It’s the biggest weekend of the year in the cannabis deals and discount world and Wendy Bronfein of Curio Wellness tells Nestor about what happens after the 420 holiday with a new and innovative rewards system available to adult-use customers all over Maryland.
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
dispensary, curio, people, products, timonium, regis, thc, cannabis, week, rewards, live, wn, central park south, rolling, saturday, move, day, talked, learn, sports
SPEAKERS
Nestor J. Aparicio, Wendy Bronfein
Nestor J. Aparicio 00:01
Welcome home. We are wn S T am 1570, Towson, Baltimore and Baltimore positive. We are getting the Maryland crabcakes. We’re back out on the road. Yes, we were fadeless last week. Yes. We had a former mayor Sheila Dixon on we also had Shannon Sneed on running for city council president through vignarajah is going to join us soon on Jason brand. It’s got all of the electeds and elected to be exact Blanchett on from the 11th. Last week as well. So a lot of invites out next couple of weeks. We have elections. We think it’s important, but more than that, we also think some cool stuff that other other things that happened horse racing industry. Next Wednesday, we’re gonna be doing the show from Green mount bowl. Yes, it’s my buddy David Richardson, who’s involved in horse racing industry, who’s going to educate me so we’re gonna get together based on what happened last week in the legislature in Annapolis. That happens Wednesday, two to four. We’re gonna watch the Oriole game from four o’clock on, I’ll have some scratch offs in the Maryland lottery some PAC man’s to giveaway. And then on Friday, Rebecca fails where the crab cakes are delicious. Shrimp Salad was delicious. We’ll be there on the 26th from two until five we have to be there each and every Friday during the season. And this is a special weekend here. Certainly on Friday, you can online order Saturdays kind of like when like a Christmas or New Year’s falls on a Saturday or it falls on a game day Sunday on New Year’s or whatever it may holidays are Thursdays are always like Thanksgiving before 20 can be any day of the week. It’s like the derby or like the Preakness this year. It is only Saturday. Wendy brown fawn is our chief cannabis officer. She is here to educate us on how to First things first, a couple of products, this good day product, I really like it you you know you told me this would be something for me. Focus, focus, focus, and then this move proxy. These are things that you don’t smoke them, they don’t get you high. We’ll talk about all that stuff. But this is the week they’re on sale. So tell people if they hear this Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, they can still get the rewards. But they’re not going to get the 420 deal. Unless you’re doing that crazy thing. We’re like Monday you’ll just extended and spring it on us but I don’t think it works that way do
8
Wendy Bronfein 02:01
as far as I know. Saturday is the big day. Yeah, I mean for anyone who’s not familiar I guess kind of think of it like it’s like Black Friday for cannabis shopping. So it is for 20 That is our celebratory day. So what you see at the dispensaries are tons of like crazy deals. Lots of fun extra giveaways. There going to be kind of stunted programming going on. We’re gonna have at our store blondies donuts and Blackacre roastery at in the morning serving doughnuts and coffee because we’re opening two hours earlier than we normally do. So
Nestor J. Aparicio 02:40
Friday at is that illegal thing? Could you open it seven or no?
Wendy Bronfein 02:45
Right now we have we can be open for 12 hours so you can take your
Nestor J. Aparicio 02:49
8phone out but at midnight you couldn’t be like the Terps open and their season with moonlight. Man. You couldn’t do that. Okay. 12 hours. See, I’m learning I asked you you have all the answers. I know this.
Wendy Bronfein 02:59
Yeah, so now it’s gonna be exciting. It’s It’s a big day on Saturday. But yeah, so at our stores, foreign daughter in Timonium, and then farm Ken in Elkton. From a promotion standpoint, it’s going to be 40% off of all curio products 35% or
Nestor J. Aparicio 03:18
40%. I was saying 35% to my wife.
Wendy Bronfein 03:23
Yeah, okay, so there’s so the move the topical topicals tablets, and tinctures and concentrates are all 35% off. I did get it right. Yeah. Okay. Other scenario products are 40% off and everything else in the dispensary that doesn’t fit into those two buckets is 30% off. And then in Timonium in our front of house in that retail where we sell cannabis lifestyle products and hemp based CBD and like natural skincare and other wellness products, all of that is 30% off as well. And we’re also going to be doing a couple raffles we’re going to be giving away four tickets to an Orioles game with a parking pass. They’re really good seats. We’re going to be giving away tickets to CFG arena upcoming concerts this spring summer and then this is probably the one that’s going to excite people maybe the most when cannabis for a year what we can yeah it’s like a lottery
8Nestor J. Aparicio 04:21
thing hold on we you know it’s like hold on hold on, hold on. I just want to do this everybody wants to know this. So
Wendy Bronfein 04:28
there you will basically have a monthly allotment that if you’re the winner will be allowed it’ll be available for you for your pickup once a month you
Nestor J. Aparicio 04:41
know people sleep out for days to get Chick fil A right yeah but that right
Wendy Bronfein 04:44
8for it to have their this their free monthly get
Nestor J. Aparicio 04:47
if you I slept for concert tickets for you know tons of concerts back in the day but so you ever Ward’s program and before like I even get to that I just for this sale this weekend. I want to make sure we’re clear on On this because I’m ordering this at 35% off, I just no doubt about it. And when I say that the Gen like we’re both sort of one over on that I’ve already shown you, this is it I’m down to nothing. This is all I have left, this is it. And so I need to get out. For 17 It runs out for 20 I can replenish it, but on for 19 Because when you know how much I love people and I love lines and I love being backed up on you know all the way around Timonium road to the to the to the freeway, but you’re not even doing curbside right because your place is small. It’s narrow. It’s a little kind of different as far as an ingress and egress out of different areas. You’re doing coffee and doughnuts that’ll bring that’s getting us out of bed Saturday morning. I promise you won’t be there to collect on that before we pick this stuff up. But you can order on Friday night tell me because I may or may not be spotted with a family member of yours at a Bruce Springsteen concert two states away on Thursday night, but we all queue up to get concert tickets and stuff like that. Are people going to sign up on Friday? I mean, is it this gonna be unprecedented for you online Friday? Because you’re telling me to do it? I’m sure anybody that orders online will think okay, so what time does that happen? Rockin through like for these my buckets? I’m good for the year. So
Wendy Bronfein 06:17
typically, you can order online once the that existing day closes. So close Friday, nine o’clock. Alright. 901. Okay, so So yeah, so then you can play. So we’ll come in the morning, we’ll start seeing orders that are in the system, and we can fulfill them. Yeah, so you can always do online order for pickup. You can also come in, I mean, yes, we are expecting it to be very busy. But we also are hoping to be able to really fluidly move people through so that nobody is waiting too long. I would say that like if it’s anything like the launch of adult use. I mean, don’t hold me to this. But I think actually in the afternoon it got better because I don’t use launched on Saturday to which you know, that Saturday factor really adds a level to it. But you know, there was tons of people there and those early hours because it was like the beginning and you know, I think we saw kind of it get a little quieter and mid afternoon it was still busy, but it wasn’t you
Nestor J. Aparicio 07:17
don’t have coffee and doughnuts in the middle afternoon. You know where you’re gonna get me over. What you find is here from curio wellness far daughter. They make cool products, interesting things above and beyond all the fun we have with cannabis and THC and all the other things but things that really help the body move, heal all the things we’ve talked about sleeping better gi all of that. But you know, you’re such a new business and I want to promote my 25th anniversary here and this piece is because we’ve decided we’re going to launch it at 5:08pm on Thursday, the 25th. So your big holiday Saturday, all day long. We’re it’s a big holiday for football fans, right? It’s the NFL draft is the 25th the Ravens will draft until 30. If they’re not going to draft till 10 o’clock at night, maybe 11 o’clock, they might trade out and not even take a pic. We’re gonna release the 25th anniversary documentary on Thursday night. And, you know, I guess all of it for me is I go back now as before two years of media, 25 years of radio of owning the station 32 and a half years of being on the air. And I think about every step of the way, how life changes, business changes, I started as a reporter with an am radio station who likes sports like and then the entrepreneurial side kicked in. And I’ve seen all of these things that have happened and changes in life from the picture of the cover is me at a payphone right. So like there are no there are no more payphones. Right. So I’m at the payphone. It’s called No one listens, everyone hears because the accusation has always been nobody listens to that guy. Everyone seems to hear when I say things. So that’s sort of the thing but like I’m thinking of all of these dated crazy things like that this nasty newsletter that we mailed out to people. It’s basically Facebook now like in real time in color with pictures and videos. And I think about how far we’ve come but the rewards program for you and for your business and your industry. Look, I mean, Marriott Disney, we go on and on and on about rewards and all of that stuff. Your business is so new. So sort of on the edge cutting edge in so many ways that you’re still rolling out things that are you know, I don’t know, for the industry new and different and certainly for your customers. Because I didn’t know about this and you dropped this on me before we went on the air here. Like we’re rolling out a rewards program. I’m like, Well, yeah, of course you are. But like you couldn’t have done this five years ago. Yeah,
8Wendy Bronfein 09:32
no. So anyone who shops currently in dispensaries would know that at the dispensary level, there’s typically a rewards program just like when you go to like any retail store, the grocery store, things like that getting points for what you buy. It doesn’t really exist on the brand level. So the products that you’re choosing to buy in the dispensary from those companies. And so we’ve partnered with a company called loosen green. If you ever buy our products, you would see the There’s a QR code on that product. So right now, when you buy a product, when you scan that QR code, it takes you to the page where you can get more details about the product, learn about it, see its certificate of analysis, all of that remains. But what happens now when you scan it is it will automatically if you don’t have the lucid app, it’ll prompt you to download it. When you open that app up. It’s gonna say claim your bud points, and you’ll get as many bud points as the MSRP for that product. So if the MSRP is $20 You’d get 20 points. You
Nestor J. Aparicio 10:33
just like when you get the dog food you take the thing off the bottom is sent proof. Yeah, she Yeah, so you’re just like, oh, Wendy Come on, man.
Wendy Bronfein 10:40
So you’re scanning you know, you’re scanning the QR code on the package. You’re the app says claim your points, you start collecting them you hold a wallet and then you can redeem them for a bunch of different like cool merch that we’ve put in there from like Bluetooth speakers to branded pet collars and storage like secure stash bags and all kinds of cool stuff but it’s a curio
Nestor J. Aparicio 11:02
8if you’re correct me if I’m wrong so this is for curio products curio products only okay and so if I had a friend of mine hit me and we’re talking about you literally earlier today, and he’s like I shop at this dispensary on ramps I’m like, I bet they have curio product. I don’t know how many dispensaries because I’m always trying to educate people about there’s foreign daughter curio and maybe if you’re a dispensary person you see a curio product and I’m like I’m trying to explain to them you are to like what the auto industry what Chevy and where you make the products right you distribute the products, but you only have one storefront but your products are in dozens if not hundreds of dispensaries. There aren’t hundreds of dispensaries. But you’re in in most dispensaries around the state. Am I correct in saying that? Yeah,
Wendy Bronfein 11:47
we’re well over 90% of the dispensaries in the state. So that’s that’s sort of where the value is. So the patients and customers can now sort of basically double dip on earning rewards.
Nestor J. Aparicio 11:59
points at your dispensary if you live somewhere and you don’t come to Timonium or you’re not a foreign daughter, customer, correct. You’re using a Curie. I mean, one of my business associates, we got to talk about you. And he held up his move on my fantasy like literally, and I’m like, Oh, your choice I keep it on my desk. And this is like a person that I would never think of GHG greenstuff flower like not that kind of like just got an achy body and he’s older than me and much more beaten up because he’s a former athlete, but he held up so he now he lives in like Forest Hill. He was up in northern Bel Air. He’s never been to your dispensary. But he buys your product that you you’re really appealing to right.
Wendy Bronfein 12:35
Yeah. So no matter where you shop, you can scan it, you earn the points, you redeem the points and the redemption can be either for like the merch inside, or it can be for curio credits. And so for if you redeem it for the money, which is essentially a gift card, you can use that gift card exclusively at our store in Timonium or our store in Elkton, Maryland. So you have the option to turn it into quote cash or to get cool stuff.
8Nestor J. Aparicio 13:04
Okay, like like what we’re wearing, right? Like a little bit of this. Yeah, yeah, there’s
Wendy Bronfein 13:08
sweat, there’s apparel. There’s pet accessories, there are Bluetooth speakers. There’s duffle bags, I mean, there’s all there’s, there’s tears. So there’s all kinds of really awesome offerings and not not really a lot of things that you we’ve never done before. So it’s like it’s an exclusive group of merch that doesn’t exist relative to other things we’ve put out before
Nestor J. Aparicio 13:28
you get some special for 20 merch this week. I mean, a lot of stuff says for 20 Oh,
Wendy Bronfein 13:32
8I don’t Yeah, I do. I should have brought it with me. So I should have worn it. Actually, we did a show Monday for a while now. It’s a gift. It’s a giveaway. You probably Ideally, you’ll be seeing people in dispensaries wearing it and we’ll be giving them out as well. But we call it the concert t shirt. So it’s a gray t shirt. It says curio with the date on it for the 420 date on the left chest and then the back is like instead of a list of cities it’s a list of our strains and it’s got like a cool 420 graphic going through it. Okay,
Nestor J. Aparicio 14:05
all right. Well, I will have to sport that at a concert somewhere this summer outdoor Merriweather you know as far as the rewards thing goes rolling something like that out getting making everybody aware of it dispensary to dispensary. And and and I mean, that seems to me to be like I said, I’m 30 years going back into my Wayback Machine and saying this is something you just don’t roll out something you’ve been thinking about. But something you probably couldn’t have done two years ago or three years ago.
Wendy Bronfein 14:32
Now, I mean, well, so the company that we’re working with, in the beginning, they weren’t a partner to us, right. So and then we learned that this was an additional offering to what you can do with this QR code. And we thought, well, this is a really interesting play because people think about are very much focused on that loyalty program and earning rewards but it’s it’s always tied to the retail location. And this takes that out Got a bit so you could always earn wherever you shop. But when you choose us, you can get another level of rewards that you’re earning as well. And it doesn’t matter what dispenser you shop at in the state.
Nestor J. Aparicio 15:10
Nice first of market again with the others. So listen, you know off the cannabis thing and off this stuff, my wife and I were having a conversation the other day. And like, I know you for a while now we’ve talked about things. And you have just said when I was in the television business, because you’re always like, make sure the mics right and hairs right. And you like we’ve improved the quality of our podcasts and all that stuff. What did you do in the television industry? Because I I was watching a certain morning show based in New York that’s had a revolving cast of male characters and a female character who has a husband who came from the soap opera industry. So I said it she watches a lot. My wife’s a big fan. And I said, I think Wendy did some something something there. So am I right? Or am I wrong? Yeah.
8Wendy Bronfein 15:54
That was so when it was Live with Kelly and Michael. That was my last TV job before I left, New York came back to Baltimore and started a cannabis company. Yeah, but prior to that, yeah, my my college major was here and here’s my age. My college major started as radio, TV and film. But by the time I graduated, it was now called Electronic Media
Nestor J. Aparicio 16:22
podcasts.
Wendy Bronfein 16:24
So yeah, so like from a technical perspective, I learned to edit audio on a reel to reel and ended doing it digitally on Pro Tool so probably like, you know, the last non digital generation so yeah, so then I was in I moved to California after college I worked in original production like started I was a PA on the first season of American Idol so like that kind of stuff.
Nestor J. Aparicio 16:53
8And you were there when they were auditioning and like all that part.
Wendy Bronfein 16:56
Really know when that when the show was once like live not not the game night? God yes. Okay. With when there were two hosts at the beginning not not one.
Nestor J. Aparicio 17:07
But you were never worked with Regis you worked with Michael? Oh,
Wendy Bronfein 17:11
yeah, only Michael Yeah.
8Nestor J. Aparicio 17:12
So back at the turn of the slide. This would be a fun little thing for my document because you don’t know like, you’re gonna laugh like hell, you’re gonna have a good time watching my document because you’d learn things about me too. And I’ve got like a, you know, storied, lurid crazy back, you know, sports rock and roll all this crazy stuff. But I was nationally syndicated the turn of the century at something called One on One sports. The became Sporting News Radio was at Chicago, but they had an owned and operated station. They were syndicating much like you sell curio products and other places. They were syndicated, but they had owned and operated in New York, Chicago, LA and Boston, because these are big four big sports towns. So we were clear there. 24 hours a day. I was there affiliate. So wn St. I own the station in 1998 99 2000. I ran them in the overnight. And then I became their afternoon show host for 400 stations all over the country. And when I did that, they flew me here flew me there throughout first pitches in places and went places and did shows and did fights and just all this, you know, there were big NBA Finals masters all this kind of crazy things we did. But I was based in New York, when the Yankees and the Red Sox were sort of fighting 20 years ago. So this was 99 2000 2001 Yankees Mets World Series. And we based in Mickey Mantle’s restaurant which is gone. It’s next to the Helmsley hotel Central Park South on 59th. Between like the seventh and eighth, you know, Broadway ish, so I did the show on the window there. Once a month, every month for three years. I sat in that window with Bob Costas Joe Buck. Gary Bettman, who’s still the NHL Commissioner, Bert sugar lived down the street would come down and we tell all these stories and but it was a hub for celebrities at Central Park South. So you would just randomly see Richard Grieco walk by you would randomly be able to pull people in. But Regis ate there a lot. And I was there one day when Regis was eating doing the show, and I’m live nationwide, two to six and I’m in the window and Regis comes in he’s having lunch. And I think that like my producer was going to go up say something. And I said we stopped eating I’ll ask or whatever. And that that man is just like, we’ll ask him he’s in there all the time. Manager comes back. He said, Sure. He’ll do the show. And I’m like, I’ll go by and say hello. I went introduce myself. You’re related to Aparicio all we got to do the show. So he sat down and did eight minutes. This is when Who Wants to Be a Millionaire was the biggest show in the world. Like he was on five nights a week. Do it. He wants to be a millionaire like it was bigger than then. Don’t tell Kelly but it was bigger than the TV show. It really was a big big deal every night. Is that your final answer? So He said he said to me is this your final Nesta? So I’ve got to get that into the now that I’ve mentioned this to you. This is your gift. I gotta get Regis somehow because I forgot about this until you brought it up. Didn’t think maybe you work with Regis because Regis did my show. We talked Notre Dame football. He was the nicest man. He loved baseball and my cousin and so I loved Regis I’ve never met Kelly, I don’t you know, my straight answer on the show strands ancient was Tony Agnone here because he didn’t hit. Yeah, yeah, so So Stringham was a legendarily nice guy. I mean, I always dealt well with with him. And I thought it was a fascinating guy to be doing television in that way. From being an athlete, he did a lot of things in his life. Michael Strahan Yeah.
Wendy Bronfein 20:44
No, they were they were both great. It was it was a really awesome experience. And I mean, I was a person who, you know, grew up watching the show, even from like, Regis and Kathie Lee. Right? It was like one of those like, your home sick from school shows or whatever.
Nestor J. Aparicio 20:59
Did you ever meet Regis? What did he come back and visit or anything when you were there? No.
Wendy Bronfein 21:03
8i Oh, yeah. I don’t think he ever stopped by the day he
Nestor J. Aparicio 21:05
died. People said the most beautiful things about him. And I’m thinking he was so beautiful to me like I did. You know, he’s a pretty star in the world. He’s in there to do show. Sure. Come on over. He just didn’t do it. He did it. He owned it. Yeah, he was reached. So my show was awesome. You know? Yeah.
Wendy Bronfein 21:22
Well, I mean, I think consistent with that. I mean, I would say, you know, they were they were awesome. They were super fun. They’re very authentic. I think that Kelly is one of the most authentic people I’ve ever been around in terms of how showing up on camera and off camera. I mean, there’s a professional. Yeah, no, but not but sometimes, like, whether you’ve been to a taping or you work somewhere like people can put it on right and then it stops rolling and they’re not necessarily exactly the same but she she’s a great person. That’s exactly who she is. Yeah,
Nestor J. Aparicio 21:55
Australia is going through some struggles right now with his child and so send some love out to him anybody that follows him in our space but a little background because I like I knew you had something to do with it but I wasn’t sure if your tentacles and all that one day will this dish on the on the industry we’ll talk about that. And you know, closest I’ve been is David Simon on talking about the wire but didn’t want to talk about the wire. So I like talking about television when I get the television people when he brought five she wasn’t television. Now she is in the what’s illicit now adult use available for 20 cannabis space, helping people doing the science and the technology that makes things like move, make my back feel better. And and other things tell people about this good day product because this is something that you know, everybody’s familiar with gummies and a concert or to loosen up or all those things we talked about. We’ve talked about chirps and terpenes and profiles, but this is an interesting product here for up a real mental clarity without the without the deny part.
8Wendy Bronfein 22:53
Yeah, so the one so good day has a couple of different products in there. You’re the majority of the line is high CBD, low or lower THC, right? So it’s less about the high in those formulations. And but the one that you’re referring to is leads with thc v, which is a minor cannabinoid that doesn’t promote psychoactivity, but rather promotes more energy, mental alertness, clarity, things like that. And so that formulation is four milligrams of thc v, one milligram of CBD and one milligram of THC. And, you know, like everything we do, we made it behind the scenes we trialed it with people validated that it gave us the results we were looking for. And yeah, I mean I’ve I’ve really enjoyed it as well myself I mean, I find that on mornings when I’ve taken it you know if I let’s say eat it and like the seven o’clock seven to eight o’clock hour there’s usually some time like a couple hours later I go oh, okay a lot of stuff done. Yeah, like I suddenly realized oh, yeah, i That’s why but I don’t I you know, I don’t feel I don’t feel caffeinated or agitated or anything. I just am like a little bit more on Well,
Nestor J. Aparicio 24:08
I’ll tell you what, we’ll try to get folks on this weekend. It’s 420 weekend do it responsibly people don’t let me be the grown don’t maybe be that guy. But But do it responsibly here this weekend. But enjoy however you do the holiday the Orioles and we get the draft coming up next week. I’m releasing my crazy film. And they have a rewards program now with a few curioso if you buy curio products elsewhere, and you haven’t been out the foreign dollar good chance to do that this weekend. Sign up on Friday. That’s what I’m gonna do. She’s Wednesday on Nestor. We are wn st am 1570, Towson Baltimore. We never stop talking Baltimore positive
