like, you know, can you source everything regenerated?

Jared Simon - 00:40:37
Do you have to source everything regenerably and I'm sure, you know, a number of the conversations you've had with with, you know, different folks on this podcast have gone into that and and what the trade offs are and what the balancing of that.

Anthony Corsaro - 00:40:53
Right.

Jared Simon - 00:40:54
So I had always thought about it. I probably discovered it, you know, at an expo west, you know, that I've been going to for 15, 20 years. Right, where when I started seeing it popping and I started checking it out a little bit more in in earnest. And and again, I I was thinking, how how do I get you know, some of my brands, you know, exposed to regenerative, you know, maybe through a single ingredient when I was at Hainton. And and we were looking that particularly on snacks categories. But then when I came over to Manitoba Harvest, you know, it was just it was like staring me in the face. I was like, oh my gosh. Like, as I learn more and more about the economy of hemp and what hemp, you know, looked like.

Jared Simon - 00:41:26
I started asking the questions, some of my colleagues, you know, who also, you know, were more classically trained, you know, and and seen some of these market trends develop, started asking the questions, and it came together pretty quickly. Like I like I said, we we started having these conversations, you know, in, you know, 21, you know, by 22, we were planting it. And then by 23, we had it out of market, you know, through our farming partner, ships that that we were able to turn things on pretty quickly. So, yeah, that was probably my journey in in into Regen. You know, and and it's a journey that, you know, I I think a lot of folks who are in CPG are probably, you know, going through themselves and, you know, man, I I I've seen more of this you know, in the marketplace and seeing more of this at trade shows and seeing more of it on shelf. And what can I be doing with my brands? And and that's the inspiring part. Like, that's what we all want. Right?

Jared Simon - 00:42:16
We want you know, more CPG folks saying, how do I get regen as part of the DNA, you know, and what my brand is doing because I think it really does, you know, benefit us all of them. And I and I think as a question you guys ask sometimes, like, how do you get half the market there, you know, in the future? That is what we we want. And and that would have such great benefit, you know, to the planet if, you know, not just Manitoba Harvest, but everything sitting alongside Manitoba Harvest, you know, on, on, on our shelf, is making some effort to get there over time.

Kyle Krull - 00:42:55
I think you're spot on, and I'll share a personal story. You know, we, I work for or I'm on the volunteer board of an organization called cultivate Bend. We recently hosted a screening of common ground on March 29th and went to share that with our local community. And since then, I've had 2 different brands reach out and say, hey. I wanna figure out how source more regenerative products and get it into my LOI, my list of ingredients, like,

Jared Simon - 00:43:14
who do

Kyle Krull - 00:43:15
you know? Like, who can you connect me to that can help me with this? So Yeah. To your point, like, The interest is there in the these these existing brands are like, how do I become a part of this movement? How do I support this? Cause it really does feel like the future of food. And I think we gotta do more of that. And just kudos to the the whole common ground team for putting together. So it's a beautiful movie. It's so well produced in, like, entertaining and captivating to watch.

Jared Simon - 00:43:35
Yeah. I love that. And and, look, let me put that out there too. You know, if there are others that are listening who may be source ingredients from Canada, particularly the Canadian Prairies, you know, whether it be oats or barley or flax or any of the other ingredients that our farmers might be working on and growing as part of rotation, you know, with him. Please reach out to us and Manitoba Harvest, we will connect you with some of these farmers that we're already working with in the regen space others who are interested in getting into regen because again, I think that's that's where a tipping point happens is, you know, someone calls me tomorrow and says, hey, we're looking at regen oats. Do you have a farmer can work with her. We're looking at Regen Buckwheat. You know, Buckwheat's grown in quite a bit in Quebec. You know, can you connect me with a farmer that might be going this way on on hemp? We can get there a lot faster if if we combine efforts.

Jared Simon - 00:44:17
So that's actually really inspiring to hear that people are reaching out to you right after that film was was aired.

Kyle Krull - 00:44:29
Totally. And I love the offer you're putting out there in the ether, you know, let let everybody know, like, hey. You know, that this that's what it's all about. It's collaboration and aggregation, right, to help to spur the action on the ground. So that's super cool. Appreciate you doing that. Yeah.

Anthony Corsaro - 00:44:40
Absolutely. 100 100100%. And, Derek, I'm curious, like, as you sit there as a CEO and you think about the future of this business, right, what what we see from a regen perspective right now is there is some unit economic upside in premium pricing. There's some retailer demand, and there's a, an early adopter consumer base, but it's not really enough to drive, like, to really underwrite a change of your business. Right? It's cool. It's we're we're testing it. A lot of these things are very limited with the market data we actually have just because time, you know, perspective and small sample size.

Anthony Corsaro - 00:45:06
But, you know, like, what what do you see as the theory of change that will really spur the commercial growth it linking it to nutrient density? Is it eventually it's gonna be as strong of a claim as organic? And, you know, we have people that think it's gonna outpace organic. Do you think it's always gonna be a less than 5% of the market. We're asking people to buy altruistic benefits at a premium. Like, how do you see this event playing on the claims universe.

Jared Simon - 00:45:36
Yeah. I think, you know, it's a great question. I I think it could be a couple of those avenues. Let me start with the claim piece because, you know, what I witnessed in my time in Hain Celestial that I never would have imagined was, you know, the rapid development of non GMO projects. Right, which started as, you know, couple brands putting it on pack. And, you know, within 5 years, it was like table 6, right, where every brand had started putting it on their their pack because there was just this consumer interest for it and and you know, even the consumers maybe that were less sophisticated, they saw it as, you know, some heuristic or some, you know, acknowledgment of some kind of quality standard with within within their products. So I think regenerative has that potential, you know, as, you know, a kind of group of leading adopters, you know, bring it into their homes and, you know, and and and advocate for it and come out there. Like, sometimes there does become this tipping point of I've seen that logo on 2 or 3 of the cool products that I really enjoy or some of my most beloved products. I wanna see it on more of my products. And it just starts happening. So I think there's there's a piece there.

Jared Simon - 00:46:48
What what I think also though though is really interesting that you brought up even before that was you know, how do we get to that next level of explaining, you know, both the nutritional environmental benefits of regen? And what claims could we maybe then make that make it a, you know, a must have for

Kyle Krull - 00:47:11
for at

Jared Simon - 00:47:11
least some consumers? Like, I'm gonna go pay this little bit of premium. Because, you know, I know I'm getting more nutrient dense here. I'm gonna pay this a little bit premium because I I can quantifiably understand the impact of that choice versus, you know, another choice I would make on shelf. So I do think that's there. I think, again, we're still in an earlier stage of development here. But hopefully that that continues to emerge.

Kyle Krull - 00:47:34
Yeah. Jared, I was really hoping you were gonna answer that question because AC and I ask yourselves that same question, I mean, every week, if not every day. Right? So, you know, at least we're asking the right question. That's good. I wanna pivot a little bit and talk about what it's like to be the CEO of Manitoba Harvest as part of this larger publicly traded company, and you all have really prioritized regenerative. How do the other organizations that you all kinda work within this same, you know, larger larger company feel about what you're doing. What are they trying to learn? If anything, do they care? Yeah. Is all that look like? Yeah.

Jared Simon - 00:48:09
That's been pretty inspiring. I mean, there's there's been some really great feedback and, you know, admiration from what we've been doing on Manitoba Harvest as part of a bigger entity. And and and there's been a lot of interest. I actually have been surprised you know, by the level of interest of my colleagues who are in sectors that maybe normally aren't as focused in on agricultural and agricultural practice. Is. I I think, you know, the the most interesting opportunity that I see, so we have a a sister division that's made up of a number of beer and and spirit companies. You know, and and some of those beer companies were kind of original, you know, kind of bogey you know, craft breweries that that are throughout the country.

Jared Simon - 00:48:45
And and one of the things that, you know, I've started talking to some folks in those organizations about is the opportunity here for Regen within some of the agricultural products that go into making beer. Right? If you think about, you know, barley and and hops and, you know, if you think about some of the other things that go into beer or if you think got a great brand called Breckenridge Brew Breckenridge Distillery that does some fine whiskeys out of Colorado. Like, there's some really neat opportunities to bring regenerative grains into the fold for those brands. And that's a sector where, you know, and you you might see a lot more than I do, but I haven't seen a whole lot of activity in Regen just yet. In beer and spirits. And I think that would be pretty cool.

Jared Simon - 00:49:33
And and that's yet another touch point with consumers, maybe in an unexpected place where they could do some discovery of of Regen and what it means. So that's been really fun internally just being an advocate for for Regen. And starting to explore those conversations with colleagues, you know, in very different parts of, you know, the CPG industry.

Anthony Corsaro - 00:49:59
The super interesting here.

Kyle Krull - 00:50:01
AC, go ahead.

Anthony Corsaro - 00:50:02
It's super interesting to think about that beer and spirits market. I mean, we've had some wine producers, you know, I think top line of what we're seeing there is Maker's mark has made some big commitments. They're pretty tied in with REGENIFY. You have what Patagonia's provisions is doing on the beer side. They're obviously very tied in with rock. I was actually shocked

Kyle Krull - 00:50:19
at this point. Also. Shout out to any time for for what they're doing.

Anthony Corsaro - 00:50:23
Yeah. You got any time. You got some of the wine folks. But I was shocked at Expo West. Guinness had their 0%, like, their non alcoholic beer in the hot products haul, and they had this giant display about regenerative agriculture. Like, literally it was happening with that. And he was talking about all the practices that they're implementing from a from that perspective. And so I was super curious about that. Because to me, like you said, that consumer is especially not making purchasing the with the same drivers as maybe the person buying packaged hemp hearts at Whole Foods. So the architecture of how you build it into a claim or the marketing strategy or the storytelling or whatever is is so different.

Anthony Corsaro - 00:50:54
And I'm just, yeah, intrigued to kind of continue to see how that space develops around this topic.

Jared Simon - 00:51:06
Yeah. That is. And I had an I missed Guinness at at Expo West. That's interesting to hear. For me, you know, the connection does, though, happen with, you know, some of these you know, craft breweries where you might have that same consumer who is going into a natural retailer and then maybe go into the brew pub of their local craft brewery. And there's an opportunity there beyond just buying the can on shelf in a retail environment. But when you get to a group hub, when you get to a brewery, there's actually a very captive audience wanting to learn very deeply about how are you making the product? How are you brewing it? How are you sourcing it? Right? So it's a it's a really fertile ground to do some education.

Jared Simon - 00:51:39
And, I do hope that is something we can manifest in a number of our brands who do have taprooms and breweries the country, you know, if we can make this leap into regen with them.

Kyle Krull - 00:51:55
Totally. Well and there's, like, anything craft, like, the wine, the craft beers, the spirits, like, the flavor and taste profile is so important to those consumers. And I I don't think there's a ton of data on this yet, but there is a a real link between not just nutritional density, but taste and regeneratively grown products. And I think that that could be another sort of like inception point for consumers who, I mean, everybody's doing style call, massive total addressable market, right, where you can go in and be like, hey. Like, oh, my my beer tastes better because it's grown regeneratively. Maybe I want my crackers to taste better or my hemp protein to taste better or whatever else. You know what I mean? So it could be a great, like, gateway into regenerative because there is that emphasis on quality and taste, whereas a lot of other categories that are relatively commoditized don't have that.

Jared Simon - 00:52:42
Yeah. Yeah. That might be more functional. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's a great point.

Kyle Krull - 00:52:47
Another thing I wanna talk about, I know you you you had mentioned before we started recording that you wanted to talk about innovation. We love talking about innovation on the pod. So curious from your perspective, like, where is Manitoba innovating? Like, what's coming next for you all?

Jared Simon - 00:52:59
Yeah. So that that's really exciting for me. One of the things that I've really enjoyed over over the last few years is is how many great applications there are for him and how many places we want to get him integrated. You know, and and let me take a step step back in terms of, like, you know, for those who are not as educated on hemp, what's so great about hemp? Well, I mean hemp is super high in protein, you know, in a one ounce serving, a 20 eight gram serving, you're getting 10 grams of plant based protein in a hemp part. You're getting 12 grams of omegas. So omega 3 and omega 6 fatty acids. There's not a lot of great, you know, plant based sources that are so bioavailable for omega threes. And then it's like just loaded with, you know, vitamins and minerals.

Jared Simon - 00:53:33
So if you think about those areas, like, that's how we've thought about innovation. Like, like, where is there a need to bring more protein, you know, into innovation where, in a very natural way, not through necessarily isolates, but through just the whole sea, you know, home products, you know, where is there an opportunity to bring omegas, you know, into innovation, some of which we can do ourselves. So, you know, we just launched a hot cereal. It's a supersede oatmeal that's, a combination of oats, hemp, and some other seeds like flax and and chia, but but a lot of hemp in there And you end up getting, like, this really protein rich, delicious oatmeal that you can have in the morning that keeps you full through the morning and gives you that protein that you need. We're looking at the snacking category, and and and there's some projects we're working on there, again, with real protein nutrient dense snacks. You know, that can fill you up in the morning occasion or in the afternoon, you know, that have a habit at kind of the core of what we're doing.

Jared Simon - 00:54:34
But then, you know, as as you shift and and you think about, like, where can our hemp oil go? You know, not all of these projects are necessarily ones that, you know, we wanna take on on our own, and that's where we're working with partners, you know, how do you integrate hemp oil, you know, into, you know, things like salad dressing, how do you integrate hemp oil, you know, into places where, you know, you wanna add that richness of omegas. And so we we are working with a lot of partners on on projects that I think are super intriguing and and hopefully will be coming to market in the next, you know, year or so that bring more and more hemp oil based products to market because of that o an omega piece. And, you know, we did launch a culinary oil a year ago. Typically hemp was sold as a supplement oil, and there was this wrongful perception that hemp couldn't be used for medium or higher heat cooking. Because there's a high omega content, and typically your high omega oils don't do very well with with smoke points and flash point.

Jared Simon - 00:55:34
Again, interestingly enough, and this is where, like, hemp just hasn't been studied, you know, until the last, you know, decade or so. When we started going out and doing testing on hemp oil, we found that the smoke point was significantly north of 400. Like, you could do sauteing. You could do some real nice baking applications. You know, you're not gonna do deep frying, you know, because it's not a refined oil, but with an unrefined hemp oil, you can get to, like, you know, a 4 10, 4 15, you know, 420, you know, smoke point. And and and I think that was really cool to understand, and it allowed us to then go into the innovation space of putting a hemp oil on the market for those culinary uses.

Jared Simon - 00:56:13
Now, So, I mean, those are just a few examples. Like, we're just getting going. Like, I'm so excited about what we can be doing, you know, on Manitoba Harvest itself. And then like I said, having this whole ingredient side of our business where we partner with other brands, you know, and we can help them do some of that research and development, you know, I think there's just, you know, huge upside on him. And and even though, you know, we sit here today, we we know about him. Hopefully, many of the listeners know about him.

Jared Simon - 00:56:44
Household penetration on hemp is still really small. You know, it's it's less than 5%. And even less than 5%. I know. I know. Isn't that crazy? I know.

Jared Simon - 00:56:50
We're always we're

Kyle Krull - 00:57:02
always amazed.

Jared Simon - 00:57:02
We're saying, okay, we're just not like the tip of the iceberg here. Even in Canada where it's been around, you know, much longer in terms of the market and the understanding of it's less than 10% even in the Canadian market. So There's a whole lot of people out there that need to start using hemp, you know, and and the sooner that we can get it into all kinds of products that penetration is gonna go up and up.

Kyle Krull - 00:57:22
Yeah. Totally wise. Yeah. I can't think of a a more well positioned, like, ironically legacy brand. You know, protein is only becoming more and more important. Omegas are only becoming more important. And if those are, like, 2 of the key, like, primary attributes for hemp, like, to your point, you're so well positioned and there are so many opportunities. It's probably somewhat overwhelming. You know, to look at the category data, like, okay. Cool. Like, we can go this direction. We can go this direction. You know?

Kyle Krull - 00:57:38
So that's gotta be hard, right, to to, right, choose strategically. Okay. Which of these do we have the time and bandwidth to go after first? How do we make that prioritization? You know, order of operations? Who are the potential partners? So Right. I'm I'm excited to hear you talk about it.

Kyle Krull - 00:57:51
And curious to see where things go next.

Anthony Corsaro - 00:58:01
Totally. Yeah.

Jared Simon - 00:58:01
Yes. Thank you. Yeah.

Anthony Corsaro - 00:58:03
Yeah. Jared, on the B2B side, is there an opportunity for any, like, co branded or, you know, people launching products and you have a little Manitoba Harvest seal on it, or is it all really just, hey, we're an ingredient supplier. We're just selling them the the ingredient. You know?

Jared Simon - 00:58:17
Yeah. There's absolutely not opportunity. And we've talked to 1 or 2

Anthony Corsaro - 00:58:21
partners about that.

Jared Simon - 00:58:22
You know, especially when we're doing some big development together, you know, in terms of having our logo, their logo together. Most of our our partners, you know, slash customers just want their brands to be the hero and we're okay with that. You know, that's ultimately if you want your brands to be the hero brand and and we can be the enabler to get you the hemp ingredients that that's perfectly fine so long as, you know, you're doing, you know, what what you need to do to, you know, tell the story and, you know, and and build up a nice business but yeah, I think those are special partnerships when you can get that co branding as well. And, you know, maybe there's some marketing investment from both organizations, you know, maybe there's you know, kind of complimentary, you know, sales and and marketing opportunities within our organizations to go and sell the product. Those are kinda neat when they come together. So, yeah, we're very open to to both.

Kyle Krull - 00:59:13
Yeah. I don't mean to make this more complicated than it already is because there's many applications for hemp. There's the B2B side. There's all the different branded side. I'm curious from a food service perspective, in in particular, like, the smoothie area Yeah. You know, like, I I feel like that's that's a a huge potential market. Like, is that something you all are currently working in? Something you're curious about working in? And if so, what what is that channel look like for you?

Jared Simon - 00:59:36
Yeah. It's early days on that. We we historically haven't focused on it, but it's one of the things that, you know, team and I have sat down and mapped out as a big opportunity, like, to build out, you know, a food service strategy and to get the right partners in place. We we don't have a food service Salesforce per se. But yes, absolutely. I mean, you think about restaurants, you know, especially, you know, more and more restaurants healthy offerings, have, you know, high protein offerings, keto friendly offerings, like, and then fits into all of those categories, right, whether it be you know, as a compliment or kind of the the crux of of the meal or the dish that's being built, you think about, you know, universities you know, and and that's a big one that we talk about is, you know, how can we find the right partner to maybe bring us to universities because, you know, you have a very open minded consumer, you know, in that eighteen to twenty five year old range, and and, you know, that may be a great time for someone to discover hemp and a really great source of plant based protein and plant based eating. So yeah, we think the opportunity is is is endless there on the food service side. It's just been a matter of focus and attention, and we've been focusing a lot on ingredients and retail up to this point.

Jared Simon - 01:00:41
But I think that is certainly a big frontier that's ahead of us.

Kyle Krull - 01:00:54
Super cool. And, yeah, I think you're spot on. There's so many, again, so many applications and so many opportunities. Just overwhelming. So, again, here's see where you land. It's it's gonna be fun to see, have continued to explode and hopefully get more households here in the future.

Anthony Corsaro - 01:01:10
Totally. And speaking of overwhelming, let's go to the most overwhelming question of the mall to close this out, which is and Jared, you you started to touch on it earlier too, but, you know, curious to give you the floor back for kind of a full answer. How do we get regen brands at 50% market share by 2050? How do we do that?

Jared Simon - 01:01:26
Yeah. Yeah. It's it's a fantastic question. I know you guys ask that question all the time, and I've heard some great answers there. You know, I I look, I think it it really is about consumer education, and it gets back to, you know, what we were talking about a little while ago, like, how do you get to that tipping point where, you know, There's gonna be the consumers who educate themselves. How do you get more consumers who educate themselves? And then how do you bring along with consumers that maybe don't care about educating themselves, but just want that shortcut of this is good for me and it's doing something good for the planet. And that's all I know, but that's fine enough. Right? So, like, to me, that's what gets us to 50% is, you know, when you've got a critical mass at the top who's leading the movement.

Jared Simon - 01:02:00
And then you've got an even bigger group of people who want to follow that movement for whatever reason. And and do it in a very simple way. So to me, it's like, how do we continue to build enough of, you know, our real advocates you know, here at at the top of the movement to then influence everyone behind them. And I think it's more and more brands getting there. You know, I think it's some big CPGs continuing to get there because, you know, while I sit here, you know, and and Manitoba is a nice size brand. I know that, you know, my household penetration is is only what it is.

Jared Simon - 01:02:39
And, you know, when you get, you know, some of these other big mega brands, you know, the the $1,000,000,000 brands starting to talk about reach in, that really makes a difference. And, you know, I I've worked at companies that've had some of those brands, and I know, you know, what their marketing engines can do, right, and when they when they get on something and they wanna go and talk to to their consumer about it. So, you know, that's my hope is is, you know, we lead the movement you know, as some of these, you know, true blue mission and purpose driven brands. And then we make enough noise that, you know, the bigger brands who maybe aren't as mission driven, but are opportunistic, see it, hear it, start pushing it out there. And then the whole supply chain just starts evolving and changing. And, and to me, that would be wonderful.

Jared Simon - 01:03:21
And and I think there is an opportunity to get to to 50% of the market one day. It's an aspiration that I share with with with you guys. And with many of the others who have been on the podcast.

Kyle Krull - 01:03:36
Yeah. We certainly hope so. And what you mentioned before, but, like, we're currently in this sort of, like, hardcore phase. There's this concept I heard a couple years ago that I really love and it's about you you put consumers into 3 different boxes. There are swimmers. We stay on the surface. There are snorkellers who dive a little bit deep. And then they're like scuba divers. So we're gonna wait even wanna understand, like, everything about the product. Right. And right now Yeah. Regina is sort of focusing on the divers. As it should.

Kyle Krull - 01:03:51
Those are people who are, like, you know, the early adopters and carrying the torch forward. But to your point, eventually, we can hopefully get enough steam where we can focus on those shallower consumers who are just, like, I know that this regenerative means something good, and I wanna buy it because of that inherent goodness that I feel either for myself or knowing that it doesn't look good for the planet. So Right. I think you're spot on there. And there was something else I was gonna say, but I completed the last potential thoughts. So I'll see if AC is anything else he wants to add.

Jared Simon - 01:04:23
Yeah. I'm I'm gonna throw

Anthony Corsaro - 01:04:24
in one more question here, Jared. That's really coming to mind given your, set of experiences, which is you know, we know a lot of those huge brands, those $1,000,000,000 brands per se will never have a fully certified regenerative product. Right? So how do we hold them accountable and prevent the greenwashing to get involved in a meaningful way where they're doing meaningful work and they can help us spread the awareness and tell the message, but, like, it is legit. Like, I'm curious about your set of experiences. How do you think about that?

Jared Simon - 01:04:53
Yeah. No. That that that is, you know, that that's $1,000,000 questions, you know, how do you avoid that greenwashing? You know, how do you avoid, you know, some of the, you know, the the regen light, you know, entering the marketplace and taking credit for it, but not really doing the activities that make the impact, you know, on on the planet and and on, you know, on the farm. You know, I I don't know what the perfect answer is there. I would say, you know, there's always gonna be, a level of of, you know, gatekeeper that the retailer plays that can kinda hold you know, the the manufacturer, keep the manufacturer on it, so to speak. So I think that becomes important and, and remains important. And I think by and large, what I've seen, you know, look, with with USD organic, no one's cheating USD organic, right, and and and you know, if we can get to a common set of certifications that, you know, you can't go in and claim your regen unless you're gonna be at these level of different certification levels. Maybe that safeguards that a little bit.

Jared Simon - 01:05:55
You know, just like it has on on organic, where you know, there is a a certification and, you know, it prevents that actors from being, you know, in the marketplace. So, yeah, I I I don't know. It's it's it's a tricky one. Because I'm sure there will and and, look, this is this is a conversation I've I've had with some peers too. Like, I've shown there's gonna be desires to go, you know, and do much bigger projects in Regen that are non organic in in the years to come. And and those can have huge, profound impacts, right?

Jared Simon - 01:06:23
So I think we should all have an openness to it, but I think there's also a balancing of, you know, how do you make sure, you know, in in, you know, reach end. That's not all the way to the current rock standard. You're getting, you know, what really makes the impact on the planet, on the people, you know, on the farm. You know, you don't lose it. So I think we're all gonna have to be super involved in this process and have these tough conversations and these debates and, you know, show up, you know, when when we're having, you know, the these these meetings.

Anthony Corsaro - 01:06:55
Yeah.

Kyle Krull - 01:06:55
Totally. Well, for the consumers, we're interested, check out manitobaharvest.com. You can learn all about the brand there and the degenerative efforts. Also, I would be remiss if we didn't give Trisha and Rebecca from your team Yes. Some of the golfing. Trisha is, like, so, like, wanted to contribute to the regen Coalition. Like, we really appreciate the enthusiasm. I was lucky enough to meet, Rebecca and a couple other members of the team at CHFA. Last week.

Kyle Krull - 01:07:14
So just just wanna give a shout out to, like, their level of enthusiasm for wanting to collaborate with other brands and move this initiative forward. Like, we love that. And and we're stoked to have managed overhauls in the fold to to push these initiatives forward because collaboration is really the key.

Jared Simon - 01:07:33
Yeah. You know, thank thank you for saying that I wanna personally thank my team because, you know, it does take a village. And if it weren't for, you know, the 100 plus Manitoba Harvest employees, you know, who really do care about sustainability and care about, you know, what hemp can do for the planet. You know, these initiatives you know, wouldn't happen. And, you know, I'll I'll say one last thing, you know, being a regen brand, it just fits in perfectly to everything we do and everything we're about. You know, we're certified B corp as well. So it was very easy for employees to understand what was going on with regenerative agriculture and wanna get behind it and want to have you know, a leadership position in the regenerative space. So Kyle, thank you for saying that and acknowledging a few folks on my team.

Jared Simon - 01:08:13
And, you know, thank you for for all the time that you're willing to end with us and and highlight, you know, what we're doing.

Anthony Corsaro - 01:08:24
Yeah. And I I so appreciate the way you showed up to answering all these questions because, like, we don't know the answers to any of them, but you gave us, like, real honest transparent, educated feedback. And, like, that's all we have right now. And I do think Our our movement is limited by the amount that we are all willing to show up in that capacity. And so we have to continue to do that, and we have to continue to do it lot more. And so just love the way you showed up, man, and thank you for spending the time with us.

Jared Simon - 01:08:52
Yeah. Thank you for the opportunity.

3 - 01:08:57
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