SEATTLE — Two to three hundred people have registered to attend Friday’s cannabis summit, which includes a job fair for people interested in the cannabis industry.
Stan Wagner, the CEO of Cannabusiness Accelerator, is organizing the day-long event at the Silver Cloud Hotel in Capitol Hill, starting with a panel of experts to talk about best practices in the business.
After the career fair, the day will end with a networking mixer, open to the public, which begins at 4:20 p.m.
Seven companies will be featured at the job fair, including two general contractors, a software company, a security company and a managing consultant firm.
“You’d be surprised. It’s not just about dispensaries and growth facilities. It’s actually about security; it’s about managers; it’s about marketing opportunities; it’s about social media,” Wagner said.
Some of these jobs don’t involve touching marijuana at all. The general contractors, for example, have drug-free workplace policies. But they are designing and building facilities for grow operations.
The founder and CEO of CannaGuard, Noah Stokes, said he’s hiring project managers and people who can grow his business of surveillance cameras and alarm systems. The security is tailored to what’s legally required for dispensaries and grow operations in the state of Washington.
"The liquor control board’s standpoint is, we want to see all four corners of everywhere, in a room that there is marijuana present. So we do one camera, as opposed to three, four or five,” Stokes said.
His fish-eye camera and another 20-megapixel camera can cover far more area than cameras in typical surveillance systems.
Still, the Washington retail pot business has gotten off to a slow start. Only one retail pot shop, Cannabis City, is currently open in Seattle.
The “mayor” of Cannabis City, James Lathrop, said while not many retail stores are open, there will at least be a need for seasonal workers as a large crop becomes available in October.
“If we’re looking at these farmers coming online in October, I do think there’s an opportunity where they’re going to need trimmers, they’re going to need packagers,” Lathrop said.
Although Lathrop does not need to hire from the job fair, he said the conference is a good idea.
One attendee, Ashley Kingsley, is a marketing executive who flew to Seattle for this conference from Denver.
Kingsley said she’s here to learn about the pot industry in Washington, and meet potential clients.
In seeing the slow start of the retail business in Washington, Kingsley said, “I think people need to see that it is moving. When it goes, as it did in Denver, it’s going to go fast.”
KIRO
