Adam Bierman: Author of Weed Empire & Co-Founder of MedMen

Episode 685

On this episode of The Kara Goldin Show, we’re joined by Adam Bierman, entrepreneur, cannabis industry pioneer, and author of the bold new book Weed Empire. Adam is the Co-Founder and former CEO of MedMen, the first major American cannabis brand to go mainstream. Under his leadership, MedMen scaled to 33 stores across five states, employed over 1,500 people, and achieved a nearly $2 billion valuation—all while navigating one of the most complex and highly regulated industries in the world.
In our conversation, Adam shares what it was like to lead a business that was both pioneering and polarizing. We get into the rollercoaster ride of building MedMen, the lessons he learned as the face of the cannabis revolution, and what founders need to know about scaling in gray space industries. He talks about the moments of breakthrough and breakdown, how he navigated public scrutiny, and why he felt now was the right time to write Weed Empire—a raw, unfiltered story of what it really took to build at the edge of culture and regulation.
Adam also shares his thoughts on what the cannabis industry got right (and wrong), what needs to change for the sector to truly thrive, and what’s next in his journey as a futurist and advisor. Whether you're building a disruptive brand, recovering from a high-profile pivot, or just want the truth behind one of the most talked-about startups in recent years—this episode is a must-listen. Now on The Kara Goldin Show.

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Transcript

Kara Goldin 0:00
I am unwilling to give up that I will start over from scratch as many times as it takes to get where I want to be. I want to be you. Just want to make sure you will get knocked down. But just make sure you don’t get knocked out, knocked out. So your only choice should be go focus on what you can control. Control. Hi everyone, and welcome to the Kara Goldin show. Join me each week for inspiring conversations with some of the world’s greatest leaders. We’ll talk with founders, entrepreneurs, CEOs and really, some of the most interesting people of our time. Can’t wait to get started. Let’s go. Let’s go. Hi everyone, and welcome back to the Kara Goldin show. So, so excited to have my next guest here, who is an author launched actually his book as we are recording this. Really, really thrilled to welcome Adam Bierman, who is the author of the I will say it explosive, soon to be best selling book weed empire. So, so good. He’s also the co founder and former CEO of a company you may have heard of called MedMen. It’s a cannabis company that became a household name and one of the most recognized brands in the space. Adam didn’t just build a business, he helped define a movement, and he scaled MedMen from a single store to a national presence, took the company public and played a major role in mainstreaming and really destigmatizing cannabis and what we know of it today. At its peak, MedMen was worth nearly 2 billion. But that level of impact comes with the cost. As we all know, being an entrepreneur is not easy, and it’s a incredible story that he has decided to really share with us. So in his new book, weed Empire, which he gave me a preview copy, I highly, highly recommend it. It is so, so good. I couldn’t wait to keep turning the pages all of the crazy stuff that goes on. We talk about leadership a lot, and the gray zones, and this book and the story has it all. So definitely, definitely excited to jump in here. So thanks Adam for joining us.

Adam Bierman 2:22
Thank you for that intro that warmed me up. I appreciate it so

Kara Goldin 2:26
you helped build the first mainstream cannabis brand in the US. What made you think you could pull that off, and especially when no one else believed it was possible, a

Adam Bierman 2:41
very crazy combination of DNA and experience and circumstance, right? My wife would put a bow around it and also say it needs to be topped with a little bit of delusion. But that is, that’s where I have found myself in, in this journey that we’re all on, that was where I found myself on my journey, as I stepped into this opportunity and what would become, you know, my life. So you know, why did I think I could do it? Because I was living, at that time, a life of why not, and just believing that I needed to go do something that nobody else thought might be possible in order for me to create an existence for myself. And this is what I was able to create. And this experience is what was, you know, what? What you’re reading about now.

Kara Goldin 3:38
So weed Empire is so good. Congratulations. You’ve done such an amazing job capturing an incredible journey. What made you decide now was the time to really tell the story? Well,

Adam Bierman 3:53
first of all, I started down this path of writing this book over three years ago. So it wasn’t now, you know, the the book itself, the writing itself, was quite the multi year experience. The decision to write the book was really twofold. One was there was recognition by me that I had never proactively or even reactively spoken in my own voice as the CEO of MedMen, as a spokesperson for the industry, as all the different with all the different hats that I had worn over this lifetime of business, one hat that I never wore when it came to the public or the media was that of my own. And so, you know, there was a recognition three, four years ago that if I didn’t put on my own hat and put down this story, then this story would just continue to be written without. Me, which means full of fallacy, and unfortunately, you know, very lazy conclusions that you know, don’t even get close to as entertaining as the real stuff. So I think, you know, it’s twofold, it’s it’s one is that, you know, this story was being written right? Part of mainstreaming marijuana was bringing marijuana into the day to day culture, right? And to do that, it means we had to be present, you know, in the media, you know, on the screen, for better or worse. And so as a result, you know, so much that had been covered was just so untrue. And so part of it was that, and part of it was that there was a recognition that this journey that I had been through in building MedMen and helping build this industry was so similar with so many lessons and so much to learn to any other industry that’s disrupting right as I look at culture today, as I look at industry and business today, my understanding of how all of that is created and how that world works is so different than it was before I started this journey, Because through this journey, I was invited into the room, right? And I got to see how all of it happens. And so there was this opportunity to share all of this, you know, so that other people could go through this journey with me and take their lessons away from these experiences, experiences that otherwise they might not have encountered in their lives, and then benefit from those lessons going forward. The same way I would have loved my 20 year old self to have read this book before I started this journey, but I did. So now I put it out for the younger version of me, or anybody for that matter, to digest for themselves.

Kara Goldin 6:58
So take us back to kind of the concept of starting MedMen. And what year was this? What did you want to accomplish, and what was in front of you at that time that you said we can do this. I

Adam Bierman 7:14
mean, you know, the the truth was that when I discovered this concept at the time, it was of medical marijuana. It was in 2009 in Los Angeles. All I discovered was a potential opportunity that I didn’t understand, which I decided to pursue. As I, you know, attempted to create a life for myself with nothing to lose, right? And as I account for in the book, you know, without even a car, and the repo man, you know, takes the car away. And I’m literally living with my parents. So, you know, as I’m searching for what it is that will give me stability, you know, I encounter what I believe, intuitively, is an opportunity I have to be real here. You know, there’s no belief in that moment, and I certainly don’t account for it in the book, that I can change the world, or that I can create or help participate in a movement, or that even mainstreaming marijuana is important, right? The only thing I’m looking at in that moment is, you know, can I provide enough stability to have a home and a vehicle and, like, live a basic

Kara Goldin 8:23
life. So, so interesting. So did you ever think that you were gonna run a public company? I mean, this is, this is like crazy. Your story was just absolutely incredible. I

Adam Bierman 8:36
think that I’ve always had this belief that I can educate myself enough to go perform in the business world, even if you know it’s inside of a topic that before I start learning about it, you know, I’m completely ignorant. I think part of the admitting that you’re ignorant is how you become informed enough to go execute at something. You know, this story is so much about reaction. There was no plan to be the CEO of a public company. I was the CEO of a public company because I was reacting to the reality that we were trying to run a business that, at the time, was worth billions of dollars in a country, our home country, where that business was federally illegal, and as a result of it being federally illegal, we were restricted in the access that we had to those resources and infrastructure that is available to all other industries, and one of those access points is to access capital. And you know, one of the craziest parts of this story is literally building the infrastructure for an industry in America without it being legal and without being able to access traditional capital sources to do so I was reacting creatively to solving for that issue. Which, in and of itself, is a crazy kind of idea. And the way we did it was to go public in Canada and stay, you know, operational down in the US. And I did find myself as the CEO of this public company. That’s

Kara Goldin 10:13
crazy. So you lived the founder fantasy, scaling fast and, you know, raising big checks and then ultimately taking the company public. What’s the part of the ride that people glamorize but don’t really understand? I

Adam Bierman 10:31
think that, you know, one of the things that I reference in the book, and it actually was a line that was given to me by Phil Stutz, who I talk about, talk about a lot in the book as an influence on me. My my shrink at the time, but there was a moment in one of our sessions where, you know, he said, you know, Adam, you’re you’re getting towards the top of the mountain, and the higher you get, the thinner the air is going to get, and the harder it is going to be to breathe. And as you get closer to the top, you’re gonna fall to the bottom, and you better be ready to climb the back up. And I think that, you know, there’s this concept of the more success we had in our mission mainstreaming marijuana, de stigmatizing marijuana, creating an asset class that was permanent. As we had more and more success, the oxygen in the air I was breathing became thinner and thinner, and as I account for in the book, you know, not only is the oxygen so thin that you can barely breathe, but you’re all alone. Because, you know, at a certain point, at least in my experience in business, as we get into big business, not only are there no friends, but if you believe for a moment, as you get into a relationship, that it’s predicated on friendship versus predicated on returns, that ignorance will end up costing you you know, either your life or close to it. And so you’re all alone, and you’re breathing thin air because everybody else is trying to figure out how to get their piece of the mountain, and even if you know that means climbing over you, there’s nothing glamorous about that. You can go to bed. And you know, from the public markets perspective, have had a amazing day as the CEO of a public company. But during this journey, you know, most of the nights I went to bed, you know, facing my side of the bed, all up in a corner, feeling all by myself, right? And so that’s the trade off. And there’s nothing glamorous or envious about that, but that is part of what this takes.

Kara Goldin 12:45
Yeah, it’s just, I mean, the the industry, I always say that the beverage industry is hard. I mean the cannabis industry, you’re that’s like, another level. So, I mean, what you were able to do by growing men men is just, I mean, it’s crazy, right? Like it’s it’s amazing in so many ways. So when you’re literally operating in kind of a gray zone, how do you get people to follow you, right, and to write checks to do? I mean, that is, it’s what you were able to accomplish in order to achieve what you did is just incredible. But how do you do that? Right? Because it’s, it’s just a it’s an idea. You believe it, but then all of a sudden you have a lot of other people who believe it too. So how I mean that that’s what you did and what you accomplished?

Adam Bierman 13:40
Yeah, I think so much of what we were able to do that helped to create, you know, what I what I now look at as a permanent, you know, asset class and industry was super creatively solving the disconnect, which is a wide One, right? And the disconnect is federal illegality, with all the threats that come with federal illegality, and how do you bridge that with the overwhelming excitement, investor excitement around the opportunity to participate in the end of at the end of prohibition, right inside of a category. So you won’t find anyone from the financial world that says it’s not a good idea to participate at the end of prohibition of anything, right? They’ll be clamoring for it, but at the same time, it’ll be only if my lawyer or general counsel says it’s okay. And so, how do you bridge those worlds? How do you figure out how to convince people that they shouldn’t be drinking sugary water with horrible sugar in it versus having fruit juice in it? How do I convince GCS the world over or, you know, private equity funds. Turns the world over that there is a method that we’ve set up whereby they can invest into this opportunity without feeling legally exposed. And that’s why, as we account for in the book, you know, I’m not just, at the end, the CEO of a public company. Before that, I’m running a private equity fund. And after that, you know, I’m launching a REIT, right? We launched the first cannabis, cannabis REIT in, you know, of its kind. You know, I didn’t, I didn’t know what a REIT was, just like, I didn’t know what a private equity fund was. But we had to figure it out, because those were the mechanisms that would unlock, or that would, you know, bridge this gap between the illegality and it wasn’t Gray, you know, I think that’s a euphemism, right? To understand this story, we have to understand its realities. Federally, it was illegal, right? And on the state level, we were operating with a state license, so we were just sitting in the middle of, you know, a fight ready to happen. And we were able to give investors the world over that roadmap, and then that roadmap was the roadmap that everyone else used, which was the plan. And now we have, you know, cannabis as an industry,

Kara Goldin 16:14
yeah, no. I mean, it’s just, it’s incredible. So I feel like one thing that not a lot of people think about when they think about lots of companies, but certainly MedMen, is that you had all these different audiences, right? And I would imagine that the consumers, the ones that are really looking for medical marijuana, loved what they’re doing. They reach out to you and say, Thank you for doing this. And you know, staying close to people who are super interested in what you’re doing is great, but then you’ve got this other side of you’ve got, you know, the investors, you’ve got to make sure that you’re keeping the employees excited and happy. You’re dealing at one point with the DOJ, like, it’s just crazy, all of the different tentacles, right that are coming in to into you. What was the toughest for you to really manage and deal with?

Adam Bierman 17:12
Well, I think it was just the reality of what you just said, looking back now, was not only the toughest, but was also, you know, one of the many reasons that, as you look back on this journey, there was the inevitability that this character myself would end up in that boardroom, you know, being told it was his last day. When we went public, you know, and we talk about this in the book, but when we went public, we try to hire, you know, recruiting firms to find C level executives to join the company. The recruiting firms wouldn’t take our money. Forget about, you know, the potential executives completely unwilling to leave a successful career in a legal industry, just to have on their resume that they joined an illegal business. So this reality that, you know, I was, you know, at the center, as we kind of tried to deal with and figure out the DOJ, I was at the center of being the spokesperson for an industry. I was at the center of being the spokesperson for the company. I was at the center of all the fundraising for the company. Like I would have loved to hire a chief revenue officer, I would have loved to hire a rock star, CFO, we tried, but as the ones that went through that door first, that wasn’t available to us, and so all of it was hard, and what you find is this character juggling it all and keeping it all together, and knowing that the more balls you add to the juggling act, you know you’re just watching and waiting for that last ball to be the ball. That makes it so it’s impossible to keep going right? And that’s, and that’s what happens, as you would expect it to happen, you know, now, looking back and reading the book, and just for me, you know, understanding it more from the outside,

Kara Goldin 19:13
no, I mean, it’s just, it’s crazy, what you accomplish. So it’s, it’s really awesome. So you went from running an industry that not a lot of people knew about, I don’t know, like, I think cannabis 10 years ago, or 15 years ago, when you were starting, it was, you know, Cheech and Chong maybe, like, that’s what people viewed it as. They just thought, everyone’s getting stoned. And it just it must have been so hard to get people on board with this. Is this legal? How do I do this? All of these things, but then it went from taboo to super trendy. What did the industry get right? And where do you think it went totally wrong? But

Adam Bierman 19:57
you said the industry, so we’re talking about the businesses. Now, I think where the businesses went right was in their belief, those businesses that filled in after MedMen, you know, opened up the doors. You know, those brands that were built once, you know, it had been proven that you could put a store and a logo on Fifth Avenue or in Beverly Hills, and it would work. You know, everything you saw transpire. I think the industry got that right, but we have to understand what that was that literally, I said earlier, was the railroad tracks. That was the baseline infrastructure to be able to have a legal cannabis industry work inside of the United States. It didn’t exist before we all showed up. And so getting right was making the investments that we all made to that supply chain right now. Doing that had significant capital costs, but I think making that investment so there is now a supply chain. They got right. The industry got right. Here’s what the industry is currently getting wrong. The industry is acting as if consumers will continue to make a special stop on their way home for a shopping experience where they are purchasing a single item or product inside of a category, and what we’ve seen is those days are over. People don’t shop like that anymore, right? It’s too easy to have things delivered. And if you’re going to leave your house, you’re going to go somewhere where you can get a lot of things at once, going out of your way just to buy your cannabis. That is not a long term solution. And so what the industry has gotten wrong, in my opinion, is that there’s been no innovation outside of what I just mentioned. When it comes to the effect that cannabis can have on the human endocannabinoid system, there are many different ways to deliver that effect. You’ve seen some of these businesses now with hemp. Say, I have a hemp beverage that you can buy in a mainstream grocer, you know, MedMen helped launch, you know, the first real beverage in that category. How many years ago was that eight? Yeah, nothing innovative about that. Now. So, unless the industry innovates, you’ve seen a surge with Big Tobacco lately, and Big Tobacco surge is coming from where it’s coming from, diversification of delivery systems, right? We’re talking about delivering effects into human beings. Big Tobacco is not going to miss the opportunity to add cannabinoids as the effects that they can deliver. You can deliver them the same way. They’re smoking them, they’re putting them in pouches, they’re letting them it’s all the same. So you know, at the end of the day, if cannabis, the industry, this asset class, doesn’t innovate, you’ll see these big whether it’s big tobacco, big alcohol, you’ll see consolidation, and you’ll see effects end up in a single category, I believe, under a single umbrella. And I don’t know what’s good or bad or right or wrong, I just think that the cannabis industry, the business is today, unless they go fight and innovate against the inevitability of what I just laid down, of course, that’s what has to happen

Kara Goldin 23:24
when you think back on your journey of building med man, what was the point when you think about where it was super exciting and you were at that top of the mountain, what could go wrong? Do you remember? Can you share a story of you know, when you on that day when you thought, This is it? This is going to be massive. No,

Adam Bierman 23:49
because I really dug as deep as I could in this three and a half years of writing this book, to just make this as honest as I can possibly recount it. And there are, there aren’t really those moments, but I think that’s because I’m being real. Yeah, back to this mountaintop, you know concept. Well, tell me how it felt when you got to the way top, wasn’t it? No, I just said I could barely breathe, yeah, and that I was being shot at from every direction below, and one guy was pulling on my ankle. Yeah, it was up there. But I will give you a real story that’s, I think it’s in the book that’s probably the most demonstrative of this, and also shows you like this character didn’t understand I’m looking back now, which is also why I’m hoping that sharing this will help others. But I’m just looking back. So here’s a moment, as we talk about in the book. You know, on our board of directors was Jay Brown, who was from rock nation, Jay Z’s business partner in that business and venture. And so Laura and I the. Wife. We have my eldest, Mateo’s birthday party in the morning, and we go through the motion. And that’s really what it was to a large extent for me back then, because I was so focused on work. We go through the motion in the morning to have the birthday party. We both change in the bathroom of the bouncy house birthday party place, and we drive up to the rock nation Grammy brunch that we had been invited to. And you know, at that brunch was, you know, every person in entertainment that any of us you know ever see or follow or like or listen to, and there is me and my wife you know, not because we snuck in, but because we were invited, because at that moment, we were at that place in the mountain, if you will, right? And so I’m having a conversation with Jay Brown, and then I end up having a conversation with one of his other partners at Rock nation. His name is Tata. He goes by Tata, and he asked me how I’m doing. And my reaction to him in front of Jay Brown was, I don’t belong here. And he said, What do you mean? Man, come on, dance, smoke a spliff. You know, hang out. Yeah, I get it. I I just don’t belong here. I don’t know how else to say it. I don’t belong. I don’t feel like I belong here. And I think that was this character, you know, intuitively trying to say, you know, raise a hand and say, Hey, when are we slowing down? When are we checking ourselves, you know, when are we looking around and saying, What do I want out of life? What am I redefining, or, How am I defining success for tomorrow? How am I measuring whether I have a good day today, none of that was happening, right? This character was mono maniacal and committed to the death to go see this vision through, right? And then there’s this little piece of me going, what Wait, what about me? And it comes out in the weirdest way, in the weirdest venue. So that’s how I was feeling. You know, in those moments, wow,

Kara Goldin 27:07
it there’s so many stories. So weed Empire is definitely, I mean it like I said it was, it’s a quick read, but it actually has some intense moments that I felt like I wanted to go back and kind of reread it and really get a feel for what you were feeling then. Because I think any founder, any entrepreneur, can appreciate this, but you don’t even have to be a founder or entrepreneur to appreciate, you know, trying to do the hard and you know, you’ve got critics and lawsuits and headlines and, I mean, it’s just there’s so much that was going on. So I really, really appreciate everything that you wrote. Everyone should get a copy of weed empire. We’ve got it here, but such a nice, nice job Adam writing this. And really, really appreciate everything that you’ve done. So thank you so much for joining us. Thanks everyone for listening. Thank you Kara, thanks again for listening to the Kara Goldin show. If you would please give us a review and feel free to share this podcast with others who would benefit and of course, feel free to subscribe so you don’t miss a single episode of our podcast, just a reminder that I can be found on all platforms. At Kara Goldin, I would love to hear from you too. So feel free to DM me, and if you want to hear more about my journey, I hope you will have a listen or pick up a copy of my Wall Street Journal, best selling book, undaunted, where I share more about my journey, including founding and building hint we are here every Monday, Wednesday and Friday. Thanks for listening, and goodbye for now. You.

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