Vancouver’s fourth (and Clark County’s fifth) pot shop is set to open for its soft-launch on Saturday, Feb. 7, at 11 a.m.

The Herbery, at 212 N.E. 164th St., Suite 11, will be the first of two stores of the same name in Vancouver. Owners are aiming at opening their second shop on April 20 (or 4/20 – the popular pot culture code – to the math challenged).

Jim Mullen, the chief operating officer, said one of the goals of the business will be to narrow down the product list so that customers aren’t overwhelmed. The plan is to have about 24 strains of flower, a variety of concentrates and oil and a few edibles – at least until the edible market prices come down.

“We’re not going to buy from anybody until we see their facility,” Mullen said. “We are advocates for our customers. We want to have a product and buying experience that will be enjoyable for our customers.”

The store’s upper management went on a road trip around the state looking for their first batch of growers. They want to have a mix of Clark County grown products and some from parts of the state that people in the region might not otherwise be able to get.

Locally, the list includes some of the first products from Fairwinds Manufacturing, an innovative grower/processor in Vancouver who’s products include cannabis pills, tinctures, vapes and cannabis coffee beans (which the owner is producing with a local Vancouver coffee roaster).

The other local grower/processors are Vancouver’s Cedar Creek Cannabis and Battle Ground’s Agrijuana

Growers from outside of Clark County include Golden Leaf, Billifer’s Buds, Nettles Unlimited. They’re mostly mom-and-pop small farms with high quality buds and good frosting, Mullen said.

“We’ve met a lot of good people and seen some very, very good products,” Mullen said. “We can’t work with everybody, but we’ve found a really good core group that we think our customers will really like.”

I don’t know how common they are in Colorado or on the medical market, but I’ve never heard of pot pills before. And the store expects to have some on hand for its soft opening.

So far the store has about 15 employees, and over the next few months it will hire another 10 for the new store opening in April. Budtenders start at $12 an hour for a 90-day probationary period and they go up to $13 an hour, Mullen said.

Mullen has a background in shipping and logistics and worked on operations at the Port of Portland for eight years before retiring to venture into Washington’s young cannabis industry.

He’s not much of a smoker anymore, although he occasionally samples strains, but in the 1970s in college before his shipping career began, he used to partake, he said.

“Because of my career I stopped, but I’ve tried it again recently a few times,” Mullen said. “I prefer it to drinking, actually. It’s more relaxing.”

The store will have some special deals for the soft opening, and more for the grand opening it has planned for Feb. 28.

One of the deals includes a limited number of eighths for under $40. And most grams at the store will range from $12 to $20 a pop, which includes excise tax but not sales tax.

The store has two ATMs on site and is hoping to be able to take debit cards in the near future, Mullen said.

Another promotion they’ll have for opening week will be a raffle for 10 pairs of tickets to see the SirMixALot concert on Valentines Day in Portland.

“People can come by the store and enter,” Mullen said. “We’ll draw the tickets next Friday (Feb. 13) at 1 p.m. and let the lucky winners know.”

Customers can also text “Herbery” to 83350 to get on the store’s blast list for special deals and events.

“We’ll have some classes coming up on how to use things like oil or shatter, some talks by growers, we want to help the consumer learn more about our products,” Mullen said.

Some of the strains the store expects to have for opening day are: Jack Herer, Blue Dream, Girl Scout Cookies, G-13, Blue Magoo, King Tut, several varieties of Kush, Purple Amethyst and Cinex.

“We’re really excited to be opening,” Mullen said. “We hope lots of people will stop by to check us out.”

Are you going? Check out the store info below and let us know what you think!

Cheers,
-SueVo (sue.vorenberg@columbian.com)

The Herbery (Opens Feb. 7, 2015)
(360) 841-7500
212 NE 164th Avenue, Suite #11
http://theherberynw.com/
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