The LEVIA Story with Kristin & Eric Rogers

In this episode of the Ready To Drink Podcast, Nate Fochtman sits down with Kristin and Eric Rogers, the husband-and-wife founders who built, sold, and recently bought back their cannabis beverage empire, LEVIA. Transitioning from careers as "recovering marketers" for massive blue-chip brands like AT&T and Home Depot, the duo discusses the grit required to move from a kitchen-top concept in 2017 to a facility-based powerhouse.

The conversation dives deep into the "Retail Reality" of the beverage industry, including:

• The Founder's Buyback: The strategic decision to reclaim their brand two weeks ago and return to independent roots.
• Effects-Based Branding: Breaking down the science behind Achieve, Celebrate, and Dream to simplify the consumer experience.
• Parenting & Prohibition: A candid look at normalizing plant medicine at home while maintaining strict 21+ boundaries and label transparency.
• The Regulatory Landscape: Why federal banking, trademark protections, and state-level bills, like the upcoming Pennsylvania Hemp Beverage Bill, are critical for institutional readiness.

Check out LEVIA.Buzz

More stories at ReadyToDrinkPodcast.com + YouTube + Spotify + Apple Podcasts

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

All right, and I'm gonna make a joke right off the bat because I don't know the answer, and I'm gonna take a shot. Husband and wife, family, what do we got going on here?

SPEAKER_03 0:06

Husband and wife.

SPEAKER_01 0:07

Excellent, excellent. Well, I uh I'm gonna spoil it, but I this is my favorite one. I am obsessed with uh with couples that are in in business together.

SPEAKER_00 0:15

So it's uh actually we've got a lot of friends now because it's a it's such a weird and unique thing to happen and to actually still like each other. Um so we have we have like a like a solid group of us that uh you know get together a lot and it's it's pretty funny because we're all very similar. And so you know, there's we can talk about this if you want to, and the but I think part of it is you know being so wildly different. You know, Eric and I are not the same in any way, shape, or form, and I think that is why it works. And it's the same for our friends too. It's so funny.

SPEAKER_01 0:51

It's uh it's always the case that it works the best when there's a yin and the yeah and about if you have two people that are both in the clouds, nothing works. So which one before we jump into like the story, who's grounded and who's who's uh who's the air balloon? Who's holding the rope and who's the hot air balloon?

SPEAKER_00 1:07

I would say Eric's the hot air balloon. Well, he's the big idea guy, he's the big idea guy, and I'm the one putting everyone on payroll in in an hour. So, you know, that that's it. And I love that. I love that because you know, we need that. And we you just it's so funny. We have um, you know, some consultants and investors and people, advisors that we work with that are sort of the same way, the big ideas, and I mean that's how we got here.

SPEAKER_01 1:33

We need that exactly, and that's that's why we're all still in this industry. So yeah, real quick for you guys, uh, give us kind of uh whichever one wants to go, kind of a cloud level overview about the business and what you guys do, and then I'll jump into your story, but at least everybody can get a snapshot about the products and the overview first.

SPEAKER_00 1:48

Eric, you do this the best.

SPEAKER_02 1:51

In 2017, uh Kristen and I had a crazy idea for a cannabis beverage brand. So my background is all consumer marketing. I'd worked with a bunch of blue chip advertisers and really had this idea of creating a brand that consumers would love. When we looked at the landscape for what existed at the time for cannabis beverages, all of them were sodas and juices or teas and you know, really loaded with sugar and didn't necessarily align to the sort of lifestyle that we had. And so we started marching towards this idea of creating cannabis-infused seltzers, rooted and simple, all natural ingredients with no sugar added, zero calories that tastes great. Living in Massachusetts, we have the benefit of having polar seltzer, right? And our people were able to sort of learn from everything they've done and establish their sort of strangold in the seltzer category. And we were very fortunate. We built a facility from the ground up, officially launched into uh market in uh February of 2021. We very quickly got acquired. A year later, we got acquired by Overwhelmus. At that time, I exited Kristen stayed on to mine the store. Uh within a year, Kristen created the opportunity for us to buy the brand back. Uh and we just closed on that uh two weeks ago to bring the brand back home. Wow, into the graduate. So yeah, we're really excited. So our brand is really effects-based. Uh it's a fast forward. So we want to simplify things for consumers in the say the brand architecture that we created. So we have Achieve, Celebrate, and Dream, which are our effects-based products, then different flavors within each of the effects. Achieve is our get stuff done. Uh, whether you're going to mow the lawn, do a bunch of laundry, have some tasks to complete, achieve is the one that's going to part be your best partner in crime for that. Uh celebrate is much more bright and everyone's day, the backyard barbecue. Uh, you're looking for a social lubrication where you can be social and upbeat, but you're not looking for alcohol. And then dream is that sort of rest and recharge. You're looking to have date night on the couch, we'll we'll have a drink on the couch, watch a movie, enjoy that. You sort of have that rest, recharge, and that laughter sort of built into that one. Um so within those, we then have two product lines that we mostly lean on. We've got the zero calorie celtures, and then we have a zero calorie water-soluble drink infusion that we call drink drops that really empower consumers to make their own mocktails uh and dose to whatever their desire is. So our seltzas are all low dose to really reach new and experienced consumers alike, depending on their dose. But our drink drops really provide the opportunity for higher dose beverages if you want to get creative. Um, and you can also cook with them. They really integrate into food products as well. So those are sort of our products that we have to connect with consumers in the Massachusetts market and beyond.

SPEAKER_01 4:33

I love um I love the eyedropper part. I just want to make sure because I have to make a joke about the tinctures and the drops is like I'm somebody that like I love them because I love to be able to choose my base and everything like that. And I and when I'm out in bars and stuff like that out with people in happy hour and they don't have any good non-alcoholic beers and I'm kind of bored of Heineken Zero at this point or whatever. I love having those in my back pocket and my my girlfriend keeps them in her purse every once in a while. But my point with my joke is I appreciate the eye drops because I'm a big guy, I'm 6'3, 250, and I'm heavy-handed on those squirt bottles. And there's sometimes there's times where I just can't get my cases right, but I can get an eyedropper every time.

SPEAKER_02 5:09

Exactly. Perfect. Well, let's go. Yeah, okay, go ahead. Yeah. I was just gonna say the idea to make it simple. Yeah, you know, cannabis can be really complicated for consumers with all the different strained name games in terms of what it is. Um, so we're trying to make it as approachable as possible um so that depending on your dose, we're we're making it as clear of what that dose will be. Um, to really avoid that overdose um, you know, experience that everyone's sort of had if they've ever had an emballed brand out of the oven and all that. So we're just trying to demystify and really empower consumers to feel uh stressed with our brand that every time they come to us, they know they're getting the same high-quality product with predictable outcomes for them.

SPEAKER_01 5:47

I've not told this story, and I'm we're gonna jump in your story in a second when you said about the over overdosages. I went to California or not California, Colorado, when they first went recreational, and I got a hotel walking distance from the dispensary, and I was like, I'm gonna experience this. I've been a lifelong you know advocate, lifelong this. And I got one, I think it was Snoop Dogg or one of those chocolate bars. And the lady at the place was like, just take one little piece. And I'm like, nah, I'm the big dude. I drink, I was drinking everything. I'm like, I can drink a case of beer, I can take a chocolate bar six hours on the on the bed in the hotel with law and order marathon going, and I couldn't reach the remote to turn it off. So we've all been there, right? We've all been there, and that's my that's my favorite story. But uh, let's jump into you guys. So, one of the things I've liked lately to jump way into it is I'll let Kristen go first, and I want to go back to senior year of high school, and I want to say, 18, 19 year old Kristen, did you ever envision this moment in 2026, right?

SPEAKER_00 6:48

Oh my god, no. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. I didn't drink, I didn't use any kind of drugs in any way, shape, or form. You know, and at the time, marijuana was still like, ah, you know, the devil. So of course not. Even when I got to college and started to learn a little bit more and understand, so I had a couple of pretty bad experiences with some brownies where I was literally high for 12 hours. And uh in even so, even after that, you know, not really understanding the options that were out there and more of like, you know, people growing weed in their bathtub, and so very indica heavy, you know, body heavy. Um, so no, absolutely not. I would never have expected to be here. I'm a therapist, you know. This is what I spent, you know, law and therapy were what I spent my time training as, you know, I I think even when we started this, I wouldn't have expected to be here.

SPEAKER_02 7:44

No, not not at all, actually. I was also a late bloomer on even trying cannabis. I didn't even try it until I was, you know, 1920, name college. So, yeah, as a senior in high school, absolutely not. Um, had not even tried it. Um, for me, my entry point was really on the medicinal side. It didn't come until my late 20s when I was really suffering with some backsms that wouldn't go away, and modern medicine really couldn't test them. And someone introduced me the to the idea of medical marijuana. And that was really my beginning. And even at that entry point, I would say, you know, call it 10 years after high school, I still wouldn't have thought this is this is where I would have ended up.

SPEAKER_01 8:25

So let's fast track then. You guys uh uh what year, and I'm I'm not I don't want to say I give your age out or anything like that, but what year did you guys how old were you guys when you met? When you connected? You were we met in college actually on spring break.

SPEAKER_02 8:38

Perfect. So that makes sense.

SPEAKER_03 8:40

Well, maybe gave me that little link and asked my mind, where was spring break?

SPEAKER_02 8:45

We were in the Bahamas, actually. And yeah, Krista knew the three people I was with, I knew the three people she was with, but we hadn't met each other yet. And we did not start dating until probably two years later after that.

SPEAKER_00 8:56

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 8:57

Afterwards, but yeah, that was sort of uh when we met. So yeah, we've known each other a long time. That's awesome.

SPEAKER_01 9:04

That's awesome. So when you guys are you guys are dating through college, you graduate college, you're down the therapy path. Where are you and Eric at this point in your career at that point, like post-college into where we're getting up?

SPEAKER_02 9:14

I was working uh for a bunch of large ad agencies working on blue tip clients. So around that time, I was working on brands like ATT, uh the Home Depot, Goodyear, things like that, where I was working on their digital strategy, active, you know, strategy and activation. So anything that happened in digital channels, I got to work on some really cool projects. The first ever, you know, online March Madness bracket with CBS like helped, you know, build build that out and like align ATT, who was the customer at the time that I was representing. Um, you know, I also got to work on like good yeah on uh the Home Depot when they made the transition from like you can do it, we can help, to like more saving, more doing, and really like working through those transitions. And a lot of my career was focused on sort of either that massive change where you were looking to reposition an entire brand and still connect and not alienate consumers, um, or just really driving smart digital strategy for customer acquisition. So I sort of ended my career in advertising, really working with within the financial category with brands like Bank of America and Fidelity and Liberty Mutual to drive you know customer acquisition from their respective businesses.

SPEAKER_01 10:20

What um what year did you guys what year was this business concept starting to bubble up and whether where what would it take you to like the scene, the environment, what's going on when the idea sparks and then the conversations begin as far as this venture?

SPEAKER_02 10:34

So yeah, it was a a bit of a slow build. Um really, it started when we had our first daughter who turns 13 this year. So um, you know, at that point, medical cannabis consumer, we have kids. Hey, we should smoke less. Like, that's a bad, a bad behavior. Immediately pivoted into making edibles to start, you know, as a consumer. Uh, realized my metabolism was slow as hell and that it would take two to three hours for that like onset to happen. So I started researching cannabis under the premise of why doesn't cannabis like water? Like I was like, I know it's hydrophobic, what does it like? That led to ethanol. And I started making, you know, very uh rudimentary tinctures. Um I didn't even know what a tincture was, I just sort of started making it uh at the time and started dosing drinks. And, you know, it tasted terrible. So I started making mock tails to like cover the flavor and all that. And really, it sort of was this intersection, uh call it 2015 at this point, which was the intersection of like we saw our entire friend group transition their behavior away from alcohol and into these cannabis mocktails that we were making. Um, but the marketer in me said we needed to simplify it. Asking a consumer to buy a product like this, to dose themselves to do that was going to be a lot for a consumer to have to do. Uh, experienced consumers would likely do that. But if we're trying to attract new consumers, normalize, destigmatized, and really show that cannabis can be social in terms of this beverage format, um, the idea seemed obvious of like we needed something ready to drink. We needed something that the consumer could grab, a very cool, you know, CPG-oriented label style, so that it could be a conversation starter. We were very fortunate that, you know, this was 2015, 2016, 2017, still getting laughed out of rooms, talking about drinking cannabis. 2018, some are a white cloth. All of a sudden, a spiked seltzer made sense to everybody. And then we were able to say, yes, okay, now you understand a spiked seltzer, but you still have 80 to 120 calories in every drink. Ours is zero. We're going to be a zero calorie adult beverage. And that really helped to kind of contextualize what we were doing and how we were going to be different and also like fit into the space uh overall.

SPEAKER_01 12:48

That was one of the the when I looked at your website before hopping on, it was one of the biggest draws because I always tell people that hemp beverages that do self-regulate and follow procedures of of label transparency and the QR codes of the COA is literally the most transparent and I don't want to say anything of any health things, but the cleanest, one of the cleanest and transparent products that's on the shelf. And then you add, I look at your website and I see the zero calorie and the zero sugar, and I'm like, well, we just went one step further into like, I don't understand why any adult would not want to participate in this. It checks every single box that everybody wants and everybody's looking for. Wow, talk a little bit about uh Kristen. If you if um on your end of things, do you uh as far as the amount of states you guys are in and kind of are you guys just in Massachusetts at the moment, kind of looking to expand? Or how do you guys kind of operate the back end of getting on the retail shelves and stuff?

SPEAKER_00 13:38

So what's really exciting, I mean, difficult, but also exciting is that we our drink drops were in five other states um with air. And as sort of, you know, they had financial difficulties and sold-offs in states, we we ended up with back in just Massachusetts. But because of that, I have tons of experience in these other states. So it's been really fun to sort of get back to basics, really focus on Massachusetts, but then move forward again. New Jersey is the next regulated state we're gonna be in. And then we do have a hemp facility that we are moving forward with in Maine. Maine is a really fun state for cannabis, especially hemp. And um we're really excited to do direct to consumer in states that don't have a regulated, um a regulated program.

SPEAKER_01 14:26

What area of Maine are you guys gonna be in?

SPEAKER_02 14:29

Uh we're in southern Maine. That's actually where I am right now, is at our main facility uh right now. So uh we're in Elliott, right next to Kittery, Maine. Um so it's about 30 minutes away from our regulated facility in Massachusetts. So we're really fortunate that we found a spot and you know, live with the same operational team as we're getting things uh underfoot for us. And yeah, I'm really excited to really be able to just start distributing this product to a much, a much broader audience.

SPEAKER_01 14:55

Uh I used to, I uh my aunt lived in Maine for a long time, and so we used to go up there for the summers and stuff out in Poland Springs and uh in that area. Yeah. Lewiston, I think it was, was the other area that didn't go up.

SPEAKER_00 15:07

That's pretty southern, isn't it? Yeah, that's right around now.

SPEAKER_01 15:10

I think it's like 45 minutes outside Poland, maybe or Portland or something like that. Yeah. But uh I love that area, and and uh I love it in the summertime in the winter in the fall. But I went there on a recruit, I was recruited uh for wrestling by the University of Southern Maine. And so I went there in January.

SPEAKER_00 15:25

And oh, that's a terrible time to go.

SPEAKER_01 15:27

I love the coach, I love the team. My dad and I walked out, even it was just the tundra, and he's like, I'm like, if there were if these guys were anywhere else in the country, I'd be admired. That's not bad, but it was uh that that is a wicked place in the winter time, that's for sure. Absolutely, yeah. But um, let's let's talk a little bit about kind of your guys' role in the industry and things like that. How have you how have you guys now? This is something where both of you guys are a married couple, and we obviously we're not taking this from a victimhood standpoint when it comes down to the regulations and the confusion and the chaos and the noise that's going on. But how have you guys persevered and continue to keep the momentum going with that week in your business and your home?

SPEAKER_00 16:07

Patience. A lot of patience. And I I you know what I said earlier, I think is really important is knowing that we have wildly different skill sets. You know, I came into this and quite frankly, I never expected to be a CEO. I ex what I expected to do was help break the stigma. That was so important to me. I mean, I, you know, saw people die of opioids and fentanyl, you know, specifically fentanyl when they were using cannabis to get off of this and they couldn't get it or they couldn't get into rehabs because they were using cannabis, which was just insane to me. And so using my experience has been really great in helping to shape policy and being a beverage manufacturer and in the regulated industry gives us a platform for that, which has been which has been really great. So a a lot, you know, after leaving AIR and sort of having that platform as well as like, hey, we're independent again and being able to get out there and talk about this, I think is so important.

SPEAKER_02 17:08

I think we really connect with parenting audiences as well, right? We have three kids. So like the fact that this is our business and we work together of just asking the basic question of like, what do you tell your kids? Like, how do you educate your kids, right? And you know, that's where it's like sometimes it's as simple as saying, well, your kids know not to get into your liquor cabinet. Your kid knows that you have beer and wine in the fridge. So, like, we're putting those types of drink, you know, a similar drink format in there that they know. And for many years, for the first five years we were in, we also would add the child resistant tops as an extra step to go to that until the state kind of told us it was overkill. Um, you know, that added significant cost to us. But if it felt like it was important as we were getting the brand awareness out there of like, this is safe. We also don't want kids to have it, right? So I think us being parents, being able to help educate other parents on how to talk to their children so that we have a more educated audience, you know, growing up and saying, like, yeah, we don't want young kids to have this as well. The same way you educate them on beer and wine, educate them on our product, you know, as we grow this industry. And that way, when you're in a social setting, you can have one of these the same way. When you light up and smoke, you got to remove yourself from that situation. You got to go out, you know, to another spot. So, hey, this enables you to really start to normalize what this experience is without the hangover, without the negative effects. And really, you know, with Kristen's background in substance abuse, being an authority on that of like, this is safe. This is something that can be done. This is plant medicine at the end of the day, that we're using a recreational platform to really spread that message to destigmatize and normalize.

SPEAKER_01 18:44

I'll touch on to both points for you guys. Like, for my personally, it's uh I went to rehab, like I was I got a DUI many years ago and then had a court mandated rehab, which was the funniest thing because the judge was like, Oh, what do you do for a living? I told him I sold alcohol. He's like, Well, you, and then he just sent me right to rehab. I'm like, You didn't even, there was no basis of my history. Now, granted, I needed to go, so but it was it was one of those things where his decision was funny. But it didn't work. And Kristen, to your point, it didn't work for the sense that uh I didn't have that, I didn't have a bridge, and I wasn't able to just go cold turkey, and I wasn't able to just do I did a 12-week program and still didn't stick. And I was stubborn as hell, but it wasn't until I got to have the bridge of these products. Now, in the same sense, I'm gonna say this to everybody that's not to say everybody's built like this. I just happened to be built in a way that I needed a bridge. There are other people that need cold turkey and need that all the isolation and need the weekly meetings, and that's not me. Uh, my journey is different. But I want to I want to say I appreciate what you're saying about that because also my therapist was one of the ones that suggested this to me. Um was really helpful because I came to him and he was happening to be, he was my fifth therapist, and nobody was working, and then I all of a sudden I landed a recovering alcoholic as a therapist, and that was it. He understood me, I understood him, and the path was the it was off to the races. But also to your point, Eric, it's uh we were talking to Chris Fantes a couple weeks ago. Uh he's I don't know if you guys know him with uh high spirits. Yeah, so he was we were talking about this exact same thing, and it was really funny because he brought it up as like people ask him all the time, they're like, Well, what do you guys do you lock everything up? And he's like, What do you lock up your bourbon? He's like, Your bourbon's sitting right on your desk, your glasses in your drawer. Like, it's asinine and insane in 2026 that that question is still being asked because regardless of what you believe of the product and the plant, and read for madness and devil's lettuce and all that stuff. Let's all be really frank. I sell alcohol, and everybody in the alcohol industry knows I'm gonna say what I'm gonna say. One's an escape, and one is present, and both are harmful to your children. And they're equally harmful to your children. One you've seen around yourself your whole life and it's been in front of you, so it's normalized. The other one is new and scary because you grew up thinking it was gonna kill you and fry your brain like eggs in a pan with a dairy commercial. Which by the way, uh, just got a notification. My new dare shirt's just landed, so I'll be wrapping up.

SPEAKER_00 20:56

I have I have a couple too.

SPEAKER_01 20:58

I'm uh I'm gonna I think I might I might uh I might wear one to the to the hill climb next week in BC Austin. But um, but yeah, it's it's it's the normalization's important. And I talked to I we have a blended family of 11, 14, 15, and 20. And the 20, the 20-year-old is is very curious about it, but not in a curious way of like he wants it. He actually doesn't want it at all, but he's curious because he sees what I've been doing the past couple years, what it's done to my life, and my kids, my 14 and 15-year-old, again, curiosity there is for them because they saw the completely horrible person for many years up until I finally quit. And now they see this whole other thing, and they're just like, This is something that's like they it's not that they want it, it's not that because I've also instilled in them the discipline that you gotta be 21 years old. I'm not one of those parents that's like 16 years old, just come to my house and just they that's not me. And it's it's one of those things where like it is locked up and it is in a separate place because it's not a trust thing, but it's just a it's a curiosity thing. And if they're my children and I know the way I grew up, I was a curious kid and I experimented on things that all throughout. My life and I was a hot stove, touch it three times, kind of guy. And um, and they're my blood, so I'm gonna lock it up as much as I can. But also, we I appreciate the education piece, and I know some parents will feel uncomfortable about this because you know, whatever. But let's be honest if you're going in the garage and you're smoking and then you're coming back in your house, your kids, no matter what age they are, they know that smell. And if you take that gummy and you think you're hiding it, they know what your breath smells like. For us to pretend and not, the problem is the confusion begins when you aren't just open. And I'm gonna say that, I'm not trying to give parenting advice to anybody, but with this specific topic, if you're open with them, it won't make more confusion for them later. And when the situation does arise and they are handed that joint or they are handed that gummy, because in today's world, they are gonna be handed that way earlier than we were. And when they have that, they can acknowledge and recognize what it is and know in their parents' heads and their voice and says, that's not for me yet. Yeah, like the day will come, but it's not right now. But if you don't say anything, and that kid, that kid says to them, Hey, this is really fun, man. This is really fun, and then all of a sudden, they I want people to, I want parents to really hear what I'm about to say. They smell that because it's a sensory, it's a neurogastronomy and a sensory experience, and they smell that, and you never spent the time to talk to them. That's a correlation of sensory that they're gonna memorize and be like, Oh, my mom smells like that, and this smells like this, so it must be okay. So I'm gonna do it because you didn't take the time to detach that sensory experience to an actual educational moment. Yeah, and I really want that to kind of close in on this part of the parenting because I know I'm gonna get comments from people being like, You're fucking crazy telling your kid. I'm like, no, you're crazy for not, and letting your parent, your kids see that it's a positive, okay thing at an everyday, all day thing, and then they're gonna have their own experience. So again, I will judge parents on that, and if you want to pretend like it's not.

SPEAKER_00 23:48

Yeah, sorry, I can go.

SPEAKER_02 23:49

I was gonna share a story about our son. Um, you know, he's 11, right? And you know, for we started this in 27, you know, set 2017, he was two. So he's known this his whole life. Like he has grown up with this, with understanding that we're consumers. And while everything I do is to not smoke as much, to use our drink drops, to use, you know, use RSO, to use all the different um options that are alternatives, but I still do smoke, you know, like it's it's sort of in those rescue moments. There was one time uh where I was doing something in the garage, not smoking, and I, you know, went out, did what I needed to do, and came in. And you know, our son said, Oh, hey, where were you? And I was like, Oh, I was just uh, you know, organizing blah, blah, blah in the garage. And he just goes, Oh, I thought you were smoking cannabis. And it was so normal to him. And in the moment I was shocked. I was like, Oh my God, what did he think of me? But then he was just like, No, it was normal to him. It wasn't this weird thing. He was just asking what he was doing because he knows that it's something that I use as in to help with my ADHD, to help with these bad things into all that so even though initially I was on my heels, I was like, oh, wait, no, this is actually a beautiful moment. He's like associating that it's that it's normal to him that this happens, but he does know it's not for him. He has no interest, he doesn't have that curiosity as an 11-year-old. Um, he does talk about it. When I'm older, will I be able to try that? Absolutely. Um, and he loves when we have regular seltzers uninfused in our flavors. He feels so fun, you know, drinking those. But to this day, no matter what, they pull one of our drinks out of the fridge. We have huge labels that say no THC. It'll say no THC. He still turns those things like this doesn't have cannabis in it, right? Correct, buddy, you're good to go, you know, and that education is there.

SPEAKER_01 25:33

That's exactly our I have a whole sampling rack in the in the garage, and like that's it's all that the alcohol and the THC, and then there's other stuff in the other, there's separate rooms from the similar drinks and all that, and it's exactly that. It's like the black shelf is no go, and then everybody knows the black shelf, and I have everything color-coded and everything. So there's no confusion at all, visually or audibly. Um, Kristen, you were gonna say something there.

SPEAKER_00 25:56

Yeah, I you know, I think this is such an important topic because this is an industry unlike any of us are ever going to see again in our lifetime. You know, something that has been used for, you know, hundreds of thousands of years, that is now sort of coming back into mainstream and being able to shape the conversation around how we talk about this in public, how we talk about this with our children. You know, I feel really strongly that it's really important to be very open about this and to accept the bad and the good. You know, I'm never gonna say to my kids, like, this is something that you should have before you're 21. Like, we we all there is enough research out there to know that there are probably going to not be great effects. But at the same time, in the back of my mind, I'm hoping that they don't pick up that whiskey and that they grab something out that's something with cannabis in it, you know, if that is going to be a choice that they make. But at the same time, I hope that we've been open enough. I mean, there's also plenty of research out there to suggest that the more open you are with your kids around any substance, uh, it will be easier for them to talk to you. And the outcomes are always better because they're gonna be honest with you. If you're if you shut down anything or if you shut down talk of weed being bad in any way, shape, or form, it it hurts the conversation.

SPEAKER_01 27:18

And it's just it's just a blatant lie, and and and I think it's a it's it's it's a devaluation of your own child because you your children are smarter than you think. Yeah, especially when it comes to this point. We have to remember, like, they're growing up. We didn't grow up, I mean, we probably look like we're about the same age. We we grew up and we didn't have the four you page pushing ads into us every day. It was whatever the guy in the corner, like as we were walking down the street would you know, a coax us into some house or whatever to go. But it's like these kids, it's at their fingertips, it's in their pockets. Honest with ourselves and realize whether we talked about it or not, they've been exposed to it 16 times a day before they even had lunch. You know what I mean? Like, and that's that's a whole different ballgame. And it's like for me personally with my kids, I feel like that was that among many things, was really into their teens, opening up, being open about that and being open about what I do and seeing having them see it as a sense of pride and not a sense of embarrassment, and not for my ego, but for their own selves to be able to understand fully what I do. That that's it, it wasn't me saying, be proud of me. It was like me explaining what I do, the importance of it, the regulations, and the education of it. And then in turn, organically, they're like, Oh shit, like dad's more than just making TikTok videos, you know what I mean? Like dads doing your dad's doing real things, you know? And and it's for everybody. And I think they uh my kids especially, they listen to the they listen and watch the podcast and stuff like that. So they're gonna love this part of the conversation because they always they always get themselves caught in situations where they openly talk about it and and other people are not as comfortable about it. And I'll I'll give you one where uh I think it was my daughter was asked, like, they do the thing in class, like when she was younger, where it's like, what your parents do for a living.

SPEAKER_00 28:50

Yeah, we got we got that in the in the first dare class. My daughter came home in a dare shirt and I was like, Oh my god, we didn't talk about this before this happened. And I go, What did you what did you say? And she goes, Oh, I just told them you guys have a cannabis company. There, there is, there does, I mean, this was just recently. So clearly there is there's a a better storyline that goes along with that in in dare that I'm at least where it is, where we are in New England, where it's talked about as medicine and not something that you should be using recruitly recreationally before you're 21. So it's I was very pleased with that, but I was I definitely had a moment of panic of like, oh no, what's gonna happen when you tell them that this is the family you come from?

SPEAKER_01 29:32

Well, I'll tell you what mine did is uh she repeated, she repeated what I said as I love that. Say it this way anymore. Was when people asked what I did for a living, I would always be like, Here's the weed, I'm in the vices business, and my daughter is a product of me, and she said it the same tone, the same proudness. My dad sells weed, he's in the vices business, and oh the whole husher of the classroom. Anyway, that was the opening for me to explain everything better. Take me, uh, before we cut, we got about 10 more minutes or so, take me through the name and the branding and give me kind of the backstory of where you guys landed there, and kind of that way the audience and consumers, as well as distributors and retailers, kind of understand the intention behind where you guys did the messaging.

SPEAKER_02 30:14

Yeah, absolutely. You know, when we started, it was this idea as a brand marketer that we're coming out of prohibition, right? So, like what was that time in alcohol, right? And what did that, what were sort of some of the brands that were burned out of that uh time period? So for us, you know, we really wanted to be colorful, we wanted to be bright, we wanted to be clean design, right? Really focusing on more of a what something that you would see on a supermarket shelf or a liquor store shelf. We were intentionally not using uh traditional cannabis imagery, the leaves and things like that. Um again, from an archetype perspective, we really wanted to simplify it. You know, we thought that you know, think the strain name game can be confusing as there's all these different strains, standardization, everything going on. So we wanted to sort of position of like we did the work for you, we're gonna simplify this for you. Um and that's really where Achieve, Celebrate, and Dream were born, as sort of the effects that we wanted to focus on, similar to Sativa, and Indica, where we're sourcing that. And from us as a brand, we're really focused on the simple natural ingredients. We extract all our oil, we process it into being water soluble, we make all the drinks and say all of that. In terms of the name, we actually had a different name for a long time. Um and we were uh, you know, as former marketers, recovery marketers, we have done a good job of generating some pre-market buzz around what we were doing as we were trying to get to the get to market. There was another uh license holder that was also trying to solve the beverage problem and get there, saw us coming and put out a product quickly. They were already licensed at the time, put out a product that's essentially our same name. And then, you know, made a batch, sold the batch, sold part of the batch, whatever, and then you know, basically hit us with a cease and desist of this is confusingly similar to what we're doing. So um, you know, the name that we had prior sort of was a snowball name. It started early days when we were just doing stuff in our kitchen and above our garage and all of that. And then when we moved into the ready to drink, didn't necessarily feel like it fed, it fit per se. It uh it had really grown, but everyone sort of loved it and it was rolling off everybody's tongue. So we just sort of stuck with it. Um, so it was a four-letter word. And when we got hit with that cease and desist, we had built that brand architecture so that it was brand and effect, right? And then the license entity was a whole separate name in itself so that since we had limitations in terms of what we can protect in the in the cannabis industry, since it's federally illegal, you can't get the same trademark protections. So we knew we just needed to sort of swap out the name uh to better align with sort of the key brand tenants that we were sort of creating. So uh we ended up doing a really fun exercise that people still talk about. We just got a note about this, actually, where you know, we did a naming exercise. We came up with call it 10, 20 names that we put out. We were so close to launch, we had already pre-sold our entire first batch, first six batches that we had made. So we put a survey out to everybody in the industry that we had connected with and let them vote and participate on a name to see what they liked. We called that down to, I think, you know, eight to ten names. Then as a group, brought it down to five, handed it off to an attorney and said, which of these is the most defensible in this moment? There were two, and Levy was the clear winner. It really aligned with that lightness, that uplifting effect, that sort of elevated experience tagline that we have uh to really connect with consumers. Uh, that is really how we ended up there was in a true marketer's format of like, okay, we just need to make something that that fits with the brand, is defensible, and really can can shine for us as uh as a brand in the market in this new segment that we were trying to talk about.

SPEAKER_01 33:56

With your with your history, I was very confident in asking that question that I was gonna get the thank you for responsible. It wasn't it wasn't a dark board and a person. Yeah. The um I I appreciate the name and I appreciate like what you guys also put on on the cans. And I know you talked about in the beginning, but I want people to kind of, as you're looking at the can and you're on the website, looking at the fact of you pointing it out on the can as well. And it's not like you said about it's not some stylistic thing where it's like OG Kush and who knows what that means. You know, we know what that means, but a regular consumer isn't. But the most important thing is as we kind of close out this is I want to touch on the regulation piece. And you brought up something that I actually forgot about in all these conversations. About I always talk about, you know, you know, without regulation federally, there's no access to banking, so there's no loans. And I compare this to the craft beer boom of 2010 to 2017. And I tell people, I'm like, this could be bigger if they actually had access to banks, they had access to insurance, they didn't have to live their life scared that the bank was just going to decide that day we were gonna freeze their accounts and do an investigation and an audit, which you passed, but it wouldn't, it would just take six to twelve months of your time. And the last piece I always forget about, and I appreciate you just brought it up, is the trademark. And I didn't even think about that at all. Uh that the fact is that at any moment that could happen. You know, you could not have a defensible, or somebody could come in and do the exact exact thing, just have more money than you, and and then win based on that merit that they just could just drain you with boyers. So I want to kind of ask you guys like where where, you know, with let me rephrase what I'm trying to say here, with the regulations the way they are and being something, why is it so is that is that you know the importance of regulations to you guys? And I want to I want you guys to talk about how important it is to get this passed and to get things federally as well as whatever states you need to be in. I agree that we need to be at a place, and I'm obviously uh here in Pennsylvania doing our same thing, and we'll be in DC in a couple weeks doing the same thing again. Talk about what it is for you to be in it, be regulated and and how you don't want to be in this cowboy wild west uh crazy melee that we're in, you know?

SPEAKER_00 35:52

Research brings legitimacy. And I think that that is so huge, and I'm so excited because we've already got Blue Cross Blue Shield at the table. We've already got all these providers who, you know, on the face are it's it's a capitalist society, right? Everyone wants to make money, but they also want to save money from all the opioid issues that we're having and all the alcohol issues that we're having. And it has been very clear that at least anecdotally and from research in other countries, that there is a huge missing place for cannabis to fill. And all the cannabinoids that we're really just at the tip of the iceberg figuring out. You know, I'm I'm so excited. I mean, Charlotte's Webb, we've we've seen these documentaries, and there's so there's been research for years, and yet we're here we are. We're still dealing with this. I think uh, you know, moving to Schedule Three at least gives us some legitimacy. I mean, we live in Massachusetts. We've got Harvard, we've got MIT, we've got Northeastern, we've got BC, we've got BU, we've got all these great research universities, and I'm I am so excited about what is gonna come from that and allowing them to get federal money and take private money because they weren't even allowed to take that before, or else they'd lose other federal grants. So allowing people to do legitimate research is going to be huge, and I'm really, really excited about that. And then, of course, banking. Eric and I have been cut off from American Express, we've been cut off from a bunch of different places, and one was for my personal private practice, nothing to do with cannabis, just the association. And there's there's no comeback from that. You can't you can't fight it. So having legitimate banking when we are a legitimate state-by-state industry is so important, and you know, you can't go bankrupt when you are not a federally uh recognized business, and so that has really caused a lot of people issues as well. I mean, we've seen some great businesses go under because of that, and that's really hard.

SPEAKER_01 37:54

Yeah, it's it's really wild, even from the service side of things. Like I don't I don't produce products or transact products. I charge like, you know, rep shares of work done and all this stuff. And I've had to go through multiple, I'm not gonna name their names or anything like that, but it's like multiple point of sale systems for invoice processing, and I don't even sell the stuff. And I get it from that, where or they hold on to my funds for 30 days and do an audit of where the place comes from. And that has happened a lot more frequently. That uh it's gotten actually really frustrating in the past six months. It's increased the withholding where it's like you'll get paid, and all of a sudden it's 30, 45 days before I actually get activated the money.

SPEAKER_00 38:29

I my suspicion is that right now it's getting tighter because we're about you know, because we're getting so close, or that's my hope.

SPEAKER_01 38:37

I think they're trying to assess the baseline of activity in order to bring in the regulation. I think that's where the odds are picking in because it literally started shortly after November, and then the past couple months it's been it's been every single invoice payment, is is held for like 30, 45 days. Yeah. But um, so kind of closing out and everything like that, we're um I'm definitely gonna have you guys on again for we're gonna do some roundtables this year and stuff like that, as well as we're gonna do some uh some fun stuff when we launch the Pennsylvania Hemp bill. Uh, we want to get founders from the industry to you know do some different things and stuff like that. So I'll invite you guys back for that. But in closing, um just kind of remind everybody the brand name, the website, and then social media handles, LinkedIn, all that stuff.

SPEAKER_00 39:14

Uh Kristen Rogers from Levia, and it's www.levia.buzz.

SPEAKER_02 39:21

Eric Rogers from Levia, and we can be found on Instagram at Levia Brands.

SPEAKER_01 39:26

Perfect. Well, hey guys, I'm looking forward to this. I will send you guys an email as well to talk about Pennsylvania specific stuff. But uh, this has been awesome. And thank you guys for signing up and doing this. And I want to close out and publicly tell you guys not just was this awesome, but there was no questions and there's no script, and this is just an organic conversation. So I want to remind everybody we've never met. Uh we are complete strangers. And in 2026, I need everybody, and the world needs everybody to understand that there you can connect with strangers. You just saw us connect in 50 minutes, we're laughing, we're talking about our kids, like we don't even know anything about each other other than what we just talked about, and that's all that matters because we found common ground, we made friends, and now we're gonna end up having a relationship moving forward with this. And I need everybody to understand when you're walking down the street, look a stranger in the eye, hold a door for somebody. When you're at a gas station filling up your coffee, look to the guy or girl next to you, ask them how they're doing, and actually shut up and listen to what they say and care. Because more often than you guys think, there's a lot of people that really feel lonely right now. And if uh just a little conversation can take things a long way. So while we talked about fun hem stuff in THC, the underlying lesson for all these podcasts that we do is just to please treat people like human beings and stop being a piece of shit out there and put some positive stuff out in the world. So, Kristen and Eric, thank you guys for the courage to come on with no questions and no scripts because I get a lot of rejection emails from people who don't get they don't get the questions.

SPEAKER_00 40:49

Yeah, I love this.

SPEAKER_01 40:50

Exactly. But it's a testament to you guys and your authenticity because you know your stuff, you have a place of principle and passion in which you work, and you can hop on a code podcast and no big deal. So thank you guys so much for your time today and telling your story. No, thank you. We appreciate the opportunity. Thank you. Take care, guys.