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As one of the most profoundly accomplished female entrepreneurs in cannabis, Wanda James is simultaneously shattering the glass and<\/em> grass ceilings. The founder and CEO of the Denver-based dispensary, Simply Pure, is blazing a trail for not only women of color, but for women in general.\u00a0<\/p>\n James is the first legally licensed African American dispensary owner in the US. She attributes that to her strong work ethic; a willingness to trust her intuition; a readiness to pivot when necessary; and the influence of her \u201cremarkable\u201d father, who raised James and her brother alone.<\/p>\n \u201cMy dad used to always tell me, \u2018If you\u2019re ever walking down the street and something tells you to turn left, but you need to keep going straight, follow your gut: Turn left,\u2019\u201d James says. \u201cHe always told me not to let someone talk you out of not feeling that instinct.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n James learned to trust her gut and listen to her intuition\u2014an ability that helped her form a strong sense of self and build a successful career as an adult. She says she never felt that growing up without a mother changed who she was or who she could become. Being part of a family without traditional gender roles helped form her expectations of the future: As she saw it, anything was possible.\u00a0<\/p>\n After graduating from the Naval ROTC program as the first Black female in 1986, James admits she didn\u2019t understand the significance of many of her accomplishments until years later. She found discipline and structure within the military, something James admits she needed at the time. So, James didn\u2019t realize that it was uncommon for her to be the only Black woman in ROTC, or the only female officer or one of very few Black executives in corporate America. She says she didn\u2019t realize she was America\u2019s first Black dispensary owner either.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cI didn\u2019t even know that until I think it was MSNBC that brought it up, because I didn\u2019t know it was unusual,\u201d she says. \u201cThe more I\u2019m experiencing and looking back, I\u2019m now saying, \u2018Well, dang, I was<\/em> the only woman. I was like, \u2018Go me!\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n Her work as a Fortune 500 Executive, a small business owner and a leading advocate in the cannabis industry led James to work with government leaders including President Obama, Vice President Harris, Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, Rep. Barbara Lee and Colorado Governor Jared Polis. She says she focuses on social equity<\/a>, justice and ending the War on Drugs. She ran for election to the University of Colorado Board of Regents representing District 1 and won in Colorado\u2019s general election on November 8, 2022. With yet another achievement, James is a first-generation graduate of CU Boulder. Combined with the fact that there hasn\u2019t been a Black woman on the Board of Regents since the 1980s, it\u2019s another remarkable accolade in her career.<\/p>\n James admits that some of her life\u2019s most significant decisions weren\u2019t planned.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWhen the universe presents something to you in a moment\u2014whatever that is\u2014your \u2018spidey\u2019 senses, your gut, all of a sudden, it all comes together and it\u2019s like, that\u2019s what you\u2019re doing,\u201d she says. \u201cAnd so, I wish I could tell you\u2014even with everything with cannabis, even with going to college and joining the military\u2014all of those decisions were things that the universe presented me with at a time when that wasn\u2019t what I was looking for. But it all said, \u2018Say yes.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n But the road hasn\u2019t always been easy. James says it\u2019s these tougher experiences\u2014learning how to overcome hardships\u2014that have provided her with many of the skills necessary to succeed. James made this clear while speaking to a political science class at CU Boulder. A student asked about her many career highlights, so she started running through her triumphs, but then, she suddenly stopped and said, \u201cI need you to all understand that all of this happened because other things didn\u2019t go right.\u201d<\/p>\n Even in the competitive landscape that Denver dispensaries operate, she says her shop\u2019s superpower is that they\u2019ve remained small and have yet to take on any debt. Also, James says their ultimate success is because of the people behind the work.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019re like The Little Engine That Could<\/em>,\u201d she starts. \u201cNobody has been greedy. My investors have held on even when they don\u2019t always get dividends. But we\u2019ve all looked at it as if we\u2019re almost at the point of legalization. It\u2019s been the people who work there as well as what we believe about the plant. And it shows. We take time to explain things to customers; we\u2019re not trying to rush them in and out. We\u2019re doing the antithesis of what every consultant says you should be doing in a retail operation.\u201d<\/p>\n When it comes to counseling women trying to break into the industry, James isn\u2019t all sunshine and roses\u2014not even close. \u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWhenever I\u2019m asked about advice I\u2019d give to women about entering the cannabis industry, I\u2019m always torn between wanting to give the uplifting answer that I know somebody in my position should deliver to folks,\u201d she says. \u201cIt should be something like, \u2018Hey, believe in your dreams, and yes, your cake can be on the shelf of every dispensary out there.\u2019 But, sadly, that\u2019s not the case at all. I\u2019ve always been about entrepreneurism. I love being an entrepreneur. I\u2019m wired that way. Not everybody is wired to be an entrepreneur.\u201d<\/p>\n James emphasizes the importance of understanding what you\u2019re getting yourself into. While some people may have their heart set on starting and growing a business, others may be better suited working alongside a team of passionate employees.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cThere are incredible careers and high-paying jobs in the cannabis space,\u201d she says. \u201cIf you\u2019ve never run a business, if you don\u2019t understand mass distribution, if you\u2019re not looking at scaling your product line the same way Coca-Cola scales, then in that case, you\u2019re in the wrong business. If you\u2019re not looking to build that kind of business, sitting in front of a computer most days, having countless meetings with people you may not like very much and who don\u2019t understand your passion and don\u2019t speak your language, cannabis may not be your calling.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Luckily for James, cannabis was the siren call she never knew she needed to answer. After a lifetime of groundbreaking firsts\u2014in cannabis and in business\u2014this dynamic force of nature is determined to keep following her gut and continue making her father proud.\u00a0 \u00a0<\/p>\n This story was originally published in issue 48 of the\u00a0print edition<\/a>\u00a0of Cannabis Now. Read it now on the Cannabis Now\u00a0iTunes app<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n The post The Pioneer<\/a> appeared first on Cannabis Now<\/a>.<\/p>\n
As one of the most profoundly accomplished female entrepreneurs in cannabis, Wanda James is simultaneously shattering the glass and grass ceilings. The founder and CEO of the Denver-based dispensary, Simply Pure, is blazing a trail for not only women of color, but for women in general.\u00a0 James is the firstContinue Reading<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":562,"featured_media":67491,"comment_status":"false","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[50,21,1077,1484,85,65,6535,7067,420,5654,510,4229,5429,16958,6538,17223],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67490"}],"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\/562"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=67490"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67490\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":67492,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67490\/revisions\/67492"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/67491"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=67490"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=67490"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=67490"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Wanda](\"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/08\/Wanda-James-with-VP-Kamala-Harris-1.jpg\")
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\nRead More: The Pioneer<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"