The first thing you notice when you walk into the Bud & Breakfast called "B and B 420" is that it's really, really clean. There's a sense of relief you get when you realize where you live is going to be nice - better than good, better than your house. The second thing you notice is the faint smell of fresh marijuana in the air, and a gram sample sitting in a Tupperware container on a coffee table tray, next to some rolling papers and a pipe. The third thing you see is the light streaming through the windows, reflecting off the snowy backyard, highlighting the tasteful furniture, king size bed, flat screen TV, "No Smoking" sign and ironically hanging to the right The "B&B 420" poster is opposite it. The sign isn't tongue-in-cheek - no smoking here. Technically marijuana.
I found B and B 420 on Bud and Breakfast, a site that does exactly what its name suggests: It's like AirBnB, except it provides users with cannabis-friendly places to stay. Some places, like B and B 420, offer free cannabis samples to guests, while others simply offer a cannabis-friendly place to stay where connoisseurs won't get in trouble for vaping or smoking inside or outside the house . This website serves buds and breakfasts around the world, both where recreational and/or medicinal cannabis use is legal, and where it is not, at the owner's own legal risk. Bud and Breakfast launched in April 2015 with just one accommodation and now has more than 300 properties around the world. Co-founder and CEO Sean Roby told me that if current growth rates continue, they expect to have 3,000-4,000 public companies by the end of 2016.
The company's rapid expansion reflects a booming industry across the medical and recreational cannabis markets — cannabis tourism, or "cannabis tourism," as it's affectionately called. In the six months since the state's first recreational marijuana retailer opened in July 2014, searches for accommodations in Seattle increased 64 percent, according to Hotels.com, even though local and state tourism agencies don't endorse or promote it Marijuana is an attraction in Colorado, and a survey by the Colorado Department of Tourism found that 48% of Colorado’s tourism industry is related to marijuana.
I myself was in Denver for two nights to cover the Women in Growth Leadership Summit, a conference connecting women in the emerging cannabis industry – so it seemed only fitting that my accommodations would match my other experiences But that's all.
As I was putting my stuff down, Darrel Hoffman, the owner of B and B 420, knocked gently on my door. Darrel, 45, is a tall, handsome man with the mature style of a Colorado snowboarder. His eyes were reddish and he looked shy, or at least wary of pushing anyone, and he said he just wanted to welcome me and make sure I knew how to use the Keurig, the heater, and the security code on the door. He then directed my attention to my supplemental bud samples, one of which was a fresher-than-fresh strain he grew himself called "Guerrilla Glue." "They're super delicious. Just like at home," he said, and asked me to continue.
Feeling exhausted and overwhelmed after a long day of traveling and reporting, I knew I wasn't going to smoke and leaf through the B and B 420 guest books. It was filled with gushing letters of thanks from all over the country.
I made myself a cup of sleep tea, took a luxurious shower, and then stepped on the Tempurpedic bath mat that fits my feet. I feel very cool when I step on it. This is a bathroom with modern facilities and cleanliness, suitable for town and leisure , with a small and strange difference, hanging directly above the toilet.
The next morning, I invited Darrell to join me at the restaurant, where he offered a $20 gift certificate each day in lieu of a homemade breakfast. He drove me in his pickup truck, and as we walked in, the hostess and waitress at the Broadway Breakfast smiled in approval. “I’ve always been here,” he said with a smile.
"People from Texas say, 'Oh, man, we can't even talk about marijuana... They feel like refugees, and when they come here, they're like foreigners. They hang out, they love it. Every Everybody loves it.”
I sipped black coffee and Darrell's orange juice as he recounted how he started smoking marijuana as a teenager in Florida. Marijuana, for him, has always been a treatment for attention-deficit disorder, he said. "People like me, naturally, have so much energy. When I first started smoking weed, I felt like my friends might always feel that way. I feel normal. I sleep better Something, to be less irritable and hyper."
He moved to Colorado, where marijuana has not yet been legalized for recreational use, but medicinal use is. "In Breckenridge, you can get fined for possessing just one ounce. One ounce is a lot of weed. In Florida, you can get into a lot of trouble."
When Darrell arrived in Colorado, he met an older man, a high school dropout turned millionaire who needed help with his growing business. He took on Darrell and two other young men as apprentices, from where Darrell learned the art and science of growing cannabis. In addition to running the B&B, he serves as a consultant to Colorado growers. He prefers small plantations, where you can pay more attention to each plant and even talk to them. (He even once played pieces by Vivaldi and Chopin and observed how they flourished.)
But the industry is growing, and he has to keep up—Darrell also consults on large-scale growing operations; the warehouse can house more than 300 plants, which require fertilizers, trimmers and hundreds of bulbs to keep up with demand. He doesn't seem concerned that the industry is growing so big and so fast.
"I used to be angry about it - I fought against it a little bit. But then I realized there was nothing I could do about it. So like everything else, I just let it be, I just went with it and did the best I could ”
Bringing cannabis and entrepreneurship together seems to be the Denver way, which is how Darrel came up with the idea for B and B 420, which opened just last May. He saw an opportunity in the market for all cannabis visitors to Denver to have accommodations that matched the rest of their trip. He worked with his friends to build an extension to his house and eventually connected with the folks at Bud and Breakfast to post his stay.
"I didn't expect to be this busy. My whole life has been about doing things and not planning too much," he said. Darrel is booked 25 days a month from May to September.
He had guests from all over. Ninety percent of people travel specifically for marijuana, he said. The other 10% belongs to the industry itself. Most people are around 50 years old. He believes this more mature age is due to the price of the room: $225 a night. About a quarter of the guests were expressly seeking medical treatment, meaning they were not looking for cannabis containing psychoactive THC, but just pain relief, non-psychoactive CBD oils and edibles. So far, he has received about 60 reservations, with eight groups from Texas and another eight from Kentucky, making the South the largest region hosting guests so far.
"People from Texas say, 'Oh, man, we can't even talk about marijuana. We were in trouble ten years ago for growing a little plant, and now we don't even talk to anybody about it.' They feel like they're Like refugees, and when they come here, they're like foreigners, they love it here."
"I'm a neat person. I get under the bed. You never have to think, 'Did the quilt get washed?' — it gets washed every time ."
Darrel does not need a dispensary license to operate his B and B 420 because recreational marijuana use is legal in Colorado and he does not sell the marijuana he serves. "This is my gift to you. This is definitely not included in the price of the B&B." He said firmly. "I give someone a gram a day. I can give someone 28 times more a day, so I feel comfortable with a gram."
What's important to him is that people feel comfortable and at home; cannabis is just part of that. "I'm a neat person. I get under the bed. You never have to wonder, 'Did the quilt get washed?' - the quilt gets washed every time . I feel like I know what you want on vacation and what you want on vacation You deserve what you get and that's what I don't mind cleaning every time someone leaves. "I noticed the bed smelled super fresh and even the spare blanket was bright white and spotless. . This is a level of cleanliness that I rarely see, even in nice hotels. No trace of anyone else at all.
At the restaurant, I ordered the burrito and Darrell ordered the chowder - "holding the eggs" - I'm not sure if it was out of consideration for my vegan diet. He eats in a rhythmic pace.
"When people come in, I try to educate them as much as I can. I have an old Cadillac and I throw people in and take them to different dispensaries, to Red Rocks, a cocktail, etc. I never think People do that before, he smiles, “so I have to keep up. "I have to keep learning more about what Denver is doing so I can know."
There is still much to know. There are new dispensaries and businesses opening every day around Denver's cannabis scene, from designated drivers named Mr. Submarine (who charges $65 an hour to be a deluxe designated driver for cannabis tourists) to cannabis wedding florists and planners. In Colorado, the stereotype that drug addicts accomplish nothing is being overturned every day as new businesses pop up to meet the needs of new markets. Sales at Colorado dispensaries and recreational stores were $996 million last year, an increase of nearly $300 million since 2014, The Denver Post calculated. Cannabis sales are expected to grow 30% annually through 2020, meaning the market will quadruple over the next 14 years. It's called the "green rush."
I was overwhelmed by the introduction to what is likely to be the fastest-growing industry of our time and thought of Darrell's words: "This is really big business. It's hard to tell people until they see it."
"The number of jobs created in this industry is astounding. When you think about warehouses that were once just vacant buildings, those homes are now growing and they have to upgrade their electrical and heating systems - HVAC people say it's 70% then You need someone to prune the buds of all those plants - they get paid maybe $25 per plant, eight a day if they're really good."
Everyone I talk to who lives in Denver about the changes in the city after legalization all just complains about traffic and rising housing prices. Darrell said he hasn't noticed any other negative effects in Denver; although he said 90 percent of the people he knows have been exposed to flames, he doesn't think consumption or abuse has increased since legalization . "I haven't noticed any difference. I haven't seen an increase in kids on the streets or anything," he said.
In fact, a Colorado survey released in 2014 found no increase in marijuana use among high school students, and since Colorado legalized recreational marijuana use in 2012, car crash deaths are at an all-time low and crime rates have dropped. The state's tax revenue increased - $70 million through 2014 alone. Meanwhile, a 2014 federal survey of Colorado residents found that the state now has the second-highest rate of marijuana consumption, with reported use jumping 22 percent since legalization. Research reports that 1 in 8 Colorado residents over the age of 12 have used marijuana in the past month. Obviously, the long-term effects of this social experiment remain to be seen — but for now, Colorado is widely viewed as a case study in recreational legalization success.
"We're the eyes of the country now. Everybody's watching us all the time. If you watch the news and the politics aren't there, they're here talking about marijuana. I think legalization has taken away some of the stigma a little bit, but there's still People from other states never change their minds,” Darrell said. (For example, his parents.)
We left the restaurant and I spent the day attending a women's growth conference where women talked about everything from treating cancer patients and pets, to mobilizing local moms for legalization, to getting venture capitalist funding for a baked goods business . Sitting in the conference, overwhelmed by the introduction to what is likely to be the fastest-growing industry of our time, I remembered what Darrell said to me in the restaurant: “This is indeed a big business. In people’s eyes It’s hard to tell them before you see it.”
It wasn't until 2 a.m. that night, after a night of stalking local stoner girls in Denver, that I returned to B and B 420 and finally breathed a sigh of relief—I was home, or at least a version of home. This was not the dusty, filthy house I had just spent three hours in the hot box. It's very clean. Cleaner than clean, better than good. I washed the smell of weed, marijuana, and mold off myself and switched the shower head flow to the massage setting, just because I could.
As I dried myself off, I noticed the fresh towel had a faint smell of marijuana, like herbicide or weed potpourri. Light weed. It's not very strong, just a light scent that reminds me to feel at home. Like warm complementary cookies on the tray.
Photo: Rachel Krantz, Darrel Hoffman/Bud & Breakfast; ArcView Market Research
