The cannabis retail environment is unique: Packages are often behind a counter or inside a display case. Customers can’t handle the product like in a typical grocery or drug store. So the branding function of a cannabis product’s packaging must sing!

In this video interview, cannabis industry expert Elizabeth “CannaBeth” Corbett, Vice President of Sales at AE Global, orchestrates a playlist of ideas and solutions, including:

• How to differentiate cannabis brands through packaging;
• How to manage late-stage, regulatory-driven packaging updates;
• How to use packaging to earn shelf space in dispensaries;
• What’s new with child-resistant packaging designs for cannabis products.

This video was initially produced and presented as exclusive content for the IME West Smart Event. This digital component was in conjunction with the in-person WestPack show, which took place April 12-14, 2022, in Anaheim, CA. WestPack is one of five co-located shows that make up the IME West advanced manufacturing expo and conference.

TRANSCRIPTION IS AUTO GENERATED

Lisa McTigue Pierce
Hello, everybody. Lisa Pierce here, Executive Editor of Packaging Digest. Welcome to our session Cannabis Branding: How Packaging Wins Higher Sales. Today I have the pleasure of talking with cannabis expert Elizabeth Corbett, Vice President of sales with AE Global. The company is a cannabis packaging provider with end-to-end solutions, including an in-house packaging design lab. Beth has more than 20 years of experience in the packaging industry and about eight years of involvement now on the cannabis side.

Related:Smart Event Explores Hot Packaging Topics and Technologies

Beth, hi. Thanks for joining us.

Elizabeth Corbett (guest)
Thank you. Nice to be here.

Lisa McTigue Pierce
Wonderful. Cannabis manufacturers, as we know, have had several packaging challenges these days, also known as opportunities. So let’s walk through a couple of these to explain what the situation is and offer some solutions or recommendations where we can.

Do cannabis companies, Beth, understand the value of packaging design on their business? Is a top of mind for them?

Elizabeth Corbett (guest)
Just like any other industry, I would say some, yes, some, no. I think it depends. I think that in markets where it’s more challenging — and more mature markets such as a California, Oregon, Washington, Colorado, even Nevada — in those markets that are more mature, behaves more like a typical retail consumer product environment. Absolutely. And your packaging really talks to your brand and your audience.

And in some markets where it will be interesting to see in places like, let’s say New Jersey or New York when they first come out and or even Illinois when it first came on, is that in those markets it’s all about … there isn’t enough cannabis to service the market when they go legal. So in that case, somebody might go to the dispensary and they literally will take whatever they can get.

Yet so in that market, I think it’s something that you see evolve.

Lisa McTigue Pierce
OK, wonderful. And I would imagine it also depends, too, on whether it’s for recreational or medicinal. Is that what you’re seeing? You said that you saw it in more on the retail side of things, correct?

Elizabeth Corbett (guest)
Right. So in those states where it’s medical only, it tends to look like medicine. So and has very stringent requirements. So for example, in the state of Florida, you’re really limited in terms of what you can put on the package, primary or secondary. And all primary packaging has to be white — definitely has a very medical feel. Same with states like Pennsylvania and Ohio. And folks try to incorporate their brand. You definitely want to differentiate your product. What's interesting, all three of those states have a very large and healthy medical market, but yes, lots of limitations.

Lisa McTigue Pierce
OK. Well, when they are able to, how are the cannabis manufacturers differentiating their brands through packaging?

Elizabeth Corbett (guest)
There’s lots of different options. It really depends. In some cases you see folks coming up with really creative structures, so everything from … And I think it brands like Dosist in California who have come up with a very elegant premium experience that definitely stands out on shelf. Same thing can be done with it in one, you know, in terms of how they can differentiate yourselves, some of it’s just structure. So you see everything from, you know rigid boxes to really elegant paperboard folding, carton experiences, tins in the case of pouches.

Still very important in this market, it can just be a really upscale pouch experience. Sometimes they can do it by being really focused on sustainability and making sure that all of their packaging really meets maybe their own internal or external sustainability goals.

There’s a, I mean, there are so many different ways that you can differentiate, differentiate yourself on shelf.

Lisa McTigue Pierce
OK, wonderful. And when they’re doing that, when they’re making their packaging selection, is custom or stock packaging more prevalent and are you seeing any kind of a change in that, any kind of a shift in it?

Elizabeth Corbett (guest)
It depends on the item. If it’s a rigid package, let’s say a child-resistant tube, a child-resistant jar, I’m seeing a lot of folks veering toward stock item just because it gives them a little bit more flexibility. Anything else? Overall, I see folks really trying to be as custom as possible, again to be able to stand out on shelf.

Whether it be … in our case, we have a child-resistant folding carton called easy lock that is terrific for things like cartridges or vape pens, and it’s fully custom, fully customizable. You see that with labels. Now, if you’re a large company doing really large volumes, you do have a lot more flexibility in terms of doing custom things. You can do a custom dosing mechanism like select squeeze, which is something that we developed for curaleaf. You could do custom flower jars, but in that case you’ve got a lot more wherewithal, right? You can create something that you can bring over in a container load from China. You’ve got deeper pockets to be able to manage that. There are a lot of folks who don’t have that kind of funding or even that kind of timeline to do that.

Lisa McTigue Pierce
Or maybe not that much skill in-house from a packaging point of view, though, right? Maybe. Is that an issue as well? Could it be?

Elizabeth Corbett (guest)
It could be. Hopefully those folks are working with people like us who are the ones who have the skill in-house as it as a brand owner. I would want if I were ever looking at doing something like that, I would really want to make sure that I’m partnering was a supplier who really understands the market, who understands all the timelines that are involved to develop something, who really has the skill set to do that and to help you manage to the whole supply chain.

Lisa McTigue Pierce
OK, so yeah, the uh, the interaction with the customer at the dispensaries, how can these cannabis companies use packaging to maybe get the space? I know in a regular retail store, where things are positioned on the shelves is very important.

How can cannabis companies use packaging to try to get this, number one, space in the dispensaries and then the best space in dispensaries?

Elizabeth Corbett (guest)
So couple things. I think it’s really smart to talk to your dispensaries where you’re going to be carrying your product. What are the things that are important to them? For example, do they want to make, do they want the flexibility? If you have pouches or cartons to have a hang hole to give them the flexibility, is it, you know, when you’re thinking about how that carton is going to be laid out, making sure that your packaging is right sized, nobody wants something that’s oversized base is what it is. I recently worked with a company where we helped them downsized their gummy box by, I want to say, maybe 40%.

Lisa McTigue Pierce
I'm sorry. What kind of box?

Elizabeth Corbett (guest)
Gummy. Box for gummies, sorry. And in that case, we helped them reduce it by about 40% because there were dispensaries in California who didn’t want to carry the product because it was oversized for what the product is. And that’s a sustainability thing as well.

Lisa McTigue Pierce
OK.

Elizabeth Corbett (guest)
You know, is there something about your, in your package? Can you provide some sort of educational element for the customer to talk about what the desired effect is of that particular product? Is it something to help you relax? Is it something to help you with anxiety, to help you sleep, to give you energy, whatever, whatever that may be? And I’ll be the first one to say as a consumer that there are products that I have tried for the first time solely based on the package. It actually is much like wine, like 70% of wine is tried the first time in … out of the store because of the label, because of the shape of the bottle. Now it’s up to the product to be good to make you want to rebuy it. And I would say the same thing applies to cannabis. Absolutely. In a retail environment.

Lisa McTigue Pierce
One of the things that I’ve noticed in the dispensaries that I’ve gone into is that the layout is nothing standard. Where if you’re selling into a store like Walmart, you know their cereal aisle is very regimented, very standardized. Just how you mentioned earlier, you know, know the dispensaries where you’re going to be selling your product … but once you get to be a large company or a multistate manufacturer, I can see how that can get unruly, if that’s the right word to use. So how can cannabis manufacturers know the ins and outs of, you know … the height of a shelf, dispensary by dispensary.

Isn’t it asking a little too much for the of them?

Elizabeth Corbett (guest)
I don’t think so because each cannabis brand will either have their own sales force within a state or they’re working with a distributor. Pretty common in states like California where you have a distributor who’s selling and promoting your product. So they you should be able to work with them to give that feedback. I think in any retailer take outside of cannabis, every retailer has different items, so if I’m a product, if I’m a company and I’m selling into the Vitamin Shoppe, they’re going to have completely different regulations about what can be on shelf versus, let’s say, going into support. And believe it or not, they’re CBD brands who are selling into both, right. So I think as a brand owner that’s part of your responsibility, but you brought up something.

Lisa McTigue Pierce
OK.

Elizabeth Corbett (guest)
You’re right, every dispensary is different, and it’s part of the reason to try to think about how do I design my brand, whether it be with a color scheme, whether it be with overall branding, whether it be the shape of a carton, how do I, how do I do something that’s going to make that stand out. So for example, for those who don’t know …

So this …

Lisa McTigue Pierce
Very nice. I love examples.

Elizabeth Corbett (guest)
So this is the … there’s a brand called Wild. They make gummies which by the way are fabulous gummies. But one of the things about this carton which is uh, you know, it’s kind of a hexagon shape, very distinctive on shelf. So if you’re in Santa Rosa, you’re actually able to have product everywhere. It’s totally bizarre. You can walk into a dispensary and they have open tables, and they’re very well laid out. But you can actually pick up and touch product. I mean, not actual product, but the boxes, right.

In most markets, it’s up behind the shelf. It’s behind glass. But if I see this carton, I know this carton, right? So I can walk into a dispensary and I’ll be like, oh, they have Wild, right. I’ll know what that is.

So every, you know, every brand has that option and another one I think that’s done a good job of standing out. Holistic Industries has the Jerry Garcia brand, right, very, very distinctive. Now this is a simple carton. But if I see this on a shelf, I’m going to go. Yeah, that’s the Garcia brand. So it can be done in a simple, you know, carton like a traditional card and it could be done in a really creative shape. It can also be done in a creative shape of the of the actual primary package as well. So there are ways that you can stand out.

Or you can make your pouch look amazing. There are things that you could do from a printing perspective, just like anything else where you can make your pouch totally stand out, whether it be through the graphics, spot, gloss.

You know it’s just like a folding carton. You have a way to make it stand out.

Lisa McTigue Pierce
OK, excellent. You know, when I was thinking about the standardization or lack thereof, I also thought that the state-by-state regulations are changing so rapidly and you know this is one of the challenges that I know the cannabis industry faces more so than any other market that’s out there.

And that because of the changes on the regulatory side. It often requires very significant changes to the packaging to reflect that. And this even goes beyond only just labeling and graphics updates. Beth, can you explain just a little bit more what this situation is, what’s going on here?

Elizabeth Corbett (guest)
The unfortunate part is every state makes their own rules, and that is an unfortunate part of the industry right now, and that comes from the fact that we’re not federally regulated and as a result, in the state of Michigan, they have recently ruled that you cannot have fruit on any edibles packaging and in the state of Washington, you can’t use bright colors. But in California, you can put anything you want. Or in Illinois, you can’t show products. So no flower, no nothing can be shown, but in California you can.

That’s very challenging as a packaging designer. Part of what we try to do is work with our end customers to try to design something that works in as many states as possible. So it may be that you design a structure that works in all of those states, but in some states that has to be labeled differently or you have to put a sleeve over it so that you can’t see the product or a label over it. So that’s part of what we can design in some cases.

Lisa McTigue Pierce
OK.

Elizabeth Corbett (guest)
Yeah, I’m trying to find a box. This is a good example. In some cases, we’ve designed a box that’s maybe a little larger than what you had originally wanted for the product. Maybe it’s just for a tube, but the back is large enough that you can label it in maybe four states. So I created a box that can now be used across four states. You’re going to hit much larger volumes. We can inventory the product because the product cannot cross state lines, but the packaging can.

So there are ways that you can design the package so that it can be used in as many states as possible. You’re always going to have ones that it doesn’t work, but if you’re in 10 states and I can come up with three solutions for 10 states, that’s a win, right, everybody, everybody wins from that perspective.

Lisa McTigue Pierce
It’s a definite win. Yep. Awesome. Are you seeing any other trends happening as new states start legalizing cannabis?

Elizabeth Corbett (guest)
Trying to think. I think, not as much standardization as I would hope, and I think that that will come part of that even comes from dosing. Like in some states you can only have 10 milligrams at a package total in some states you can have 100 and in some states if you have 100 individual dosing has to be there like you know 10 individual 10 milligram packets within it. Some states don’t have that requirement.

Overall, and one of the interesting trends I’m seeing, is the expansion of edibles, and in particular beverages — that’s definitely on the horizon.

Lisa McTigue Pierce
OK.

Elizabeth Corbett (guest)
I think that we will see … I know we personally are working on some pretty interesting packaging for the edibles market and beverages in particular, whether that before beverage dosing, which we have a brand new item coming out for or figuring out how to way to make sleek cans which are what everybody wants to have when they have a let’s say a 5 or 10 milligram beverage — have a child resistant cap that’s not elderly resistant, as I like to say.

Lisa McTigue Pierce
Yep, same as senior friendly.

Elizabeth Corbett (guest)
Yeah. Senior friendly. So I think that’s something that I see that definitely is interesting. Overall, one of the biggest trends is just trying to be sustainable, finding the most sustainable packaging possible, whether that’s using paperboard that’s recycled or recyclable or using cans or using recycled plastic or in the case of pouches, ones that are compostable or recycled or recyclable.

I think overall the industry understands that we contribute a lot of garbage because of the fact that things have to be child resistant. So I’m finding that that’s always one of the big questions. And then I’d say the other interesting trend that just is, it’s a natural byproduct of the pandemic, is moving as much production of as possible of packaging to domestic to North America and that’s for a lot of different reasons.

Lisa McTigue Pierce
OK. And that's for supply mostly? Is cost a factor too?

Elizabeth Corbett (guest)
Yes.

It is. So, it’s everything from, you know, you used to be able to get a container from China to the US for about $3000 in that same container can now cost $24,000. That’s a hard cost that gets spread across all the goods that are in that container. The other thing is, used to be able to get a container in three to four weeks. And now it’s 12 weeks plus. So if I’m waiting on my, let’s see, I was able to get something for cheap, but I can’t get it and I’m not able to have my product on the on the shelf … no savings is worth that. So that’s an overall trend in the industry and it’s one of the first questions that people ask me when we’re developing something new is, I want to be sustainable. And is there any way we can make sure its domestic?

Lisa McTigue Pierce
OK, wonderful. I would imagine though that as we were talking about — you know the regulatory changes causing some packaging changes to be needed — that from a sustainability point of view, that might generate a lot of a lot of waste where you might have packages that you can no longer use.

Are you seeing that as well and are there any other packaging technologies or processes that can maybe help manage all those regulatory changes that are needed to be reflected on the package?

Elizabeth Corbett (guest)
It’s the first, so that’s the first level of guidance. The second thing is overall, we work with our customers to recommend that they not usually have more than three to four months’ worth of inventory on the floor just because there’s, it’s too high a risk. Now the good news is that it’s not as volatile that used to be. People have learned a lot, but every once in a while, we do have a move that surprises us coming from state regulators. So if you make sure that you have, let’s say, three to four months’ worth of inventory on the floor, it really does reduce your risk.

And the last thing is you can also, I mentioned designing a package where you’re making it apply a fit different states needs with the labeling on the back that can also reduce some of your risk. So if you’re making your box be really more about the brand and not a lot of too specific information, that’s something that you can deal with labeling as well ’cause. If it’s only a change that’s, let’s say, a couple of sentences in, let’s say your batch data label, that’s something that can easily be accomplished with labeling and that doesn’t cost very much money.

Lisa McTigue Pierce
OK, maybe in addition to labeling, what about online digital printing, is that something that you’re seeing some manufacturers look at?

Elizabeth Corbett (guest)
For labels, not direct on cartons, it’s been something that’s, it’s still labeling. We’ve had a lot of, I actually know a lot of folks who’ve tried to do some experimentation printing directly on cartons and right now it seems that labeling tends to be the easier way to go.

Lisa McTigue Pierce
OK, still labeling. OK, got it.

We’ll see going forward if they’re able to maybe reduce that extra step because you print the label and then you have to apply it. So that’s an extra step on the line as well.

Elizabeth Corbett (guest)
It is. It is. There’s a couple things to consider. One is on batch data. They don’t normally have that information until that day, right? So they’re packing out that day. So from that perspective, I think that that’s a challenge. The other thing is I think you’ll see a lot of interesting investment once it’s once we’re able to go Interstate, because once two of the Interstate commerce and you can consolidate, it’s going to take a lot of these pain points away.

Lisa McTigue Pierce
OK. Beth, what do you think is the possibility that that’s going to happen?

Elizabeth Corbett (guest)
Ah, I opened the door.

Lisa McTigue Pierce
And so sorry, I couldn’t resist.

Elizabeth Corbett (guest)
Uh, I don’t know. I’m, I know we’ve talked about this. I have high faith that something in SAFE Banking will pass.

I used to think this year, I don’t know, but I think that that’s the thing that has the highest factor of passing and that’s going to help a lot of things, that’s going to help investment. It’s going to eliminate the need to have the cash industry, which honestly is not safe for a lot of people. It’s also going to allow, you know, we are, we are an industry with taxation without representation. So the IRS takes all they want, but you can’t write anything off. You can’t write off equipment investment. You can’t write anything off and so as an industry, I think it would legitimize it. There’s also some talk that if you do, if you are, if you go to SAFE Banking, there’s also some opportunities to do interstate commerce with states that are legal that are next to each other. So like a California. I mean when you think about the whole West, other than Idaho basically because even Utah has medical. So I think that … you know what’s interesting is, you know, once New York and New Jersey to go legal, 75% of the United States will have access to legal cannabis. That’s amazing, right. You would …

Lisa McTigue Pierce
And it happened so quickly, at least from my perspective.

Elizabeth Corbett (guest)
It did. I mean, Oregon. Excuse me. Washington and Colorado were the first ones to pass about nine years ago. It happened very quickly.

Lisa McTigue Pierce
Very quickly. And just to explain a little bit, Beth has said SAFE Banking a couple of times and what that is, is that’s the Secure and Fair Enforcement Banking Act. So that’s where you get the SAFE: Secure and Fair Enforcement Banking Act. And that’s something that’s been in the works for a while now. But I don’t think it’s been sent for a vote in either …

Elizabeth Corbett (guest)
It has not.

Lisa McTigue Pierce
… either the Senate or the house? Sorry. And it would be a huge benefit for cannabis manufacturers just because of all the regulation that they have right now and the limits, the very strict limits that they have from a money point of view.

Elizabeth Corbett (guest)
Uh-huh.

Lisa McTigue Pierce
OK.

Lisa McTigue Pierce
You know, as if we haven’t talked about enough challenges, I do believe that there is one other challenge, well, two other challenges that I want to talk about and then we’ll wrap things up here. And one of them is the fact that a lot of cannabis companies, especially the larger ones, now have a wide portfolio of products and it could be still in flower, it could be in edibles. But the products even within those particular areas — flowers or edibles — often are categorized themselves by different tiers. So for example, they might have a premium brand and then you know like a value brand, which is typical for any other retail product that you’re seeing and buying in the store.

How are they using packaging to help them position those, their brands with the within those tiers?

Elizabeth Corbett (guest)
Yes. So from a tier perspective, we’re seeing the fastest growing segment in the cannabis segment to be what I would refer to as more of your everyday tier, right, your everyday — I hate the word economical. So I’m going to use the word “every-day.” And when you’re thinking about every day, you’re going to think about from a packaging design, Hey, what’s going to fit my budget? Right, ’cause? Obviously, that’s a big part of it. You know, you might have a much lower budget per SKU [stock-keeping unit]. And sometimes that’s made up for the fact that you might be doing larger volumes. So you may be able to do a little nicer package than you would have thought of just ’cause those tend to be running in much larger volumes.

And then you have what I would consider like you said, more of your let’s say premium and then I’m almost what you would consider like reserve limited edition. And we are definitely seeing some of that reserve Limited Edition which is pretty fun and those tend to be a much higher-end package, right? Something that definitely has a very premium feel. You see that with devices, right, absolutely with devices somewhat you know high end vape pens and then …

Lisa McTigue Pierce
Definitely a higher price point for the product.

Elizabeth Corbett (guest)
Absolutely higher price point. So those are all things you know. Whenever we’re sitting down with somebody to work on new packaging, one of the first things I ask is, do you have a target cost of goods, do you know where, do you have your target COGS and do you know where packaging fits in that ’cause that really helps me figure out, are you going to be doing a pouch which is your probably least expensive oftentimes? Is it something where you’d like to at least get into a child-resistant folding carton? And you know, what is your brand saying and so. And you already mentioned this. I actually think one of the most fun things about cannabis is the wide variety of products to package. And I think one of the biggest challenges is how do you make it all look like it came from the same company, right? So.

Lisa McTigue Pierce
Ah, family look, yes.

Elizabeth Corbett (guest)
So you might have a brand of, I’ll use Cresco as a really good example. Cresco has multiple products, multiple families and so you might have the high supply family, you’ve got the Cresco, you’ve got Mindy’s. I mean, you’ve got, I think they have six different brand families now. They all definitely stand apart on their own. But if you put them all together, they’re very complementary. And they do look like they came from the same company. That is challenging. You know, I think of … the only company, the only industry that I can think of anything like that is cosmetics. Cosmetics is probably the only industry that I can think of that has that many different kinds of products. You know, what are you going to do for your primary package?

I’ll give you a good example of how what I would sing it and every day versus maybe a premium. So in every day might go in and just a child resistant tube with a label on it and maybe next step up maybe child resistant tube inside a really nice folding carton and maybe one step up from that might be a much more elegant experience. Maybe it in maybe a higher end folding carton. So all of those are achieving what they need to achieve, but it’s all really going to be also driven by your target cost of goods.

Lisa McTigue Pierce
OK, so that’s quite a lot and I would imagine that it’s a, it’s like a lot of the other … there are some markets where your volume … well, maybe not. Is the volume where the words the best opportunity for good margin. I guess what I’m trying to think of is, if they’re going to be selling everyday products and have a, you know, a price point for packaging just from an investment point of view, if they want to spend a little bit more on packaging. And while we’re there margin, if the volume is there, those are all business decisions that I guess would depend company to company and probably brand to brand.

Elizabeth Corbett (guest)
It would, I think it also depends on the item. There are certain items within cannabis that aren’t known for being more competitive and lower margin. So for example, pre rolls. Pre rolls tend to be and you can have. It doesn’t mean you can have a can’t have a premium pre roll. You can have a high-end pre roll but pre rolls would be an example of something where it tends to be pretty competitive and that’s something that you have to keep in mind when you’re designing the packages. How do I design something that still really represents your brand?

Lisa McTigue Pierce
OK.

Elizabeth Corbett (guest)
Looks great on shelf, but is meeting your target cost.

Lisa McTigue Pierce
OK, great. Alright. Thank you for that. And I want to wrap up with one of the challenges that, I have to be honest with you, Beth, of all the people that I’ve talked with who are in the cannabis market, this is the one that they’re almost always bringing it up to me first. And that’s the whole idea of child resistance. And we know that it’s a must. It’s a requirement for cannabis packaging.

Elizabeth Corbett (guest)
Uh-huh.

Lisa McTigue Pierce
What’s going on here and what are some of the more creative solutions that you might know about that you can share with us from packaging and different sizes and shapes and different materials? I know it’s a lot to ask.

Elizabeth Corbett (guest)
Absolutely. It is, there’s a lot there. I think long term, if I had, if I had a globe in front of me and I can figure everything out …

I think it’s pretty interesting what Michigan is doing, where they’re saying that flower products — so inhalables — do not have to be in child-resistant packaging and that edibles have to be. And I think that that’s actually really smart because I’m hoping that no child is going to is going to grab a pouch and start eating an ounce of weed. I don’t even know what that would do to them. But I can’t imagine that happening.

Edibles, I think, is incredibly important to be in child-resistant packaging, right, beverages, all of that I think are very important. So if I had a crystal ball and I’d be very interested to see what the industry as a whole starts to do to think about that from a child resistant perspective. I think we’re all trying to figure out how to have a pleasing experience. It still accomplishes what it’s supposed to do.

Lisa McTigue Pierce
Right.

Elizabeth Corbett (guest)
I know in our case we have something called Easy Lock, which is just a button. The button is actually plastic, it’s actually reground plastic, so it’s recycled and you open it up. It’s designed to be a one-handed move, so it’s easy to do.

Lisa McTigue Pierce
Could you do that one handed? Maybe in the middle of the screen.

Elizabeth Corbett (guest)
Is that so? I’m sorry, I’m not …

Lisa McTigue Pierce
I think I’m … just a second. Let me see if I can …

Elizabeth Corbett (guest)
There we go.

Lisa McTigue Pierce
OK. Yeah.

Elizabeth Corbett (guest)
See. He said that so then, so the sorry, it’s hard ’cause I’m at an angle. But then you can push that open, and then there’s your tray.

Lisa McTigue Pierce
OK.

Elizabeth Corbett (guest)
That’s designed to be one handed.

There’s actually a vape pen that I bought in Northern California that I refuse to ever buy again, even though it was actually a great vape pen because I could never reopen the packaging. And I kept having my husband have to open it for me.

So you’re right. That’s a … it’s incredibly challenging. We’ve all had packaging that we just couldn’t open. It makes me not want to buy product again, right, which is terrible. I think that we should all keep that in mind when we’re, when we’re looking at buying something.

Lisa McTigue Pierce
It does. Yep, it does.

Elizabeth Corbett (guest)
I think overall, a lot of people are aware of it and we’re all trying to come to good solutions for that. I know we really keep that in mind. I know our customers keep that in mind.

And even in pouches, there are some pouches … because they all have CR zippers. There’s some CR zippers that I literally cannot figure out how to open, right. If you have to sit there for five minutes or thinking, well, they really didn’t want me to get into this, right.

I will say one thing in child resistant that I’m waiting to see happen is right now a lot of CBD product is not in child-resistant packaging. I see more ending up in child-resistant packaging. Long term, I could see that happening. But I guess I don’t have a very good answer for you.

Lisa McTigue Pierce
OK. Well. I just know that a lot of companies are working on it. And one of the things that I wanted to end with here is that there may be some solutions at the upcoming CannPack event which is in Anaheim, CA, co-located with the WestPack event. And this is April 12th through the 14th. That’s when the event is in Anaheim, CA.

I mentioned that because this session is part of this part event all about the in-person Anaheim event that we have coming up. Beth is going to join me with a couple other people on a panel discussion there, which is also going to talk very specifically about sustainability strategies for cannabis packaging and that is going to be on Tuesday, April 12th, right. In Anaheim, CA, with the rest of the event.

Lisa McTigue Pierce
Beth, we could talk for, you know, hours at least, about more on packaging for cannabis and cannabis in general, packaging in general, and then packaging for cannabis. But I do thank you so much for your time and look forward to talking with you, hearing what you have to say a little bit more on the sustainability side at the in-person event. Thank you so very much. Appreciate your time.

Elizabeth Corbett (guest)
Thank you.