Pubdate: Sat, 28 Feb 2015
Source: San Francisco Chronicle (CA)
Copyright: 2015 Hearst Communications Inc.
Contact: http://www.sfgate.com/chronicle/submissions/#1
Website: http://www.sfgate.com/chronicle/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/388
Author: Greta Kaul

ORDER UP A FARM-FRESH (MEDICINAL) POT VARIETY

When San Franciscans awoke Friday morning, those with medical 
marijuana cards were able to make high-grade, sun-grown cannabis 
appear on their doorsteps within an hour.

Flow Kana, the startup behind it, celebrated its new farm-to-table - 
or farm-to-bowl - service by passing joints at a Berkeley hills 
launch party Thursday night.

About 125 guests were ferried by a fleet of vans to the party at a 
posh ecofriendly house overlooking the bay. As guests traveled up the 
spindly drive, the voice of Flow Kana CEO Michael Steinmetz came 
through the speakers, dubbed over music from "Interstellar."

He ran through a few house rules (no smoking tobacco on the property) 
for his guests - many of them cannabis industry workers or investors 
- -and outlined the company's mission: "Who's going to grow my 
cannabis, and with what values?"

Customers who want to use Flow Kana begin by downloading the app. 
Once users verify that they have a medical marijuana card, a quiz 
matches them to types of cannabis they would probably favor. From 
there, customers can browse boutique strains from categories like 
chill, zen, awe and active.

Most of the time, the goods will arrive via bicycle courier, packaged 
in small mason jars, with tags indicating who grew it, where and 
when. Not unlike farmers markets, the idea is to sidestep 
dispensaries and let farmers create brands, Steinmetz said. If 
customers want to, they can read about the farmers on Flow Kana's website.

Customers pay by cash or debit card upon delivery - banking is still 
complicated for those in the weed business. The price is the same for 
any variety: $50 gets about 3.5 grams.

At the party, three women wearing flowery crowns flitted about with 
cannabis-laced treats. On the terrace, a man chose between two 
strains of marijuana - Strawberry OG and Headband - as he readied a bong.

With lights and candles around the perimeter, it was a setting fit 
for a private wine tasting. That was part of what made it special to 
Casey O'Neill, a Mendocino County cannabis farmer who will sell his 
wares through Flow Kana.

"We celebrate fine wine; we should celebrate fine cannabis," he said. 
"I really hope that this can be a nail in the coffin of prohibition."

O'Neill and other farmers see marijuana, which is more profitable 
than other crops, as a way to keep small Northern California farms 
producing vegetables on the land. O'Neill's Happy Day Farms is about 
two-thirds cannabis and one-third vegetables.

"Vegetables are soulful work, but without cannabis I wouldn't do it," 
he said, speaking of profit, but also in terms of the manual labor 
involved in farm work. He said he finds that some strains of 
marijuana, which take away his back pain but leave his head clear, 
are much more effective than regular painkillers.

Like Steinmetz, O'Neill calls marijuana medicine.

"If I take a substance and it makes me feel good, that's by 
definition a medicinal effect," he said.

States are quickly chipping away at the federal government's 
prohibition on marijuana. Medical marijuana is legal in nearly half 
of the states - California was the first in 1996. On Tuesday, Alaska 
became the third state to allow recreational marijuana, and on 
Thursday, the District of Columbia made it legal.

Marijuana aficionados in California remain hopeful that recreational 
use will become legal in 2016. After all, California's Emerald 
Triangle - Mendocino, Humboldt and Trinity counties - produces a 
sizable chunk of the marijuana grown in the U.S.

"It's important now that we're at this level that we respect the 
people who built this industry," said Jamie Kerr, who came to the 
Berkeley party from Shasta County, where she runs a dispensary and 
wholesale edibles business.

Flow Kana has adopted that philosophy, Steinmetz said, because the 
growing part of the business is a nonprofit collective of farmers.

Steinmetz's company has raised about $400,000 from angel investors, 
but the entrepreneur hopes to attract more cash quickly so he can 
expand to the rest of the Bay Area by the end of the year, and 
further as more areas make marijuana legal. He said investors are 
knocking at the door.

When PayPal cofounder Peter Thiel's venture firm put undisclosed 
millions behind Privateer Holdings, a private-equity firm focused on 
marijuana, industry insiders saw it as a sign that things are about to heat up.

Among investors, "The cannabis industry went from being a cocktail 
conversation to being taken seriously in just the last six months to 
the last year," said Troy Dayton, one of many investors at the party.

Dayton is CEO of the ArcView Group, an Oakland marijuana investment group.

"There's this race on for the Uber of cannabis," he said, alluding to 
Flow Kana and similar weed delivery startups including Meadow and Eaze.

Steinmetz is confident about his business model, which he called the 
first of its kind, because he's already plugged in to the tight-knit 
Northern California cannabis community, "For me, the supply is 
infinite," he said. "We just need to build the demand."

At least among among those at the party, there seemed to be such a 
demand. After Steinmetz wrapped up his remarks, drawing cheers from 
the crowd, the air grew heavy with marijuana's distinct musk.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom