Searching for “Something that Elevates the Experience” - Rootwurks Speaks to Bryan Gerber of Hara Supply

Facebook, Def Jam, Dell computers, HARA Supply - all of them can trace their beginnings to a college dorm room or apartment. 

Like many college students, Bryan Gerber realized something about cannabis early in his undergraduate days: people liked getting high, but they really liked convenience. 

As a student at George Washington University, Bryan would buy Raw and OCB papers by the box on Amazon, just to have a ready supply at all times. During sessions with his friends, they’d offer to buy a pack of papers and filter tips for $5 and he would happily oblige - after letting them know that the whole box itself only cost $10. 

“I realized it was convenient. That’s why they're paying me $5 when the whole box only costs 10 bucks or something. I started realizing that convenience was more important than pretty much anything at that moment,” Gerber said. 

That realization sent Gerber on a path that eventually led him to found HARA Supply, which he stated is today the world’s largest producer of cones for pre-rolls. He stated that they make around 100 million pre-roll cones per month, and employ more than 4,000 people at several facilities in India (“hara” means green in Hindi). 

But before founding HARA, Gerber put his college experience with convenience to test. 

“Birchbox for Stoners” 

The year 2015 was a big year for the subscription economy, Gerber said, citing successful brands like Million Dollar Shave Club and Birchbox.  

“I thought, you know what? Why don’t we just do Birchbox for stoners,” Gerber said, using the example of the subscription beauty product service. 

While his fellow graduates were seeking out jobs at places like IBM or Deloitte, Gerbr started working out the kinks for the subscription service that would become Hemper. He came to the conclusion that “no one is reading about the latest stoner gadget,” and this is where “a subscription box for stoners” could come in.

Gerber launched the subscription box idea with two co-founders, including his college roommate. In the first month, they clocked 30 subscribers and then they started scaling, finding new and better items each month. The company hired an influencer who in one month boosted its subscribers from 300 to 1,500. They then segued into using musicians as spokespersons, including Cypress Hill and Ty Dolla $ign, among others. 

Eventually, Gerber had another realization: all of these products could be bought at the store individually by customers if they wanted. 

“Then I landed on, we need to manufacture and develop our own products. We need to be the authority, not just a vehicle to get other people's products to doorsteps.”

Gerber said he realized that the box was the company’s “Trojan horse marketing tool to develop our own products for retail.”

The company then began sending out boxes and using customer surveys to figure out what works and what needs to be scrapped. 

“It was the first data-driven approach to smoking accessories.” 

Bongs are still #1

When asked which marijuana accessories are the most popular, Gerber didn’t hesitate. 

“As much as everyone says, “how many bongs do you need?”, we turn bongs into collectible sneakers. You could have 15, I think our average consumer actually has 12 on average.”

Another major revenue stream is making mass market products for convenient stores, including a paper and ceramic one-hitter that comes in a variety of flavors. 

Currently these products are sold in thousands of stores, Gerber said, adding that they’ve taken the approach of being a squeaky clean “new age market opportunity for convenient stores” who are turned off by companies that feature a lot of weed leaves and “Reefer Madness” style packaging. 

The company will also continue to innovate to find new products that hit the mark. 

“If you come out with 100 products a year, 10% are going to be winners. So we have to test and iterate to find the winners. But because we’re vertically integrated on a lot of the manufacturing side, we don’t lose our tail.”

Gerber said the COVID-19 pandemic didn’t spell doom for his company, rather, they hit “new heights like we’d never thought were possible.”

The company has continued to grow since the pandemic, and is helped by the fact that unlike plant touching cannabis companies, they aren’t threatened by falling wholesale cannabis prices.  

What makes a great cannabis accessory?

With all the variety on the head shop or convenience store shelves, what makes cannabis accessories stick out from the crowd?

For Gerber, it’s obvious. 

“I think it's solving a problem or making your session better. That could be speeding it up, or making it easier or taste better. But mainly we’re looking at different products and thinking “can we innovate on this?”

Mainly, Gerber has an awfully simple approach to cannabis products. It involves taking cannabis accessories people already know and love and finding ways to tweak them in a compelling way.  

“This is what's selling by the billions on the shelf. Can we make something that’s comparable but elevates the experience,” Gerber said, explaining his approach. 

He is also helped by the fact that his company does not have to deal with cannabis compliance guidelines because they aren’t plant-touching and don’t sell any cannabis-derived products. 

“Luckily I get to play in the cannabis industry without any of the regulations. I don't have a major accounting team or a compliance team, none of that.”

He also credits what he says is his approach that hasn’t changed even after almost a decade. 

“I still have that bootstrap mentality. I've been in this for nine years now and I think if you lose that bootstrap mentality, and you just start spending on stupid stuff and trying to be everything to everyone, you're going to lose. We’re focused on what we're good at. We haven't had shiny object syndrome,” Gerber said.