The Pioneering Women of 48North

Integrity and Innovation in The Cannabis Industry

By Brie Jarrett

Photo Credit 48North

In the last few years, attitudes and perceptions have radically shifted regarding cannabis, from the stereotypical stoner to the mainstream recreational user, with many Canadians today now feeling cannabis can be a part of a natural health solution.

"The demographic for our company, we would rather see the educated consumer, the responsible adult, and it is one of the reasons we market towards women," says Jeanette VanderMarel, Co-CEO of 48North Cannabis Corp., a vertically integrated cannabis company focused on the health and wellness market. “I always say, women are the chief medical officers for their family. We would like to be the trusted company. We are very strict on products and brands we work with; it has to be all-natural products, no synthetics, grown organically.”

Photo by Nicole Breanne

Last year, VanderMarel owned and operated Good and Green, an indoor-licensed cannabis production company and found she shared similar values and visions as 48North CEO, Alison Gordon. Rather than compete against each other in the market, they decided to merge their companies and collective knowledge, becoming Co-CEOs, with Gordon spearheading marketing, sales and investor relations and VanderMarel managing operations, government relations and human resources.

Gordon, co-founder of Rethink Breast Cancer and former chief marketing officer for Weed MD, worked extensively in the United States prior to cannabis legalization in Canada. While most of her colleagues in Canada were knee-deep in regulations, focused on building massive cultivations and on the medical market, Gordon was seeing an evolution of products in scope along with a transition from homemade to branded products.

“Everyone in Canada thought I was crazy because I said it’s a consumer package goods industry; no, it’s medical (they said,) and now we can see that ultimately it is a consumer package goods industry. That’s the vision I brought to 48North.” Gordon states, continuing, “Marketing and branding is about selling a story, selling a vision, selling a product and when you run a public company and you’re in the cannabis industry and that industry is new, you have to have the ability to sell the vision and sell the story and this is where I’ve had a lot of success.”

Photo by Nicole Breanne

Gordon recognized, as certain next generation products are set to be legalized this coming October, the need to partner with companies that have standards and experience aligned with the vision of 48North, thereby reducing the learning curve.

“Cannabis is a strange industry,” explains Gordon, “because you are in the cultivation business, the extraction business, but you’re also in the food, vape and cosmetic industries.” 48North’s strategy is to partner with best-in-class companies to not only innovate and create great new products but to deliver consistently on them. Recently they have signed exclusive partnerships with leading U.S. companies Avitas, a single strain vaporizer cartridge (avitasgrown.com) and Mother & Clone, a rapid-acting sublingual cannabis nanospray (momandclone.com). In April 2019, 48North partnered with humble+fume (humbleandfume. com) to build a state-of-the-art cannabis extraction facility and packaging line, in Brantford, Ontario.

VanderMarel, was raised in agriculture and her entrepreneurial family was one of the larger apple growers in Ontario.

Photo by Nicole Breanne

“Our kitchen table was a bit of a board room since I was a kid, trying to manage staff, logistics, etc.” she says. From there she went into health care and became a registered nurse, a critical care pediatric specialist at McMaster Hospital in Hamilton, Ontario. VanderMarel’s interest in cannabis was peaked in 2009 after hearing about families using cannabis for epilepsy, a cause near and dear to her heart as her daughter, born in 1994, sadly passed away in 2003 from Dravet Syndrome, a disease characterised by uncontrollable epilepsy.

Around this time, she had bought with her husband Scott, a 25-acre hobby farm in Jerseyville, Ontario – growing lavender and starting the Ontario Lavender Association. Still investigating cannabis and wanting to see clinical trials for epilepsy, VanderMarel learned that Health Canada was accepting applications for growing cannabis for research and development.

“In late 2012 they came back and asked if we would like to be a commercial producer," she explains. "We said yes! We self-funded and built out the facility, which is now The Green Organic Dutchman, known as TGOD, traded on the TSX. Quite a large company and the value is just under $2-billion right now.” Proud founder, with large shareholdings still in the company, VanderMarel is no longer involved in the management, having resigned her board seat in summer 2017. VanderMarel saw there was still gaps though in the cannabis industry; very few women and most of the industry focused on stock promotion, rather than growing good product. VanderMarel started Good & Green, and was the fastest license ever issued in Canada, purchasing the building in February 2018 with licencing in October 2018.

Photo by Nicole Breanne

On October 17, 2018 Health Canada’s Cannabis Act came into effect, legalizing outdoor cultivation of cannabis on a commercial level. With this new regulation, legal cannabis companies could significantly reduce the costs involved in growing cannabis, compared to an indoor facility or a greenhouse which was welcome news for many in the industry.

Gordon and VanderMarel, saw this new development as a step forward in the burgeoning cannabis industry in Canada, allowing them to grow product more economically, but equally important, substantially reducing their carbon footprint.

“The cannabis industry is very energy intensive, and corporate social responsibility is one of our key mandates. We want to be a carbon negative company, so by having the farm we are actually reducing our carbon footprint to less than nothing,” explains VanderMarel.

Photo by Nicole Breanne

Already with licenced indoor facilities in Kirkland Lake and Brantford, Ontario, 48North set the ball in motion by submitting the voluminous 160-page application just four days after the Cannabis Act came into effect. Reported to be the first to apply they hoped to receive licensing in time for the 2019 planting season.

Photo Credit 48North

In preparation, 48North purchased an organic farm in Brant County, complete with the necessary infrastructure needed such as tiling for drainage and irrigation ponds. The company promptly installed the extensive high-tech security required for the farm, with local Brantford company Maich Security Inc. as the General Contractor and Security System Integrator and Installer. It was a massive undertaking, requiring 72 hydro poles, installed to power the security system and 8,300 feet of high-security fence around the perimeter of the property. Using state-of-the-art fibre optics, microphonic detection system and infrared cameras to reduce light pollution, the facility is protected by HD quality, 24-hour CCTV surveillance.

Photo by Brian Couture

Long anticipated, 48North received the green light from Health Canada for its 100-acre organic farm on May 17, 2019. The Good Farm as it’s called, now licensed, positions 48North as one of the largest-ever licensed cannabis operations in the world, expanding their expected capacity from 5,000kg annually to over 45,000kg.

This is a major step forward for 48North in producing high quality, sun-grown, low-cost organic cannabis in preparation for the next generation products that will be available to sell in October 2019. With one crop a year on their nearly four-million square feet farm, it is equal to a one-million square feet greenhouse producing four crops a year.

Photo by Brian Couture

The Good Farm cannabis crop will be used mainly for extraction for use in next generation products, while the Delshen facility in Kirkland Lake and the Good House facility in Brantford will provide that controlled environment for products needing consistency. Even though legal cannabis companies can use certain pesticides, 48North chooses to grow organically, something VanderMarel and Gordon are passionate about and one of only a few companies in the industry that grow organically - one of many things that sets them apart from other growers.

When asked what motto they live by, Gordon, without hesitation, states, “Always be hustling. I live and breathe what I do, so you have to love it and be passionate about it because there are always opportunities.”

Photo by Brian Couture

VanderMarel’s sage philosophy is “always say yes. Take opportunities and challenges and don’t let fear guide you. It’s important to take those meetings where there is opportunity and explore them. Don’t go with your gut reaction and say no - listen - at least explore it.”

With the legalization of the cannabis, many executives from the finance, junior mining and venture capitalist industries were attracted, resulting in the industry being 94 percent male dominated. Gordon and VanderMarel represent the six percent of women leaders in this industry and are two of only eight women cannabis industry CEOs in Canada. Gordon and VanderMarel’s diverse experience combined with their unique perspective as women leaders, bring a refreshing vision while forging new frontiers in the cannabis industry, and they do it exceptionally well. ~