How a Niche Consulting Firm Pivoted from a Dying Market to US Expansion

What happens when your perfectly timed, booming consulting niche suddenly goes bust? Dr. Sherry Boodram and Dr. Lucas McCann, co-founders of the cannabis consulting firm CannDelta, join Michael to share their incredible journey of navigating a volatile industry. They launched their firm from a kitchen table during the “green rush” of Canadian cannabis legalization, quickly growing to a profitable, 20-person team with phones ringing off the hook. But when the market cooled and the inbound leads dried up, they were forced to make a bold choice: adapt or die.

Sherry and Lucas detail their strategic and risky pivot into the complex, state-by-state U.S. market. They reveal the multi-channel marketing machine they built from scratch to overcome the “buy local” bias – from a complete rebrand and “boots on the ground” presence to a sophisticated content and SEO strategy. Tune in now for a masterclass in resilience, strategic risk-taking, and building a thriving firm by knowing exactly when and how to pivot.

In this episode you will learn:

• Launching and scaling a firm in a brand-new, rapidly growing industry.

• Recognizing the early warning signs of a market downturn.

• The strategic pivot from a national market to a complex international one.

• Overcoming the “buy local” bias when expanding into a new country.

• Building a multi-channel client acquisition strategy from scratch.

• The high ROI of a “boots on the ground” and in-person event strategy.

• Combining SEO, content marketing, and strategic partnerships to generate leads.

• Why taking calculated financial risks is essential for long-term survival.

• Navigating complex, multi-layered regulatory and compliance challenges.

• The role of fitness and a resilient mindset in entrepreneurial success.

Welcome to the Consulting Success podcast. I’m your host Michael Zipursky, and in this podcast, we’re going to dive deep into the world of elite consultants where you’re going to learn the strategies, tactics and mindset to grow a highly profitable and successful consulting business.

Before we dive into today’s episode. Are you ready to grow and take your consulting business to the next level? Many of the clients that we work with started as podcast listeners just like you, and a consistent theme they have shared with us is that they wished they had reached out sooner about our Clarity Coaching Program rather than waiting for that perfect time. If you’re interested in learning more about how we help consultants just like you, we’re offering a free, no pressure growth session call. On this call, we’re going to dive deep into your goals, challenges and situation and outline a plan that is tailor made just for you. We will also help you identify where you may be making costly and time consuming mistakes to ensure you’re benefiting from the proven methods and strategies to grow your consulting business. 

So don’t wait years to find clarity. If you’re committed and serious about reaching a new level of success in your consulting business, go ahead and schedule your free growth session. Get in touch today. Just visit Consulting Success – Grow to book your free call today.

Dr. Sherry Boodram is the CEO & Co-Founder of CannDelta, a leading cannabis and psychedelics consulting firm. As a former federal government cannabis regulator, she provides expert guidance on licensing, compliance, and operations. Her deep industry knowledge helps clients launch and maintain successful businesses across the US, Canada, and international markets. Sherry holds a Ph.D. in Chemistry and is a recognized thought leader, regularly speaking at conferences and engaging with the media.

Dr. Lucas McCann is the Co-Founder and Chief Scientific officer at CannDelta. A medicinal chemist and former federal regulator, he provides expert scientific and business strategy for the cannabis industry. He has successfully helped launch over 300 licensed businesses in the U.S., Canada, and overseas by guiding clients through complex regulatory frameworks, licensing, and commercialization. He is a recognized public speaker and has published multiple peer-reviewed articles.

Connect with Dr. Sherry Boodram
Connect with Dr. Lucas McCann
Discover more about CannDelta

Alright Sherry and Lucas, welcome.

Thank you for having us. Thanks for the opportunity.

Yeah, I’m really excited to have you guys both here. I’ve enjoyed getting to know both of you in some of the work that we’ve been doing inside the Clarity Coaching program. But I’m really excited to have you share more about your story today and how you’ve built this business and some of the lessons that you learned along the way. So you both decided, “We’re going to get into the cannabis licensing business.” So now you are a cannabis licensing consulting firm. Can you just explain what that means? And I think it’s also important to put some context around this that, Canada, parts of the US, right, cannabis is legal, whereas in certain parts of the world it is not legal. So it’d be interesting if you could just kind of frame up what cannabis licensing consulting actually mean? What do you do for people?

Right, so just to, I guess, step back and talk a little bit about the framework in Canada. So Canada has had, you know, various iterations of regulations over time to allow people to use cannabis specifically for medical purposes and very limited case-by-case occurrences. And the government used to be the one that was providing cannabis to these patients. They would grow cannabis in very discreet locations, and then they would be the provider. Eventually that mind shift has shifted from the government, and they said, “Okay, let’s outsource this and make it more accessible and create a commercial industry.” So they did do that in 2013 and created a medical cannabis framework that was based on, you know, a commercialized industry where you could have license holders, so companies that are licensed to manufacture cannabis. There are activities that they’re allowed to do at those facilities have evolved over time. It was really first just like cultivating and then eventually they were able to make oils, and then eventually has evolved to what it is now where you see a variety of products on the market, but it was largely medical.

And then in 2018, the government, the Trudeau government decided to legalize, and then we- there was a revision to, or a new enactment of regulations that came out, and it’s the Cannabis Act and the Cannabis Regulations that allow individuals and companies to participate in the industry, so on a recreational front. So we still do have a medical framework in Canada, but we also have a recreational. And then these are the stores that you see out front, you know, in different cities that have a, like, a standalone retail store, like an actual retail store where you could go in and buy product. So that’s the retail chain.

So in 2018, when- it just so happened, that’s really around the time that this all kind of came together, and it was very serendipitous, I would say. Because, I had just, I got to a point in my career when I was working for the private pharmaceutical company that I was, you know, sort of, like, looking for other things. And this opportunity came and I was doing it really on the side on the weekends and just kind of saying, “Okay, well, I could help you with this. I know, let’s get a retainer in place and just started kind of formalizing something.” And because there are a lot of legalities to what I was doing, it’s in a regulated market, I really wanted to make sure that what I was doing was structured properly. So, I did get insurance. I did want to register a company name, like, right from the get-go, you know, because I didn’t want to have any liability associated with any of that. So I was very proactive in that sense right from the start.

Did you have interesting conversations with, like, family members or friends when they said, “Hey, like, what are you doing? I haven’t seen you in a while,” or, “What are you up to?” And it’s like, “Yeah, we’re running a cannabis consultant company.” Did that- like, how did that kind of happen?

I think, well, like, I would say my family, I feel like they never really know what I’m doing. No one else in my family’s in science, so they just know that I do a lot of things and, you know, maybe I’m smart. So they just kind of trust what I’m doing. But, no, and I don’t really come- I don’t come from a family of entrepreneurs, so to them, they were like, “Okay, like, this is interesting and new, and go and do it. I wish you luck,” kind of thing, right?

I was going to say. So today you’re helping companies, whether they’re looking to cultivate cannabis or they’re looking to sell cannabis or some other product to license.

[04:28] – Navigating Licensing, Compliance & Investor Expectations

Yeah. So there’s a variety of activities that are permitted under the Cannabis Act and Regulations, which is that you could cultivate, you could process or manufacture, which can be anything from just packaging dried flower or, you know, processing it further to make extracts or make edibles or topicals. And so that’s kind of where, you know, my support kind of comes in, where I can help them complete the application that Health Canada requires. So it is regulatory. So there is an extensive application package that needs to be put together, and it doesn’t only include a description of the activities, it’s also the facility itself. Because in Canada, in order to get the license, you actually have to commit to building out an entire facility, and submitting evidence of the facility itself to make sure that it meets the security requirements, that is built to a quality standard that makes sure that ensures that the quality itself is safe and there’s integrity to the product, so it’s going to be safe for human consumption. And a lot of thought goes into that and know-how. And if you’re not familiar with what’s acceptable and what the regulation speaks to and how to translate that into practice, it could be quite complex.

Makes sense. Lucas, you wanted to add something, I think.

Yeah, just to build on it. I think one of the reasons why we were able to fill up part of the market where there was really just a gap was there was a huge need there. And there was a huge need there because the process was extremely mysterious for people. It was extremely dark and there wasn’t a very clear delineated process. So our regulator in Canada, Health Canada, they are, they like to be very mysterious in the cannabis program. They don’t ever use their name. They would just use a general signature, and they would ask you to email, basically an inbox that was very poorly monitored that you would probably never get a response from.

So the process in Canada, when Sherry and I started doing this, was people would have to wait approximately two years to get a response on an application. So you can imagine when you have investors who have put millions of dollars into your company, you’re filling out an application, it’s going into a pile, and you’re trying to explain to your investors that this is different than anything else you’ve worked in. You’ve given me all your money, and I need to hold onto this money, but we’re not going to get a response for potentially years after submitting an application.

We would come in because we would be able to have some connections at Health Canada, we knew these people because they were our friends, they were our colleagues that we worked with, but we also understood what this process would look like. So I think we were doing a little bit of not just the application running, but a lot of the counseling that comes along with being an advisor or a business coach and telling people like, “No, no, this is normal. Trust the process, it’s going to work right.” Especially if they’re investing somewhere between 5 to 15 million dollars in building out their facility entirely, the last thing you want to hear is that it didn’t pass the zoning check that you had to do with the municipality and their location would not be compliant.

You’re acting like the advisor, the sherpa, guiding these clients and organizations. Let’s fast forward them to today so people have an understanding of what the business looks like in terms of, you know, number of clients you guys work with per year, number of team members, employees, just like anything you can share to give people a sense of what the company looks like today in terms of the size.

[07:39] – Scaling From Startup to Established Consulting Business

So yeah, in 2018, this company started at a kitchen table. It very quickly grew into something where we’re like, in a couple of months we’re like, you know, let’s go to a coworking space. We worked in a coworking space for a couple of months. I quit my job selling digital textbooks pretty much right away. And every few months we were moving into a different larger office in the coworking space. So it was like one employee, and then it was two employees, and then it was five employees. And then we’ve, we’ve kind of been around the 10 to 20 employees I think for the last couple of years. And, around the time when the world changed forever, we had acquired our own space because we were getting a lot of in-person meetings. So the company has changed a lot. It’s grown relatively consistently for the first few years into the size that it’s approximately at now. But our offerings have changed substantially.

We’re going to talk about that. What would you say were some of the biggest challenges that, you know, both of you faced, the company faced in the early days of building the business? Like just take me back to 2018-19. I mean we talk about 2020. Of course we had COVID, so that, that I’m sure posed a series of challenges. But aside from COVID, what were some of the initial challenges or growing pains that you encountered?

COVID wasn’t a challenge. We did really well during COVID, funny enough, because it was around the same time that cannabis was getting the green light, and it continued to get the green light until it was declared an essential service.

Where the challenge happened for us was that- it was a couple things. One, we actually grew. We were extremely profitable, like right away, right out of the gate. Our first year we made a little bit of money. Our second year we made a lot of money. And then our third year, we made, like, a really good amount of money as a company. After that, the market shifted.

So we were under the impression that, like, we are a company that’s not going to be able to scale fast enough, right? We were just like, “Let’s- we need to hire more people. We need more people and more. More seats. More people in more seats.” And it was when the market shifted that we realized, “Okay, hang on a second. You know, this is part of a boom. This is in a bubble. The bubble’s burst,” and now, you know, stuff kind of gets real after you realize that.

Yeah. And I would like to add to what Lucas said. One of the, one of the advantages we had, and, like, unlike a lot of other companies, when they start and they have to build up their credibility and their brand and everything, for us, it was very quick because when I left the government, it was very rare and unusual because many people do not leave the government ever. So when people heard that I had left the government, it like, spread like wildfire, and we got a lot of business out of that. We got a lot of recognition. There are a lot of events in cannabis, so we got speaking engagements, like, right away, we got media engagements. I was speaking on BNN Bloomberg for a very notable cannabis scandal that had happened for one of the companies, and I was on there, like, five times, so- and this is way before now, where I feel like there’s a lot of, you know, webinars and social media presence. There was, but it wasn’t as how it is now. So that really added to our reputation, our credibility, and, you know, we were able to leverage that.

But I guess, yeah, so, like, where Lucas is speaking to now, where things have turned, where we really faced our challenges, was really after COVID and the markets in Canada had cooled a bit, or I would say, a lot in cannabis. And we kind of, because we’re consultants, it kind of had a, it was kind of like a ripple effect for us. We don’t really feel the impact right away. You know, the companies at the top kind of start to struggle with money, and then eventually it kind of goes down the chain where they’re just like, “You know, now we need to cut consultants,” right? So we don’t necessarily feel it right away. So it was a little bit delayed when we got the impact of it.

How do you navigate that? Because, I mean, that’s a very common thing, right. In any kind of new industry, a lot of money goes in, and then all of a sudden, like, anyone thinks, “Oh, I can be successful.” And then the reality sets in that there’s probably going to be some players that don’t survive for one reason or another. There’s consolidation in the market. So when that, when the market shifted, how did you respond to that? What did that actually mean for you?

[11:41] – Adapting Through Service Expansion & Geographic Growth

A few things. Of course it always impacts the bottom line, you know, we start to look at our finances like how can we make cuts to our expenses. It always goes back to, you know, staffing unfortunately as well. But, we wanted to avoid that. We had a lot of great staff and we knew that there was a lot of value with them and that’s, you know, we were trying to avoid that. So we had thoughts of expanding our service offerings, right? What else can we offer to our clients to maybe make things add more value to them? So it’s not necessarily like they’re looking at the dollar and cents, the cost, but it’s like how can we help you get out of whatever, you know, rut that you’re in to help your business so that you could generate more money and then we all make more money, right? And kind of phrasing it that way so more of a long-term support that we could provide for them, coaching, helping them like go-to-market strategies, things like that for their products.

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So instead of hunkering down and just putting your head in the sand or just making big cuts, you look for ways of adding even more value to the market and to your clients as a way to almost grow out of the problem instead of just cutting. I’m sure you made some cuts, it sounds like, but you were also thinking about growth and more value.

We had, yeah, we had to go through a downsizing event, which I think was very, very difficult. It was very much a reality check to go, okay, we can’t sort of expand infinitely doing the same thing that we’re doing. We need to make a few changes, right? So we looked at expanding our offerings and talking to people like, what problems are you trying to solve? Unfortunately, the answer didn’t lie, you know, with our current clients, the answer was elsewhere. So we really had to look at expanding our geographical reach and working in other markets.

Right. We’re going to talk about that in just a couple minutes here. When you look back, just, you know, the benefit of hindsight, what’s one thing that either one of you wishes that you would have known earlier that maybe would have helped you to avoid, you know, a big setback or would have maybe helped you to accelerate success, you know, even faster than it did?

In retrospect, I would probably would have been better at looking for some of the earlier signals in like a new business in a new industry. I think the signals were definitely there. And, I saw them in some of our CRM reports. And I was looking at number of opportunities being created every month. And, the value of the opportunities was starting to decrease as well. Like there, there were signs there, and I thought, you know, maybe this is just a seasonality thing.

The other piece was, I think, trying to grow too fast too quick, thinking that this was going to be, at least a wave that was going to last probably a couple more years than it ultimately ended up doing. So those two things were the things that I wish that I had-

And Lucas, on that first one, do you, do you remember how, how long before kind of, you know, the impact really happened that you started to notice that, oh, the number of opportunities or the value of the opportunities is trending downwards? Was that like a month before or six months before, three months? What did that timeline look like?

If I recall correctly, I mean, we were in a year where we were profitable, but we started to see some of these signals. I think it probably looked like about six to eight months.

Okay, good. Good for people to know, to pay attention to that. I mean, that’s one thing I always try and pull out of these conversations on the podcast, as you guys know that, lessons that you learn can benefit others. So I appreciate the specifics there. And then, Sherry, I don’t know if this is a question for you or for Lucas, but you just touched on a moment ago, both of you, that you did make a geographic expansion, so you started the business in Canada, but then, and today you are quite heavily in the US market. Can you talk a little bit about, number one, why do you go to the US market? I mean, is it just that it’s a much larger market than the Canadian market? I mean, we understand ourselves, so is it that? And also the other question is any complexities that you ran into? I think in the day, kind of an age that we’re in, people are very used to working with clients potentially, you know, in different countries or halfway across the world, but the way that you guys operate in, for example, the US may be a little bit different. I mean, you spend a fair bit of time- so can you just talk about any complexities or any major challenges that you had to kind of go through and why you spend so much time in the US?

[17:32] – Entering U.S. State Markets & Strategic Partnerships

Yeah, well, ultimately, we did make the decision to change or add a geographic location to, you know, our offering, really, because, yes, we were working in Canada, but ultimately it really was drying up, like, we couldn’t justify staying in the market. And very similar to what happened in Canada, where there was a legalization event that was happening across the US at the same time. So you’re seeing New York open, New Jersey open, Minnesota, Maryland. So our business, because we’re primarily focused on licensing, and then like later on, there’s the post-licensing support with compliance. But the real, initial event is the licensing piece. That’s kind of where we had to go and, and start following that train, you know, through the US. In the US, they are not federally legal. So federally, you can’t cross state lines with cannabis. But each state has the ability to make the decision if they want to legalize cannabis or not. So there are quite a good number of states now that have legalized, and we’ve seen a real uptick over the past three years in that.

So we started initially in New Jersey and that was hard for us on the operational side because, one, we’re very risk adverse. Like we, we almost intentionally hire that- we work in compliance and everyone is very risk adverse, I would say, and kind of like mentally analyzes the risk. We’re like, “Okay, we’re going to have to go to New Jersey. We’re not from there. It’s a totally different country. They’re very litigious in the US. And, we have to become familiar with a whole new set of regulations and we don’t have boots on the ground there.” So that was kind of hard for us mentally to feel comfortable with.

Why did you push forward? I mean, for a lot of people, when they would weigh those kind of risks, and especially for those that tend to be a bit more conservative, they might take some pause and go, “No, let’s just really focus on expanding in the Canadian market or let’s look at, you know, some other market.” Given that you tend to be a little bit more conservative or risk averse to a degree, as you said, or really analyze things and think about important things like compliance, why did you guys decide, “Yes, let’s actually go for this”? And you really have gone for it.

Yeah, but I think that we also thought very logically about strategies to help protect ourselves. So we aligned ourselves with people like lawyers and law firms, right? Because in the US- in Canada, there are a lot of consulting companies that are non-lawyers that help with the applications. There are some lawyers, yes, but I would say the majority are non-legal firms like ourselves. But in the US there are a lot of law firms that work on cannabis applications and just support that. That’s just the way that they’re set up. I don’t necessarily- my personal opinion is that lawyers are not the best position to do that. They’ve never really even been in a facility and they don’t have a quality background. So there’s some limitations there. But they definitely know the legislation well. So they have that.

So that was sort of like, I guess our tipping point because we would go and attend a few of these events, we would strike up these conversations with folks who work at law firms. And we’re kind of in a sort of a similar space. There’s a little bit of like a Venn diagram overlap area there. And that’s how our break into those markets began, was it was through the protection of working with a partner partnership under a law firm.

And to add to that, we also have the advantage of working in an existing cannabis market, and a lot of people can’t say that, right? A lot of the lawyers, they’re confined to the state that they’re in. That’s where they’re barred and that’s really where they could operate. And if that state has never had a legal framework before, they don’t really even know what they’re looking for. So, we also have that advantage.

And like, we always- like our value, really like our, our mission is really to help individuals set up their business. Like that’s what we’re passionate about. We’re passionate about helping entrepreneurs run their business in a legal compliant way and to be successful. Like we’re entrepreneurs ourselves and where we come from, you know, academic background, we love teaching and we love educating people and it just like works really well. So we’re like, we can help these people, you know, to the best of our ability.

You definitely bring a very unique background and kind of set of experiences and expertise because of the work that you did, in science, in government, your education, and both understanding, right, the Canadian market and then after that the US market. How important was it for you to align with other law firms or lawyers in the US, kind of entering that market? Because oftentimes people wonder, or I should say, maybe they don’t take advantage enough of the opportunities to strategically align themselves with others in the ecosystem that could be complementary to them. But when you put those two skill sets together, right, it creates an advantage. That’s kind of what you guys have done. Can you just talk a little bit about the way you feel that has allowed you to do or kind of position you maybe differently than others and what’s the impact of that?

I think it was relatively short lived. You know, once we started working with the law firms, we realized, you know, sort of what this was like. We got used to the situation, the conversations, and even the clientele are extremely different, geographically speaking, with who we’re normally dealing with. So the attitudes, the personalities might have been a little bit bigger and a little bit more adversarial in, in some cases, but once we sort of had our feet wet, we were able to offer the same kind of thing, but without having to rely on a partner. I do feel the lawyer saw this as an opportunity to have someone act as an application millwriter and, just sort of pump these things out. We got the first one done. We got the confidence and then we just started, you know, rinsing and repeating after that, but without having someone sort of take a maybe a bigger cut than what they’re entitled to.

Yeah, I think it’s important to explore potential partnerships and see how you could strategically align, but ultimately, you know, if that doesn’t work for you, then don’t go ahead with it. But I think that it’s important just to go through the exercise. And so how are clients finding you today? Can you just kind of walk everyone through? I mean, I know we’ve had some conversations about this and what you guys are doing, which is quite a few different things, but just if you were to maybe rank like the top three ways of how you are generating business or building your pipeline, what would you say those kind of top three are?

[23:48] – Rebranding, SEO, and Building U.S. Presence

So we, we didn’t do any marketing when we first started the company. Like literally our phone just used to ring. We had a couple engagements that we would do with some groups who would go live on Twitter or X and do webinars, but it was through website and it was through people picking up the phone and calling us.

One day when the phone stopped ringing, we had to move into the US. We completely had to revamp our strategy. Moving into the US, all the work we had done sort of marketing and creating a name for ourself in the Canadian market, none of that actually translated into this new market. People want to buy local. They want to know that there’s a throat that they can throttle if things don’t go well. So to be able to present ourselves in the US, we really had to create this persona that we were a US-focused, US-fronted entity. So, our strategy there was to get offices in the US that were satellite, so at least some had like some kind of boots on the ground- place where we could conduct meetings, right? So we did that.

Then from there, we were able to completely sort of rebrand and market our website. We had a tagline underneath our logo that was, you know, “Canadian Regulatory and Scientific Cannabis Consulting.” Marketing that into New Jersey wasn’t going to work. So we had to scratch that off. We tried “Global” for a while, but then we really wanted to sort of play into, I think, a lot of the nationalistic tendencies that a lot of folks in the US kind of experience. So we’re like, “Okay, well, we’re ‘America’s number one cannabis licensing company.’” That tagline was available. So we threw that underneath and changed our coloring to look a lot more like the, you know, the New York Knicks or the Islanders sort of color scheme. So it was, I would say, very familiar in that sense.

Now, it’s come back to being web inbound and phone callers. But when we speak to people, a lot of them are saying, “We’re seeing a lot of the content that you’re putting out on YouTube. We’re seeing a lot of the webinars that you’re presenting through maybe through association with your partners.” So the channels have kind of come back. And then the third one is the presence of trade shows. So going out to trade shows where entrepreneurs will go, prospective license holders or existing license holders will be at, we’ll put ourselves in front. So people don’t know to look for us. They have to find us. We have to put ourselves in front of them, either through web content or by being there physically at a show.

So I’m hearing you say webinars, you know, videos on YouTube, and then also boots on the ground, actually going to trade shows, conferences, events to meet people directly. Is that correct? Those three.

And websites, yeah.

Yeah, websites. We can’t forget the SEO piece. That was extremely important. And we, we’re very lucky to find someone, bring them into our marketing team, which kind of leads into the next part of the story, who was amazing at it. And we had to be number one on every search that had the word cannabis in it. And a statement.

Is that still true for you today? I mean, I know a lot of people have seen that landscape shift with the rise of AI and the organic rankings that they used to have, you know, are no longer. They might still have them, but the, let’s say, amount of people that are just searching compared to those maybe hopping right onto AI to do some searches, has that impacted your business?

So obviously we have to rank our, you know, optimize our SEO, so we rank really high. But what that translates to is that when you’re searching in an AI GPT, that we come up as one of the sources, right? And that’s very often- if you search cannabis, a question about cannabis, and you, you know, you have all the information there, we show up as a source.

It’ll source you. Right, okay, got it. I want to just kind of like dive a little bit deeper into the whole boots on the ground thing. Because I know, Lucas, you especially spend a lot of time traveling. I mean, it’s like, I think you just mentioned a couple of times, two weeks out of every month, or like, you spent a lot of time, right, going to different trade shows and events. That’s something that I know you said early on, like in a previous life, right, or previous kind of role you really enjoy doing that. Many people that I’ve talked to who have had careers like that, they get to a point in their life where it’s like, that’s just, it’s so hard to do. They’re so tired of it, they don’t want to live out of a suitcase anymore. So I’d love to hear how do you, first of all, feel about it? Or what maybe allows you to continue to enjoy it? But the other part of my question is how beneficial do you think that is, given that so much of what everyone is doing these days is focused on digital, it’s online? But I’ve heard from you and others, I think, you know, we had a call about this in our group not too long ago where one of the other successful consulting business founders mentioned that, you know – actually a couple, another, another person, so one lady and one guy – were both saying that they spend now, you know, quite a bit of time meeting people in person and how they found it to be very beneficial. So I’d love to just kind of hear your logic or your experience of really prioritizing meeting people in person as opposed to only doing online and kind of how that’s all come together for you.

[28:32] – Importance of In-Person Networking & Local Trust

That’s deeply rooted in, I think, a lot of our core philosophies and fundamental values that we have here at the company. So we still have a flagship office in downtown Toronto. We are professionally dressed in the office Monday to Friday, nine to five. And I think that sort of stems from this piece. And I feel that, like, a lot of the folks that we’re competing with probably also have similar values in terms of, you know, lawyers, you know, will take- they have a physical office, they’ll take client meetings in person, and they’re local. So we had to present ourselves that way. And to be able to do it that way, we have to be present at a lot of these events.

I find specifically in New York, people want the option to be able to see that you’re there. They want a physical presence there. When we were sort of starting off, you know, before, you know, we have the you know, the apartment in New York and the office in New York, you know, what I used to do is I would take the 6am flight out of Billy Bishop from downtown Toronto, head to our New York office, get there around 10, 11 o’clock in the morning. I would have one meeting in that particular day, or maybe I’d be picking up a check or collecting a signature on the document and then bringing it back. And oftentimes as this would happen, sometimes people would even call me up in the morning, be like, you know, what can we just do Zoom instead? It’s this mentality of like, “You are there and you’re in New York, so I’m okay doing business with you.” That if I said I was in Colorado, California, they would say, “You know, you don’t get this market. You’re not a part, you’re not a stakeholder here. You’re not a resident here or a citizen of this, this market in this part of the industry.” So, you know, there’s, there’s a huge mental thing, I think, about buying local that is really important. And people want to have that business card. They want to see you at the trade show. And it really comes down to number of impressions. When I speak about impressions, I’m talking about number of times they see you at these events and these gatherings.

Right. That makes sense. Looking back, kind of at the business to this point, is there something that you feel has really helped your business more than anything else? I mean, maybe it’s what you’re referring to right now in terms of just that proximity and meeting people in person. I wonder, Sherry, is there something else that you feel like, yeah, doing, making this decision, making this higher, taking this action has benefited us so significantly?

It’s honestly the culmination of everything that we’ve been discussing.

Okay.

It really is. No, it really is. Yeah. I mean, everything that Lucas says is true. I think that’s critical to be flexible enough to, you know, change the way that you do things to cater to your clientele. And if that means that, you know, they want more in person, then you got to think about, like, does it make sense for me to have an actual office? Like, maybe the return on investment will be worth it, right?

So, I mean, I find that comment interesting because. And I know Lucas, you mentioned this as well, but a lot of people, when they would look at that, you know, that opportunity or just kind of consider, does it make sense for me to never mind opening up an office in a different, you know, city. I mean, you’re opening a different country. But beyond that, a lot of people would just look at even the idea of getting on a flight, booking a hotel, going to meet somebody, you know, somewhere else, and they look and it’s like, oh, the cost of doing that, it’s not worth it. But here you are. I mean, you guys have really made significant investments into establishing that presence and establishing yourself. How did you, like, did you run the ROI on that? Did you do some calculating? How do you think about will it be worth it or not? Can you just kind of talk through that process? Because I think it might be helpful for others to see.

[32:06] – Risks, ROI, and Winning in Competitive U.S. Markets

So this is a multi-component question, very, very loaded here. So we were very aware that the overregulation and the overtaxation, the Canadian industry was going to be the detriment of the industry. We still have a number of clients that are great, that we love working with, who are, you know, based in the Canadian market and will continue to work with us. But that has, you know, been decimated.

The decision to move to the US was very much based on, you know, one population. You know, between New York, New Jersey and Connecticut, we have the population of Canada just in that tristate area, which is excellent for us. All of them are experiencing a legalization event around the same time. But to be able to put ourselves at the top of the crowd, we just had to position ourselves in sort of a marketing standpoint as the number one choice to be able to do this and to be present. And you know, it definitely is a risk, right? There wasn’t anyone on, on the other side saying, you know, “If you do this, you know, build it, they will come.” This was like, “I’m going to work harder, I’m going to fly in more flights, I’m going to go and take more meetings than anybody else who’s doing this. And I will win as a result of that because, you know, I believe in the company, I believe in what Sherry and I are doing in terms of like, you know, the value that we provide to people. I really believe in that. And I’m also going to work harder than anyone else who’s going to try it. So there’s no way I could lose.

So we’’ve looked at the ROI. Now, if we look at our client portfolio, we have more clients that are US-based than we do Canadian by a good margin. And most of those US clients are based in New York. And you know, we’re just seeing the tip of the inflection point for New York’s going, you know, it’s definitely been riddled with a lot of problems and a lot of regulatory issues. You know, they recently just told, you know, 100 operators who are already open and operating that they need to move their store once they renew their license, which is like, crazy. It, it rings back to what they did with the taxi medallions, I think, like 10, 15 years ago, where people were buying these medallions on some kind of like, black market, and then, they would find that Uber was coming in and then all these medallions were basically worthless and people were like, you know, actually committing suicide. Similar things are happening in the New York market because it’s a very wild market. You know, they say, “If you can make it in New York, you can make it anywhere.” And that was sort of the mantra that we had developed here in the company is like, if we can establish ourselves in one of the toughest states to be able to establish a business or a company, then we can take that model and, and leapfrog into any other market as we follow this fire of legalization.

Which is essentially what we’ve done. So, yeah, we’ve taken what we’ve learned in New York and New Jersey and have carried that through to other markets. Obviously, we’ve made some, some tweaks to that and have optimized it accordingly for the markets that we’re in. But, you know, essentially we’ve gained the confidence and the know-how really to navigate the US market.

But it was risky, Michael. I mean, hey, like, there was a while there where we were losing- there was one year where we lost hundreds of thousands of dollars on the books. You know, we thought if we don’t commit to a movement now, you know, we might as well pack it in and, and, and give up. And we just, like, we’ve got such a beautiful thing that’s built here, you know, we got to try and, you know, preserve it and to save it. And we did that, I think, largely through our own internal marketing game, you know, through our presence game. But that also turned into sort of the next thing that, you know, allowed us to be able to survive and, to put forward, which is offering sort of a new service.

And we’ve, we’ve worked so hard on our marketing. We really pride ourselves in the marketing that we put forward to the universe. And, so much so that we now offer this service to clients as well. So we help them with their marketing and apply a lot of the strategies.

It’s important to highlight that because, what you have done is you can kind of consistently put your ear to the ground to identify what your current clients and the market wants beyond what you’ve been providing only to the current time. And that’s led you to launch new products, new services, new ways of creating value for the market and your clients, which is something that, you know, is not always easy to do. People sometimes come with new ideas but they don’t, those ideas don’t go anywhere or they’re too hesitant to try and come with new ideas because they, you know, they fear change. But you’ve both been able to, you know, to do that well and to continue growing the business. So that’s fantastic. One thing that just also stands out to me is that you know, you both are really fit. You come across as being confident. It feels like sports or activity is part of your life. And I just, I wonder how much of a role for each of each of you is- Does kind of exercise or, you know, well-being or fitness play into your life, into your success and kind of mindset?

[36:41] – Fitness, Mindset, and Entrepreneurial Resilience

Well, we were both overachievers and I think many people with overachieving A-type personalities do have the character trait of a lot of self-competition. So exercise fitness is usually a part of it. There are a lot of runners who are entrepreneurs, who are CEOs and things like that. So, yeah, I think that for myself that it really helps me de-stress and because I am like more of a high-strung personality, you know, I work really hard, have a lot on the go all the time and I think that really helps me with my own wellness, helps me decompress and, you know, gives some time back to myself.

And I do like the competition aspect of it. So I have run a lot of races. I’ve run half marathons, marathons, competed in HYROX competitions with Lucas very recently and then we’re signed up for another one in Boston. We did the HYROX in New York, end of May, and then we have HYROX Boston, end of September. It’s a fitness-

Why don’t you join us, Michael?

What kind of competition is that?

Get that signup bonus. So it’s a race, it’s a mixture of like high-intensity interval training. So you have things like a rower, a sled push, a sled pull, a farmer’s carry. But in between each of the exercises you have to run a kilometer. So you know, you run a kilometer, you do an exercise, and mind you like, I’ve got like the Apple Watch, I said it the last time I did it, and I didn’t probably train as well as I should have for the first time. But I was basically in the red line the entire hour, hour and 15 minutes that we ran the race. So it’s probably the hardest thing I’ve ever done, but certainly a fun way to, to be distracted. So. Yeah, fitness-

I’m sure you feel you feel great afterwards.

No, you don’t. You feel-

No, no, I mean, you feel great you’ve done it. Your body thought you feel very.

A long, a long time afterwards. Yeah. You’re like, oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Which is funny because I think that’s, you know, what a lot of people sort of, when they reminisce about, you know, their, their experience with drugs, you know, they don’t remember if it was more fun actually doing the drugs or just reminiscing about the times they did them. Yeah, but, you know, as you’re going through the event, the race, you’re like, “Man, this is the worst thing I’ve ever done. This is not what I want to be doing.”

I’ve done a marathon, so that’s the worst thing I’ve ever done. Maybe if I ever do a triathlon, that might be the worst.

Yeah. The first time I experienced the runner’s high, where I’m, you know, my legs are in pain, my knees feel like I should just be giving up and maybe I should stop and, you know, walk the rest of the way back. And then you, you just keep going, and you get to a place where, like, the pain dissipates, and all of a sudden you’re not feeling it. You just can kind of keep going. When I had that breakthrough, I was like, “Wow, this is the power of, you know, the mind in comparison to the body.” So the body can actually be so much stronger than the- I mean, the mind is obviously strong, but your body will send you these signals. But it can actually do so much more than you might think it can do if you allow it to.

And I think there’s a direct connection because I’m the same as you guys. I’m, you know, at the gym often and running and being active, and I just think that that is so important to not only take care of your body and your health, but if you want to be successful in business, you have to be able to play the game. And the only way to play the game is to stay healthy because the moment that your health is gone, right, it’s really hard to even show up. All right, well, thank you guys both for coming on and sharing this bit of your story. I know we kind of just scratch the surface. There’s so much more to uncover here. Where should people go to learn more about everything that you and CannDelta have going on?

[40:04] – Where to Connect With CannDelta

Yeah, they can definitely check out our website, CannDelta.com. Feel free to take a, you know, look at there. We’ve got great presence on LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/company/canndelta/ as well, definitely on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCuRbVyHGUqF-_HyORGziZhw. So if you put CannDelta into YouTube, you’ll get a ton of videos about everything you need to know about every single framework. And, you know, if I could recommend anything to anyone who’s looking to start a business in like, the consulting space, is really put content out there so that people can find you and you say something that’s of value, you know, they’ll probably send you a message. So if you like it, send us a note.

We’re on all social platforms, so: Instagram https://www.instagram.com/canndelta/?hl=en X https://x.com/CannDelta, Facebook https://www.facebook.com/canndelta/.

All right, we’ll link all that up on consulting success.com. Thank you again both for coming on.

My pleasure. You know, we’ve been a long time listener and, you know, being on the show has definitely been a big goal of ours. So it’s a monumental occasion for us. So thanks for having us, Michael.

Yeah, I appreciate it.

Important Links:

Dr. Sherry Boodram
Dr. Lucas McCann
CannDelta
CannDelta on YouTube
CannDelta on LinkedIn
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