Can You Name a Mainstream Cannabis Brand?

Updated May 2024

Tech startups aren’t the only companies that dream of building a brand that can change the world. Cannabis founders are just as hungry to make their mark—and the field is still wide open for a cannabis business to become the first truly mainstream brand of its kind.

Back in 2021, Grasslands CEO and Founder Ricardo Baca wrote in a column for Rolling Stone: 

“I believe our first legitimate national cannabis brand could emerge sometime in 2024—exactly 12 years after Colorado and Washington became the first two states to legalize recreational cannabis.”

The industry changed remarkably in the young 2020s. But Ricardo’s question is still on the table—can you name a mainstream cannabis brand?

Ricardo defined national mainstream recognition as “a brand that has broken through the awareness bubble of your family in the Midwest and your not-so-savvy friends on the East Coast.” And he felt that the industry just wasn’t there yet—but that it was getting close.

What a difference a few years can make. For one, your family in the Midwest probably lives near a dispensary now. 

Legal cannabis markets in Michigan and Illinois, for instance, have both had a chance to mature since dispensaries opened there in 2019 and 2020, respectively. And since 2021, adult-use cannabis markets have opened or been approved in Connecticut, Delaware, Maryland, Minnesota, Missouri, New Mexico, New York, Ohio, Rhode Island and Virginia.

Medical cannabis markets have opened even in deeply conservative states in the Sunbelt and South. Florida voters will have a chance to cast ballots in November 2024 on moving from med-only to rec. And the discourse around rescheduling cannabis at the federal level has only intensified in the leadup to the 2024 presidential election.

As cannabis legalization and support for legal cannabis have spread, so has B2C consumer education—and brand awareness. 

In 2021, Forbes had yet to put a cannabis entrepreneur on the cover—but the longtime financial publication did the following year, when Cookies founder Berner landed on the front of the August/September 2022 print issue. 

Some of the biggest brands in cannabis, including Curaleaf, Green Thumb Industries, Innovative Industrial, Verano Holdings, Trulieve Cannabis and Cresco Labs have a presence in at least one-third of the country. Celebrity weed brands have proliferated, too, with backers that range from the usual suspects like Willie Nelson and Seth Rogen to unlikelier investors like Gwyneth Paltrow and Bella Thorne. 

But are any of those brands truly mainstream in the way that, say, Walmart, Apple or Nike exist in the public consciousness? And more importantly—is going mainstream what cannabis brands really want?

The Pros and Cons of Growing into a Mainstream, “Generic” Cannabis Brand

Some scholars think the word charas is a metonym for “sieved hashish produced in the Greater Khorasan from the thirteenth century on [that] was cured and carried in leather pouches called charas by qalandars … who indulge in sacramental hashish intoxication.” 

But that ancient, niche example is as close as the industry really gets to a cannabis brand that serves as a deonym for, say, pre-rolls or vape batteries or hash as a category the way the brand name Kleenex can stand for the category of facial tissues in general or how Coke refers to all soft drinks in some parts of the South. 

Grasslands has worked with some of the most iconic cannabis brands in the business, including Cookies, Puffco, Alien Labs and others. We strive every day to position our clients in the national zeitgeist and we have collaborated with our friends and clients to build brands from the ground up, as with members of New York-based Housing Works’ CAURD cohort. 

Our clients have goals as diverse as the brands themselves. And while some founders openly embrace world domination as a goal, mainstream recognition can come at a price. Take for example, the terms “dumpster” or “trampoline”—both examples of items that became so widespread that most people who use these deonyms are unaware they ever referred to a specific, trademarked product rather than a category of waste disposal bins or outdoor children’s toys.

The cannabis industry still has a long way to go before its brands and products become ubiquitous enough to be absorbed into the common vernacular. The legal landscape is still in a stage where PR for individual cannabis brands is PR for the industry as a whole.

There is also a countercultural cool inherent to cannabis that resists genericization. Even as mainstream consumers embrace cannabinoids as part of their wellness practice alongside other natural products like supplements and healthy snack foods, the plant maintains an aspirational, individualist edge. That’s even more true for purpose-driven brands that position themselves in terms of a particular cause or a set of mission, vision and values, rather than sheer market dominance.

Indeed, it took decades for natural products brands to move beyond organic food co-ops and health food stores. Although the sector meaningfully began at the turn of the 20th century and was growing rapidly by the mid-century, it didn’t really go mainstream until the late 1980s and 1990s. That’s when mainstream corporate brands started snapping up independent natural products brands like Whole Foods, Celestial Seasonings, Burt’s Bees and Boca Foods. 

Today, it’s no longer a niche to seek out brands that are certified organic, all-natural or cruelty-free. In fact, the wellness industry has never been bigger, or more profitable.

Not to sound like your little sibling on a road trip, but are we there yet? Compared to more mature sectors of the wellness and natural products space, the cannabis industry still has a ways to go before we arrive at a truly mainstream weed brand. 

But Ricardo was right—the industry gets closer to mainstream recognition every year. As huge emerging markets continue to open and mature up and down the East Coast and throughout the Midwest, it’s only a matter of time.

As Ricardo wrote in 2021: 

“That’s what is so compelling to many—myself and my colleagues, included—about the modern cannabis industry. We’re still in the first inning, and the field of play is wide open. You see some cannabis brands stealing second base, and you see others warming up and swinging for that grand slam—and some of them are striking out, while others are connecting in a big, meaningful way. And in the next few years, we will see businesses emerge in such dominating positions that their brand names end up defining entire categories—in the same way we drink Cokes and order Ubers, regardless of the actual specifics.”

How Can I Get My Cannabis Brand to Go Mainstream?

So how can cannabis brands prepare for the big leagues? With a proactive marketing and PR strategy that understands the long game of brand building, even as you stack up short-term wins. 

The first generation of mainstream cannabis brands will almost certainly have four key elements in place:

• A future-proof brand name that can grow with the business
• A robust PR strategy that understands how to build media relations and narrative momentum to move from cannabis trades to mainstream media
• A brand message map that charts a clear path to win over key audience segments, from internal stakeholders to underserved demographics to new geographic constituencies
• A thought leadership strategy that positions cannabis executives not just as industry leaders, but business leaders—period

Hungry to be a mainstream cannabis brand one day? Curious how to start that journey as a single-state, independent weed brand or to stay on course as a growing MSO? Reach out today to talk about how a Journalism-Minded Agency™ like Grasslands can help refine your brand’s creative and strategic communications plan.