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Nothing cannabis-related in the last 10 years found its way into our hearts, blunts and closets quite like Cookies. Even in the earliest days of transition from the medical space to the adult-use marketplace, Cookies was the most well-branded company in the cannabis industry. Today, in a world where PR people are desperate to create the kind of movement Berner\u2019s business savvy and Jigga\u2019s genetics have ignited, nothing else really comes close in the connoisseur space.<\/p>\n
Every step in the process of Cookies\u2019 rise had its own wild amount of hype. In the late 2000s, the\u00a0Girl Scout Cookies strain<\/a>, called Cookies for short, became the most sought-after new strain in the world. Then, as the second decade of the century kicked off, Cookies became the\u00a0must-have cannabis clothing brand<\/a>, moving from social media to storefronts. Today, Cookies as a\u00a0legal marijuana company<\/a>\u00a0is using its branding savvy to take the multi-pronged business even further into the future. From its humble beginning as a singular strain, no cannabis company has been as impactful as Cookies in recent times. We got the scoop on the company\u2019s beginnings from both its most-public face, Berner, as well as its very private breeder, Jigga.<\/p>\n Now a top-selling rapper with more than a dozen albums,\u00a0Berner<\/a>\u00a0first saw the earliest\u00a0Cookies phenos<\/a>\u00a0in 2006. At the time, he was still in high school in San Francisco and had just started rapping. He said he met people like noted cannabis breeders Jigga and Kenny Powers just because they were all city boys in the weed game.<\/p>\n \u201cThe first strain Jigga brought me was the Cherry Kush,\u201d Berner said. \u201cIt was hella special when I first saw it, it was amazing. It was different for me because I knew all these other rappers didn\u2019t have something like that. You pull up to the studio or the nightclub with people that have hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of jewelry on, nice cars and the limelight, but they couldn\u2019t get what I had.\u201d<\/p>\n What made things extra exciting for Berner, and the new flavors he was getting his hands on, was the fact that enthusiasm levels around\u00a0OG Kush<\/a>, Bubba Kush and Granddaddy Purple were starting to fade a bit from their peaks of the 2000s.<\/p>\n \u201cOG Kush was never played out, but the mass producers on the black market had it,\u201d Berner said. \u201cSo the Cookies, Cherry Pie and Cherry Kush came around right about the time the big mass producers got a hold of everything that had value. That\u2019s what kind of made [Cookies] special.\u201d<\/p>\n Berner was among the first in the world to lay eyes on the most-dominant strain of the decade and was able to parlay that success into launching a new level of cannabis clout around \u201cexotics,\u201d select strains with rare genetic profiles, under the name Exotics by Berner.<\/p>\n To start capitalizing on the buzz around the weed, Berner founded the clothing brand that would eventually share a logo with some of the most loved dispensaries in the country in 2015. Much like the Cookies genetics, the clothing brand also started in San Francisco.<\/p>\n Berner first whipped up the Cookies now-famous logo just in time for his video shoot with Chris Brown, Wiz Khalifa and Big K.R.I.T. for the \u201cYoko (Ono)\u201d track. He knew he wanted to wear his own clothing brand in the shoot.<\/p>\n \u201cI was in that position, so I just made the Cookies shirts,\u201d Berner said. \u201cI made the sweatshirt and I wore it in the video. And it\u2019s history.\u201d<\/p>\n As the Cookies company entered a new phase of success, with growing fan adoration for its clothing, things continued to progress with Cookies genetics.<\/p>\n \u201cWe came up with the Gelato with [breeder and grower]\u00a0Sherbinski<\/a>\u00a0and Sunset Sherbert,\u201d Berner said. \u201cNow we\u2019re developing our new flavors like the Lemon Poundcake, the Gelattis, all the fire-ass sh*t we have right now.\u201d<\/p>\n Cookies develops its strains and then provides others with the clones to grow them out. Berner said the evolving menu is part of staying dedicated to the brand. Berner also said he was excited to drop a Cookies strain lineup on the East Coast for the first time, available in a Maryland dispensary.<\/p>\n \u201cTo see the response to the menu and flavors over there is crazy,\u201d Berner said of the reception he\u2019s seeing outside of California. \u201cWe\u2019re just trying to keep this sh*t fun. It\u2019s getting more and more corporate every day. You know you have to adapt with the change.\u201d<\/p>\n Beyond the clothes and the strains, Cookies has also launched\u00a0a chain of dispensaries<\/a>. While Berner is the public face of the dispensaries, he doesn\u2019t own them, but rather his company Cookies receives a licensing fee to brand the shops.<\/p>\n Cookies has partnered with a social equity applicant to open a dispensary in San Francisco and now also has California storefronts in Modesto, Los Angeles, Oakland and Redding, as well as a dispensary in Detroit, Michigan.<\/p>\n There have been plenty of brands that have struggled to adjust to the changes that hit the cannabis world in recent years, including increased taxes and stricter regulations, but Berner said he looks at it just like he looks at music. Music changes all the time \u2014 and yet he\u2019s been doing it for 13 years.<\/p>\n \u201cAnd I haven\u2019t fell off,\u201d Berner said. \u201cI\u2019m able to adapt to the change and stay true to myself at the same time. People just got to be able to do that.\u201d<\/p>\n Berner is now looking at the bigger picture, which he says is making sure everyone everywhere doesn\u2019t have to worry about getting caught with marijuana. When I interviewed him over the phone, he noted he was somewhere you definitely don\u2019t want police to catch you with a joint, particularly if you\u2019re black or brown.<\/p>\n \u201cPeople love weed around the world. It should be legal, I don\u2019t give a f*ck what anybody has to say about it,\u201d Berner said. \u201cThis plant was put here for a reason. Yes, the [Proposition] 215 days were incredible, yes the black market was incredible, but at this point in life, I\u2019m a grown-ass man with kids. I can\u2019t be risking going to jail over some weed. And I need the weed. It\u2019s a part of my life.\u201d<\/p>\n Berner said he hopes cannabis is legalized everywhere, and that when it\u2019s legalized, people who\u2019ve spent years working in cannabis will be able to stay in the game.<\/p>\n \u201cThat\u2019s what we\u2019re doing. We\u2019re trying to bring on some of the brands that are hot, the Seed Junkys, Grand de Flora, the PowerzzzUp guys,\u201d he said, about helping people stay afloat in the cannabis industry. \u201cI encourage more companies out there that have the juice and the capability to put more people on, don\u2019t just be holding your platform to yourself. We\u2019ve really been prideful about putting other people in positions.\u201d<\/p>\n The Cookie Fam\u2019s champion of genetics, Jigga, is arguably the most famed San Francisco breeder of all time. The only problem: No one really knows who he is. Jigga doesn\u2019t have an online presence and is not known for granting interviews.<\/p>\n When I spoke with him, he was boarding a plane to Jamaica to work on Cookies\u2019 next project and took me through the paces of how he got his start, as well as what flavors we may be able to expect next from Cookies.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n The second-generation cultivator said he saw his parents get in trouble with the law in his youth over cultivating marijuana, but it didn\u2019t deter him from starting down a path that would eventually change the way connoisseur cannabis enthusiasts describe exotic marijuana. He says he grew pot under his first light was when he was about 17 years old.<\/p>\n \u201cMy mom let me pop one up in her house,\u201d Jigga said. \u201cBut my first real spot was when we graduated to our first spot in the Sunset [neighborhood of San Francisco] at 23rd and Ortega.\u201d<\/p>\n Jigga and his friends were in their late teens and had saved up for years to build out their grow.<\/p>\n \u201cWe got this hydroponic setup. We were a bunch of High Times reading kids,\u201d he said with a laugh. \u201cYou know, we\u2019d steal High Times magazines and dream of what we wanted to do.\u201d<\/p>\n Like many of his compatriots in the city, Jigga got his start as a grower by providing for San Francisco\u2019s community of terminally ill patients. Those patients and caregivers were the same community that banded together behind activist Dennis Peron in 1996 to pass Proposition 215.<\/p>\n \u201cI worked with the San Francisco Department of Public Health on HIV\/AIDS education for many years,\u201d Jigga said, noting he gave cannabis to a few of the San Francisco compassion programs that provided to the sick with medicine free of charge.<\/p>\n While Jigga is now known for creating new cannabis cultivars, he said he likely started growing with Trainwreck.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019d get varieties from up in Canada: Hash Plants, these Trainwrecks, these other things they called the original HPs. Those were probably the very first varieties I played with,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n He wasn\u2019t always sure exactly what he was working with, but he certainly had access to good seeds. At the time, the market was favoring purps and then Jack Herer. But Jigga says he always wanted to start hunting down those exotic terpene profiles he\u2019s now so known for.<\/p>\n \u201cJust growing up, I always had that want and that desire for flavors,\u201d he said. \u201cI\u2019ve known\u00a0Kenny Powers<\/a>\u00a0forever. He was the older bro at the time. He always had the wildest genetics \u2014 just different exotic flavors. We had some stuff called Breakfast. Our OG Rastafarian friend Zulu had the Hawaiian funk, like stick-to-the-bag-crazy sh*t.\u201d<\/p>\n Jigga said as soon as you got the taste back in the day for that good kush or purple, it was like you were a changed man: \u201cYou could never not be exotic, you know what I mean?\u201d<\/p>\n Jigga started pollinating his own plants after seeing guys like Dutch Seed Co., DJ Short, and now fellow\u00a0Lemonnade\u00a0<\/a>collaborator Amsterdam-based Green House Seed Company, in magazines.<\/p>\n \u201cI would see articles telling people to throw away their males. I always thought it was a conspiracy theory because they didn\u2019t want other people to enter that little niche,\u201d Jigga said with a laugh.<\/p>\n From the gate, Jigga was experimental: \u201cI\u2019m a scientist, a nerd on the low.\u201d<\/p>\n The strain that really put Cookies on the map \u2014 Girl Scout Cookies \u2014 is a cross between F1 Durban and Florida OG. Jigga reveals that discovering this now-legendary pairing was more the result of a process than a clear plan.<\/p>\n \u201cWe knew we wanted to cross the\u00a0Durban<\/a>. It was a potent variety, it had a unique smell,\u201d Jigga said, adding that this was years before Durban really took off.<\/p>\n Eventually, that Durban was paired with a strain called F1, named after the racecar. Jigga said they sometimes called the original Durban x F1 the \u201cPurple Pain,\u201d not because it was purple on the outside, but because the inside looked like a Starburst. He said it was almost reminiscent of pungent incense and he has never seen any other Durban crosses that could compare to this day.<\/p>\n Jigga started working with the Florida OG, the other half of Girl Scout Cookies\u2019 heritage, in the middle 2000s.<\/p>\n \u201cIt wasn\u2019t even called OG, it was just called Kush,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n That Florida OG traced back to Jigga\u2019s old friend who was an LA-based contractor that helped a lot of Southern California folks get their grows setup. Somewhere in the process, he got the Florida OG and eventually passed it on to Jigga.<\/p>\n But it took years for Jigga to cross the Florida OG with the F1 Durban after the pieces were in place. Jigga\u2019s other popular early entry into the cannabis genetics scene was Cherry Pie, a cross of F1 Durban with some crazy unknown purple. The Cherry Pie was such a star that Jigga wouldn\u2019t end up popping the original Girl Scout Cookies seeds for a couple of years after making them in the 2000s.<\/p>\n \u201cI never got a chance to dig into them because the Cherry Pie crosses were so f*cking fire,\u201d Jigga said. \u201cA lot of people confuse the purple in Cherry Pie paired with the F1 Durban for Grandaddy Purps, but it\u2019s way older than that. It\u2019s more than likely a Purple Urkle phenotype. We were just so hyped on those and developing those that it took another year or more just to get back into the original seeds paired with the Florida OG male.\u201d<\/p>\n Before that though, Jigga dove into some Cherry Pie x Florida OGs. That Cherry Kush was the first pheno that put what Jigga was growing on Berner\u2019s radar. Eventually, those F1 Durban x Florida OG seeds would hit the world by storm. With a minty nose and a sweet smooth taste, Cookies ascension gained much from the promotion of the strain by the\u00a0\u201cCookie Fam\u201d on Instagram<\/a>\u00a0and the company gained a passionate group of followers.<\/p>\n After leaping to cannabis fame with Girl Scout Cookies, the Cookie Fam went on to collaborate on breeding the next hype strain:\u00a0Gelato<\/a>, with Sherbinski, another San Francisco-based cultivator.<\/p>\n Gelato started the second generation of Cookie Fam strains that evolved after the Girl Scout Cookies. Jigga says that \u201cplenty\u201d of phenos from this second generation didn\u2019t make the cut to get released under the Cookies label.<\/p>\n \u201cWhen you\u2019re in your own kitchen and you know what ingredients you have to work with, you can kind of foresee what works and what doesn\u2019t work,\u201d Jigga says. \u201cYou always just play with new things, new varieties, that don\u2019t end up making the cut.\u201d<\/p>\n Jigga said Kenny Powers, another breeder in the Cookies Fam, is the best for not allowing things to make it out of R&D if they don\u2019t deserve to join the famed lineup of genetics. Over the years, all the seeds Jigga and friends popped to get these wild genetics varied in number.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cThe way I like to [start a new pheno hunt is], as soon as you can, propagate 20 to 30 seeds \u2014 just to see a quick view,\u201d Jigga said. \u201cFlower those out to see if it\u2019s even worth going further into a bigger hunt.\u201d<\/p>\n From there, Jigga said the number of seeds he\u2019ll pop can get up to a few hundred if he starts to see the potential. \u201cNowadays you can spend your time to go search out 1,000-plus [seeds], but I don\u2019t think you really need thousands to really find something.\u201d<\/p>\n The next generation of Cookies strains includes a few big winners. The Y x Snowman pairing named after the NBA player Gary Payton is one of the strains the wider marketplace is most excited about. It\u2019s under the Powerzzz Genetics line, a subset of the Cookies brand headed by Powers. At the Cookies launch in Modesto, California in January 2020, this current batch of genetics drove what was the biggest line I\u2019ve ever seen at a dispensary. On top of this new era of genetics, Cookies is now involved in major collaborations with folks on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean.<\/p>\n Jigga held his new breeding projects close to the chest, but said he\u2019s been working with a lot of his main stock of genetics. However, with all the backcrossing, he says the genetics he has have just naturally evolved. But with the rapid pace that Cookies is scaling up, how much time will Jigga have to continue his quest for new flavors in the hands-on fashion that ruled the previous decade?<\/p>\n \u201cAs much as I\u2019d like,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n The terpene profiles that are exciting Jigga these days are tweaks on Papaya. He says that G-13 is an older cut he wants to try and get back in the rotation.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u201cI still love those exotic flavors, but with the gases,\u201d Jigga said. \u201cI\u2019m into the\u00a0MACs<\/a>. And hash strains, high terpenes, just super gassy good solvent-less washing strains. The ones that really put off the flavors and you\u2019re able to capture them in that form.\u201d<\/p>\n With breeders pumping out so many variations on any given strain these days, Jigga believes it takes years to really understand any given tree of genetics he\u2019s working with, and just for it to stabilize to final potential.<\/p>\n \u201cAfter a few generations, she becomes a mature version of herself,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Some of the upcoming windows into that quest to understand the terps will include collaborations with Dr. Dre and\u00a0Damian Marley<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019ve got flavors that are just, oh man, we are going to shock the world once again,\u201d Jigga said. \u201cPowerzzz is upcoming with some next level sh*t, it\u2019s going to be crazy.\u201d<\/p>\n Under all the assorted Cookies affiliated flags, over 40 strains are now in full production. That includes Runtz, Grand De Flora, Lemonnade and Cookies.<\/p>\n I asked Jigga what it\u2019s like now to see Cookies as the standard-bearer for successful urban cannabis brands, a company that grew organically out a world where public relations machines are now trying to convince the consumer what great weed is.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s crazy. It\u2019s really a gift we\u2019re able to give our children if we do it right,\u201d he said. \u201cThe taste of the future of cannabis genetics is in the hands of us really, you know? To have that opportunity, responsibility, it\u2019s a rush. It\u2019s beautiful. And it\u2019s what keeps you passionate, keeps you motivated. Keeps your love, keeps your vibe going around. Imagine being able to develop the taste of cannabis, for the last decade, and decades to come.\u201d<\/p>\n TELL US<\/strong>, have you tried a Cookies strain or sported any gear?<\/p>\n The post Cookies Crush<\/a> appeared first on Cannabis Now<\/a>.<\/p>\n
Nothing cannabis-related in the last 10 years found its way into our hearts, blunts and closets quite like Cookies. Even in the earliest days of transition from the medical space to the adult-use marketplace, Cookies was the most well-branded company in the cannabis industry. Today, in a world where PRContinue Reading<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":41944,"comment_status":"false","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[3931,50,1266,99,760,13450,72],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41943"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=41943"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41943\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":41945,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41943\/revisions\/41945"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/41944"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=41943"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=41943"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=41943"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Berner: Cookies Culture<\/h4>\n
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Jigga: Cookies Creator<\/h4>\n
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The First Cookies Cultivar<\/h4>\n
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\nRead More: Cookies Crush<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"