Founders talk Smoke: Marijuana + Black America for 420

According to the ACLU, nationwide, data continues to reveal significant racial bias in cannabis arrests, despite roughly equal usage rates between Black and White people. And when you look at ownership statistics for the industry, the numbers remain bleak.

A Conversation with Deadline

Recently, Simply Pure founders Wanda James and Scott Durrah, participated in a conversation about this and the documentary, Smoke: Marijuana + Black America. The conversation was hosted by Deadline and both founders were interviewed by the film’s director, Erik Parker.

The challenges to getting into the industry

“What Black America missed out on was ‘first-mover advantage,’ ” James mentions in the interview. Durrah also talks about how it’s difficult for Black business owners to obtain a loan and how they have to leverage their own resources to get in the door. In the interview, he states, “We had the resources between ourselves…We had our own house, etc., we were able to come up with the first million dollars that you needed just to be able to get in,” Durrah said, noting the difficulty they faced as Black business owners to obtain loans. “We busted our ass and built ourselves wealth and we had to fund ourselves.”

Click here to get the full interview.