Kristine Brooks had no good reason to rent me her building and a lot of solid reasons not to. Located in the central part of the City of Shasta Lake and situated on a corner of the main drag, Kristine’s building was one of the nicest in town with an attractive brick exterior, loads of plate glass windows, and jasmine flowers creeping along the brick.
Although the building was vacant, there was no “For Lease” sign in the window, as my several drive-bys confirmed. I had even pulled into the parking lot and peeked in the windows on a couple of occasions, looking for any clue as to who owned it, but without luck. Every time I drove by, I fell more in love with the building. The interior was already laid out ideally with a check-in counter and seating area. I could see myself behind the counter, welcoming customers and chatting with them while I verified their documents. I could see the separate room behind the counter where the dispensing room would be located.
It was perfect, and I had to have it.
Keeping my eye on my vision helped me enormously as I started looking for a space to launch my new business. But I also deployed another important strategy that’s guided me to success: looking for and, more important, trusting the green lights encountered along the way. The first of my green lights came from Kristine, who saw the risk—the incredible leap of faith—that I was taking and decided to take one of her own.
My ideal building had a couple of very specific requirements. First and foremost, I wanted a freestanding building. The idea of sharing a common wall with another business just seemed like a recipe for conflict over three issues: odor, security, and parking.
Whether you find it heavenly or hellacious, there is no denying that cannabis has a strong aroma that itself is the subject of much controversy. The last thing I wanted was to wind up sharing a wall with a crotchety next-door neighbor who was on the opposing side of that debate.
Security is integral to any cannabis operation, and I needed the ability to make my business and its building’s perimeter as secure as humanly possible without worrying what ears or conspiring minds might be lurking behind that fourth wall.
As any retailer will tell you, there is a direct correlation between abundant parking and a solid revenue stream. I wanted lots of my own parking, and I didn’t want to have to fight that same crotchety neighbor for my future customers’ share.
I was also looking for a building that was centrally located in a regular retail zone. I didn’t want to be off in some obscure commercial zone that would make visiting the store difficult for customers. Additionally, I objected on principle to the idea that a cannabis store should be kept hidden away like a city’s dirty little secret.
Kristine’s building checked all of my boxes. Plus, it was pretty.
I knew the city planning department had tax records, and I asked the friendly lady at the counter who owned the Locust Avenue building. She gave me a name but didn’t have a phone number. Fortunately, the internet supplied the number, and I was able to make contact with Kristine. When I told her about my proposed business and my vision during that first phone call, she agreed to a meeting at her building. While walking through the building, she explained that although her former tenant, LabCorp, had vacated the premises and moved their location, they were still under contract with her for another six months. She also informed me that they were even paying her above the current market rent. I was crushed.
With my heart in my throat, I listened to her ruminate about the advantages of releasing them early in order to secure a new, potentially long-term tenant, the whole time waiting for the “Thanks, but I’ll pass.” But it never came.
Not only did she agree to release LabCorp from their contract so that she could lease her building to me, but she agreed to a lower monthly rent that was more in line with the current market value. She also didn’t require a deposit. I could not believe my good fortune. As my high school driver’s ed teacher used to say, “If that light gets any greener, we can smoke it.” If he only knew how apropos that comment would be to me in later years. Yep, that light was as green as they get.
The green lights are always there, and the Universe will always present them to you. Your job is to pay attention, watch for them, and, when you see them, step on the accelerator. Hard.
There will be times when you will need to step on the brake, of course. The red lights do come, but even they can be used productively. Use that red light as time to think, reevaluate, and fine-tune your dream. But don’t let your foot get too comfortable there. Such paralysis—in the form of insecurity, worry, and fear—will mean the death of your vision. Trust that the green light will come again, and when that happens, you have to hit the gas.
Many years later, Kristine told me that I was not the first person to contact her about putting a cannabis store in her building.
“Then why me?” I asked her.
“You were so enthusiastic, confident, and well spoken, I decided to take a chance on you,” she replied.
I remember that first day I met her in August 2009, standing in the unair-conditioned lobby of what would become 530 Collective. Sweltering in the Shasta County summer heat, she told me that owning your own business was always ten times harder than you expected, but that it was always better than working for someone else.
She was absolutely right.
To this day, I owe Kristine an enormous debt of gratitude. At a time when cannabis stores were all but unheard-of, she took a tremendous leap of faith in support of an unproven businessperson. She also told me that her attorney had tried to talk her off the cannabis ledge, advising her that renting to such a tenant could put her building at risk of federal seizure and forfeiture. She ignored him and went with me anyway.
The building was mine. She gave me the keys, and I was one step closer to making my dream a reality.