Joshua Roberts, Co-Founder of Cannaray / CBD Products

Joshua Roberts, Co-Founder of Cannaray is passionate about mental and physical health. He’s endlessly interested in how we can improve upon our own hardware and software through the practices of meditation, diet, exercise, compassion and smiles. In his current role as the Chief Business Officer and co-founder at Cannaray he’s able to put this passion to work creating next generation CBD products for health and wellbeing. Cannaray believe in bringing you only the best that CBD has to offer, the highest quality plant extract, the most premium blends and products that fit into your daily routine with ease. In a sea of CBD confusion, their mission is to demystify what it does, how it works and where you'll find The Gold Standard formula. They strive to make CBD easy to use, enjoyable and accessible, allowing you to feel more balanced – both mentally and physically – no matter the time of day.

In this episode of the MenswearStyle Podcast we interview Cannaray Co-Founder Joshua Roberts about his background working in finance in New York and spending a year surfing in Costa Rica before moving to the UK to start Cannaray with five founders. Joshua had a strong insight into the maturing CBD market in America and wanted to bring this to the young UK market by raising awareness and educating people on the health benefits. Our host Peter Brooker and Joshua also talk about running a business via video conferencing, the myths and facts about CBD, and how Cannaray is the next generation CBD brand.

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Transcript

Unknown: 0:11

Hello, welcome to another episode of the men's wear style podcast. I'm your host Pete broca. On this episode, I'm going to talk to Joshua Roberts, co founder of Canada a, a socially conscious cannabis company empowering better lives. And I'm gonna peel off a little info here to help paint the picture of Canada Ray. And you can find more information on the website by the way, which is canada.co.uk ca double NARAY canneries subscribes to providing the gold standard of CBD products extract CBD without using any harmful chemicals which would affect the overall product. You can even trace the CBD in every product right back to the farm it was grown on combined and enriched with only the best natural ingredients. Every one of Canada's products are as clean as can be. That interview of Joshua to come. And I really enjoyed it. He's a very, very chewning guys, Joshua, very well travelled, educated and we spoke about the misconceptions of CBD the difference between the US and UK mentality and attitude towards CBD. And in general, the benefits in how it can help with anxiety, stress. Joshua talks about how it's helped in his personal life, whoever is delivering that big speech or maybe just using some CBD oil on a sore elbow. It was very, very educational. But before we get to Joshua, don't forget to check out the show notes at menswear style. www dot men's wear style.co.uk and on the social admins wear style. All the latest fashion news just published an article on the military's influence on modern menswear. Have you seen the latest posters for no time to direct Daniel Craig wearing that military sweater from NPR? Well, don't be surprised if you start seeing a bunch of those really police when the film gets released in November. Hopefully, November, please God. So check out that article and many more on the website. And if you want to tell us about your brand and your journey, you can email the show at info at menswear. style.co.uk Okay. That's fallen off my head as I lean back there. Let's get to it. This is a good one. Hope you enjoy it. Here is that interview with Joshua Roberts, co founder of cannery. Well, it's my great pleasure to introduce Joshua Roberts, co founder of kantorei. How you doing today, Joshua? doing very well. Pete, how are you? I'm awesome. Listen, thanks so much for taking time out your day to come on the podcast. Joshua, For the uninitiated, Could you just tell us about you and what it is that you do? Sure. So American first off of the tear in the UK for the last 10 years, off and on, but two years, right in a row for the last two years. And so I worked in New York before I moved to London, at a hedge fund. And so the finance guy super boring, but is what it is. And then, you know, wanted to do something different with my life. It was it was great working at the hedge fund made a lot of contacts and was able to kind of do a lot of things in life that I did not grow up with, but really wanted to make a change. So I quit 2016 and fulfilled my lifelong dream of just being a surf bum. I moved to Costa Rica and lived there for about a year. Yeah, yeah, that was an absolute blast. But it turned out to be a little bit boring in the end. And so I needed a bit of a change. So I was looking out, you know, just for for the next move. And I had been investing in, in the cannabis space and just kind of understood the market, lots of friends in Canada. And so I got the opportunity to come back to the UK to start kantorei with with a fella I knew named Scott McGuire. So Scott and I are from a very similar part of the world in Massachusetts on Cape Cod. And so we're about 20 years apart in age but very similar upbringing. So I met him over you're playing ice hockey, with a team of kind of North Americans and Scandinavians, so very funny, but they've just thought up, I guess, and that just opened it all up again. The hockey games I've heard. Yeah, thank God. I mean, it's been it's been it's been tough. Yeah, for sure. But, but But yeah, so anyways, um, came back over here to London in September. Have 2018 to kind of kick the tires on a cannabis business. And Scott had some ideas, I had some ideas. And we had some other good people around the table. So we ended up being five founders, folks with backgrounds in in retail, we have an fd who's just fantastic has done it a bunch, as done has been an fd many times, excuse me, we have a creative director. And you know, I'm kind of like the utility man, I'm the Chief Business Officer, but it's a great crew. And I feel like we're, we're different in in terms of, you know, comparison to many other cannabis companies just we have kind of a wide breadth of experience in different industries. So we bring a very strong management team, to camera. Okay, and how often do you guys hook up? Every day? Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. We do. conference calls every day when we're all zoom experts now and teams as well. So we're kind of like competing zoom and teams. But yeah, zoom is definitely my, my preference there. And is everyone dressing up for these calls? As in shirt and tie and no trousers? Yeah, exactly. It's exactly no one ever stands up. It's it's all it's a big different mix of, of dress for sure. I'm typically in a in a T shirt and a hat backwards. But yeah, yeah, it's been an interesting, interesting thing. Just communicating over zoom, we had three new joiners on the team who had to, you know, just work from home and kind of get to know us over video conferencing, which is just been very interesting. But it's somehow worked pretty well. And so yeah, we're all we're all real kind of happy understanding that we can all do this from home, but very excited to get back to the office. Right? And so 2020 the CBD industry is quite a monolith. Now, what was it like in 2018? Or perhaps some of the earlier forts that you had? What was the market like then? Yeah, well, coming from kind of a US perspective. And moving over to the UK and just kind of seeing it through through the lens of a of an American. It seemed, it seemed like it was pretty nascent over here, you know, although there were many, many brands, I mean, there's hundreds of brands over here and it's been the CBD markets been running over here since 2014. So I kind of I came in kind of on my high horse thinking that the US really had the UK beat. But, you know, in learning, and and talking to so many people in this country, CBD has been a big part of kind of the awareness of the country. And so, in some of the research we've done through kantorei there's like 60 70% awareness of CBD in the UK. I mean, people know about it, for sure. It's just one of the one of the biggest headwinds we've faced is education you know it even though people really know about it it's just getting them to trial the product Yeah, just the main Yeah, and I guess you get a lot I guess you get asked this a lot. But what are the misconceptions? What do people not understand or get about CBD? Yeah, I think the main one is just the people kind of conflate the idea of CBD being some out THC so CBD is is just therapeutic there's there's no psychotropic effects. It's really just about no internet, inflammatory, it's, it helps with anxiety, it helps with pain. Right? It doesn't change consciousness. So it's, it's a it's a product that I take daily. And it's, it's a product you can take in the morning, in the afternoon at night. I mean, it's it's one of those products that kind of works for many things that that ail human. So I think one of the big misconceptions is that it's going to have some kind of adverse effect in terms of getting getting people high, or you know, just it's it's real kind of connection to cannabis in general is, is confusing for a lot of folks. And I mean, so many people that I talked to just regular people here in the UK who are interested in it, definitely suffer from some form of anxiety or pain or insomnia, just human issues that we all deal with. And I mentioned to them. Have you heard about CBD and they're like, yeah, I've heard about it, but I've never tried it and I wouldn't think of trying it. So I mean, it really is. It's wild that that it still has this stigma. It would you close this as it being quite unlucky that it's found in the cannabis plant considering it has absolutely nothing to do with the common you know, the stigmatism that might come with cannabis and THC if this was like a separate plant growing on its own and The oil was extracted normally, then it would probably just have, you know, great impact. And you know, it'd be a great benefit for people. Yeah, well, I could go both. I could go either way with that one. So commercially, I think it's very lucky. But if you if you want to just talk about in terms of its impact on humanity, yes, it is. It is very unlucky. People are just finding out about this thing. But I think, especially this year in 2020, and 2021, really, with the novel food regulation coming through, I think it's just going to kind of open up the market even more than than it has, because people will just be a bit more aware of it and understand that it it really has a legal path, there really isn't this kind of grey market. And I think with the regulation will people will adopt it a bit more. But yeah, yeah, I mean, you could go you could look at it either way. I mean, it's it's really it's created many companies because of this lack of understanding and it's kind of mixture in with cannabis, I think in the US coming. Coming from North America, it's just a little bit people are a little bit more used to trying new things, I guess, and just kind of open minded on, on on trying new things. And I mean, California has had a legal like medical cannabis market for 20 years. So it's just it's just way it's farther ahead in terms of the whole kind of ethos and understanding of, of cannabis, new as well, that compounds what my girlfriend tells me on a daily basis. So she's Russian, but spent about another 1015 years in America. And she says American market is it's more of like an open door for opportunity. It's more like, tell me what you got. I'm all ears, rather than the UK market, no matter what it is, it's always going to start on the backfoot. And you have to persuade them. Yeah, right. Right. It's, it's it's a little bit I I can't really say this, but it's guilty until proven innocent. Yeah. Where the US is definitely innocent till proven proven guilty in terms of, yeah, if you have a new idea, if you're an entrepreneur, if you're like, really enthusiastic, people will listen to you. But here, they're kind of like, leery wary, it's like, yeah, going on with this, it starts it starts with a god. And you have to kind of figure out how to peel away the God and then present the idea. Whereas, you know, a lot of the times the stories I hear, you know, obviously a lot of American friends as well for my girlfriend, and they're more than willing to sit down and, and talk and talk about ideas. I felt like they just want to talk more about ideas, and they do people. But yeah, I digress. But maybe you can tell us a little bit about Canada and how that is distinguished from other CBD oils and products on the market. Yeah, so I think the main thing about Canada as a CBD company is that we're backed by a medical company. So cannery Limited is really a medical company. We own another company called Tara's most limited, which, which has licences to import and distribute schedule to schedule five, control drugs. So at our heart, we're really a medical company. And so we kind of develop the brand in that vein. And so, we have a scientific advisory board of 10 dividuals, from pharmacists, to regulatory experts to a whole load of different consultant and key opinion leaders in their fields of haematology and neurology, palliative care pain so and drug delivery expert and so we're actually talking to these guys and developing our products and just getting getting an idea of what ingredients should go into our products and also from you know, because Scott McGuire, the CEO came from a life science industry from that background of EU GMP and just everything needs to be GMP and ISO and it just the, the way we develop our products, I think is is definitely different and differentiates us from you know, the average CBD brand, we we really wanted to go out and be the next generation CBD brand. So, you know, whether it's having products that just taste great, smell great, feel really nice on the skin and absorb well. And so this was this was a main kind of push for me as you know, I'm basically in charge of creating the products it can array and just, you know, understanding what the market wants and looking to the best manufacturers and the best partners and on that side of the business. So yeah, we we ended up creating some products that I'm really proud of and people really respond to so it's um, it's been really fun. It's been a It's been an absolute journey, but a really fun one to see. To see people say, Man, my elbow hurts, and I get to put the muscle bomb on. And it just, it just works. And you see that smile of kind of this thing actually works, you know. And that's just like, it's not very often in life where you come across something that's new, that actually works. So that's really fun. Yeah, it must be nice, actually, creating something that helps people as well, or at least enables people to feel less anxious, or, you know, helps them sleep. I mean, I've got to think about my own life and what I do to help people and it's basically just writing blogs and podcasts. No one's gonna be hanging any metals on me. But yeah, it must be it must be a nice feeling. Yeah, I mean, don't sell yourself short man. Oh up, but believe me, I'll edit it later on. And I'll do something, maybe preload it with some really good things. I know, I completely agree. Being able to help people is really the main thing I wanted to do when I was leaving the hedge fund job. I mean, that's just pushing money from A to B and pile a to pile B is just, it's soul destroying. And, you know, I've gone through my own issues of anxiety and depression and just insomnia. So it's like, I, I have really lived, the issues that that CBD can can absolutely help with. So you know, and the path that I take is one where I had to I had to learn to meditate, I had to learn to really understand my my own mental kind of ups and downs to really get a hold of, you know, where I wanted to be in terms of myself as a human. So it was it was it, it was a absolute prerequisite for for the company or the field that I went into to really be focused on how can I help people and so I mean, Cannabis, I think is that first step on a continuum that is really going to be interesting in the next 10 years. So cannabis is opening up doors for for things like psychedelics, which, you know, have massive, massive interest in terms of really, really helping deep depression and anxiety. And so, you know, also things that I'm very interested in. Yeah, no, I bet. And perhaps you can help me with this your show? What about the people that say, don't suffer from, you know, the typical symptoms that you would prescribe CBD for people would buy CBD. So like, would would you recommend that people take CBD anyway to kind of help them through the day? I think so. I mean, you know, CBD is is mostly used for for some sort of relief, like we've talked about, but I mean, I, I would, I would wager that most people regardless, I mean, so most people are in that like two thirds in that one standard deviation on the bell curve. So most people have some issue and whether it's anxiety or insomnia or pain, if you if you have none of those, then you're a very lucky person. And it's like, maybe CBD is not something for you. But it, it actually really helps me in terms of public speaking, it helps me in terms of those times during my day, as a normal person that I get a little bit more anxious. And so, so yeah, and it's, um, you know, I think, another kind of addition to, to what we want to bring into our products is, we'd like to add some ingredients that that people really do recognise as well. So I mean, CBD is, is great to take in the morning. And so, in our products, we'll be adding vitamin D. So, you know, I know that vitamin D is going to be on people's minds right now. Jesus, yeah, yeah, you must have been under the breakfast table this morning with my girlfriend. I mean, she's all about the vitamin D. Right? Especially now that the weather has turned in the UK is like, where are we gonna get it from now? Exactly. I mean, it's, it's an interesting one, just because, you know, cameras logo is a song. And so we're in the UK, there's not much song. And especially in the winter months, we would like to be that song, we'd like to be that thing. I mean, it's just a it's a white background with a big yellow sun. So that's, um, you know, that's, that's kind of it. We have we have an interesting kind of, kind of playful way. I can write just trying to, you know, throw some things in to the brand that make it fun. Like, you know, we're just trying to brighten people's days just make it a bit easier. But to get back to your question. Yeah, I mean, I think I think people can absolutely benefit. So we're real benefit? Yeah, no, no sorry to interrupt. So where I'm trying to fit it in with my lifestyle is that I depend on like a caffeine fix in the morning, rather than something that can maybe mellow me out. And I don't, I don't know if that's the purpose of CBD or if that's the reason why you take it in the morning. But what about someone like me that kind of lives on being a bit more wired and needs a bit more of a kick, you know, rather than the other way around being wired and needs to kind of come down that slope? Well, I think, you know, similar to, you know, say macho or green tea, has an LCD ending, which is a protein that actually helps balance the caffeine. So, you know, if you have a big cup of coffee versus a cup of green tea, it's a different caffeine, feeling. Green tea is a little bit more balanced and less less of a kind of get up and down real volatile type thing. And for me, with coffee, and many people just live on caffeine. Absolutely. But I think it's hard pressed to say that if you have enough cups of coffee, you're gonna be jittery. So CBD is great to kind of balance that out. It's great to to be the LC and in like, addition in, in green tea, but for for caffeine so CBD is I mean, for coffee CBD has been added to to coffee and coffee beans and stuff like that we're not doing that type of product right now. But you know, it's something that we would think about for future. Interesting, what I loved about the product when I was on your website, which by the way people can find kantorei.co.uk, we'll leave a link in the show notes, is that you've got all the reports and research and everything online. So it's, you know, you silences everything that we found, these are the reports were very transparent, we want you to know, we want to educate you as well. Has there been enough research on CBD? I mean, you say the markets been alive for about eight years? Is that enough to completely be a deciding factor in the brand? Well, in terms of market research, I think there there definitely needs to be more. There needs to be many, many different research studies. I mean, there, there have been many, many, but in terms of doing serious clinical trial work, there, there have been trials for for medicines, like epi dial x is a GW Pharma medication. And so I don't mean to call them out, but they've done a lot of work to, you know, to to show CBD safety and safety profile and show that this is not a harmful substance in any way. And so I mean, that's, that's what you're really looking for. And when you're doing these studies, is this product safe? Is this compound safe. And so when you have the wh o coming out in 2018, saying this is absolutely safe, and it not only is it safe, but it has the potential to to really work for certain indications. And that's not me saying and that's who I think that's that's a pretty good indicator of the safety of this product. And I think it absolutely needs more study and in many different in many different dimensions of research. Yeah. I'll be interested to see how you kind of augment it into different products and different sectors. I mean, that the CBD, caffeine, CBD kind of a coffee, I'm certainly going to be signing up to the newsletter. So that one, no, yeah, yeah, absolutely. I mean that we have many people in the kantorei side who were absolutely pushing me to do a to do a coffee and oh, yeah, and CBD. It's just like it. There's so many ideas. There's so many products, it's like we got, we got to take it one step at a time at a time. We don't want to be one of those companies that just throw a million products in America. Yeah. You know, I wonder if this is how people. So let me tell you about my induction to the CBD oil. It was a conversation a couple of years ago about a lady who's a boutique chocolatier. And that's not the right title, but she makes chocolate for a living. And she would say look at maybe you can try a couple of these bars out for me and write a blog about it. I said, Sure. Anything for free chocolate. And then CBD was she had one of the ingredients is CBD and I had no idea about it. And she was like, You have no idea about this. So this was like, it's weird that you have to fuse different products and like these machinations have to come together as an introduction to CBD. It's not just the actual oil or the the original organic element, it has to come in through other and sillery you know, products. So have you found that but other people find it through other things. That make sense. Yeah, yeah, they do know for sure. I mean, it comes in through chocolate. I like chocolate and cannabis really became a bit thing in North America as like edibles really started to, to grow in favour over there. And so I've seen a bunch of companies over here, launching chocolate, I think chocolate also, just because of some of the fat in the milk, it helps it to absorb better, it helps CBD to have to absorb better than the human body. So that's another reason that people combine it with chocolate. But you know, now that I'm kind of thinking more about your original question it CBD is actually it's great for you know, if you if you're someone who's completely normally have none of these issues, but you also don't want to drink much alcohol and you'd like to, you know, try something in the evening that helps you relax. CBD is is also great for that. So I mean, CBD drinks are becoming massive in the US. And they're they're starting to catch on here. There's a few companies that are really doing some good work over here, but But yeah, and that's another massive kind of industry drinks to get into. Yeah, and I'm wondering if anybody else has this kind of trajectory during their day. Like for me, now I'm in my 40s it's all about getting up early. It's all about getting some caffeine in my system doing the workout early so that I don't have to worry about that later on. And then I kind of hit a peak around two and then you just slip off into your slippers. And the rest of the day. You just hope that nobody bothers you. You know, I mean? I mean, I don't drink anymore. I haven't drunk for like three years. I don't then have to think right. I've got to go out now it's 10 o'clock. It's Friday night. I'm like, no, it's half 10 at night. I'm in bed already and something like that. It's Yeah, I know. It sounds super old. But I can't be alone on this. I'm right there with you. right there with you. I couldn't I couldn't be more kind of parallel to what you just said. I mean, I my girlfriend I just had a daughter. So I mean, we're we're like just straight and narrow and just really chilling out. We do not drink much. And it's Yeah, I'm over 40 as well. I turned 41 next week, which is just total sad face. So boring. commute. 41 is just so boring that a 40 was great. Well, around. Yeah. 440 was party time you've and all the promise of the four is when you get yet for it and you realise Oh, Jesus Christ. Now, anyway, but I mean, the important game two, I think is the importance of rest and sleep. And you know, I think when you're in your 20s, and you know, the world's your oyster, and you feel like you can do everything. You don't put so much of a commodity on sleep, or, you know, whatever the phrase is, I mean, when you're in your 40s my god is everything, isn't it? It really is. Yeah, I mean, I I'd urge your listeners to on you to take a look at this guy named Matthew Walker, Dr. Matthew Walker. He's a, I think he's English. He's an English guy. But he has a book out. I think it's called why we sleep or something like that. Thom Yorke from Radiohead, talk about that and interview. Yeah, it is. So interesting to understand that sleep is basically everything. And those folks who even if you know, you're somebody who, or one is somebody that who doesn't need much sleep in quotes. It really does have an effect. And so I completely agree, it's, it's a massive part, it has become a massive part of my of my life in terms of being very focused on getting eight to 10 hours, as many nights a week as I can. And I thought, I find that those people in my life who don't sleep as well really have issues. And it's, um, it's not everybody, but But yeah, it's it really has become over the last five years, like ever since I was 3535 was the the absolute pinnacle. I was just like, I could do whatever I want. So let's go to Burning Man, let's spend whatever a week partying, and now it's like, I can't even spend a night party. It's like, over man I was on. So I think that was possibly my most naive time was my mid 30s. I even joined a local boxing gym and ask the trainer, is it too late? As in? Do I still have a shot at the title? You know, I've seen every boxing film. I feel like I can still do it. I've got it me like you. You can't. You can't do it. So yeah, completely 90 times. As an aside, but Well listen, Joshua, fantastic. Talking to you. I know it's something down just as we were talking, and it's kind of completely off from the grass of what we were talking about. But uh, yeah. What do you think of the English food? Now that you've been here for a couple of years? Yeah, it's Oh, my God. Do I have to comment on this? Yeah, I mean, yeah, my girlfriend and I are both are both really into food. I mean, she I really followed her lead. She was the one who was it was massively into it so we can get by I mean, I spent a lot of time in Whole Foods. And there's some very good vegetables from neterra which is an amazing farm, which we order all the time. But in terms of going out and eating, it's fine. You can find whatever you want here. I think under no, right. Okay. That's London. Yeah. Luckily, it became international 25 years ago and all the foreigners sorted out the food problem before that it was boiled vegan, and it sucked. But it's if you're out in the country, like where from I'm from originally. I mean, the basics and the staples haven't really changed or evolved much over the years. Yeah, I mean, meat and potatoes is how I grew up. So I can definitely, I can definitely live on that for a while. But then all of a sudden, the stomach's just not working well. I'm not sleeping at night. And it's like, I got to go back to the veggie diet just living that way I can sleep better, I think better, like so yeah, answer the question. I don't want to like talk too much crap about English food, but so you can leave it to me. It's not great. I'm English when I can get away of it. Well, it's been great talking to you, Joshua. Thanks so much again for taking the time out and for educating me on some Watson CBD knowledge and and also there's loads of tutorials and information, as well as the products themselves over on your website, which is again, Canada a.co.uk. And I recommend everyone take a trip over there and fall down a few rabbit holes and learn up. Perfect. Thank you so much bass. Well, how about that really nice guy could have spoke to Joshua for hours. I completely forgot to ask him about James Bond locations in Costa Rica. As that satellite, they're the one that they used at the end of golden I would have to get Joshua back on be. It'd be very nice episode, the bond locations in Costa Rica. I digress. So make sure you're supporting the good guys and head over to Canada a.co.uk and treat yourself or your loved ones to some CBD goods, the best kind. In the meantime, thanks for tuning in. If you like what you're hearing, leave a review. Maybe there's a brand or a person that you would like on as the guests on the show. Put your suggestions in a comment on iTunes or wherever you listen to the podcast and until next time.