4 Benefits of Wholesaling Your Cannabis Flower

By Allison Cohn

Wholesaling a product means selling merchandise to processors, manufacturers, distributors, resellers or retailers in bulk. Variations of wholesaling could be selling your product to commercial, institutional or other professional business users. In general, to wholesale means to sell one’s product to anyone other than your standard consumer. If you’re buying a dime bag directly from the grower, that is not wholesale. If you are purchasing an ounce from a dispensary, that weed was sold to the dispensary via wholesale, and there were likely many middlemen who helped it get from the farm to your pocket.

Tamerlane offers an online marketplace with value-add wholesale brokerage services for buyers and sellers in the cannabis industry with the mission to, “provide licensed cannabis operators with the simplest and highest value transactions based on transparency and trust.”

There are countless advantages to using a wholesale broker, whether with or without a marketplace. Tamerlane combines marketplace efficiency, transparency and trust with the personalized service a broker can provide, and they work with buyers and sellers to provide consistency, reliability and price fairness to their clients. Most importantly, though, wholesaler brokers utilize their vast network of industry professionals to establish mutually beneficial relationships and help customers achieve their goals.

Before cannabis was legalized, most sellers had to do the whole vertical themselves: grow, process, manufacture, package and retail, distribute and brand. In no other industry will you see the person producing the raw material doing all of the other aspects of sales and distribution, but cannabis growers have historically had to do just that.

ENTER TAMERLANE TRADING

“We approached the industry and said, you don’t have to do it that way,” says Tamerlane founder and CEO, Jhavid Mohseni. “So we chopped the supply chain up into segments based on what people were good at. You don’t need to be a jack of all trades. Just do what you do, and do it well.”

“Sure, growers could take it all the way to retail,” says Mohseni, “but that’s a lot of work. It’s hard to do multiple things really well.”

Tamerlane provides what Mohseni calls “white glove sales and sourcing,” where they highly value each unique client as an individual and will take care of them by doing the extra work.

“Once our clients see how easy wholesaling with us is, they’re happy to not have to deal with all of the other aspects of sales and marketing and distribution. They can focus on other more important things on their end. They can refocus on their core business, what they’re already good at. They’ve got more bandwidth. They get their lives back and see their families more. We’re building other people’s business by investing in relationships. Whenever we engage with any of our clients, our mission and intention is to be of service to build their business to scale.”

So how does Tamerlane Trading help growers sell their crops wholesale?

1. NETWORKING WITHIN THE INDUSTRY

Wholesaling connects buyers, suppliers and service providers to make sure everyone gets exactly what they need. The most valuable thing a wholesaler provides to its clients is access to their existing network of clients.

“Our network is what our current client base appreciates the most,” claims Mohseni. “We focus on building relationships and trust. We ask our clients questions and then listen. Listening to the client is a big deal.”

Tamerlane has worked with over 700 operations in the last four years. “We see what people do, whether it’s good or bad, if they struggle or thrive, and we bring that knowledge base to our clients. It’s in our best interest to see them do well, because then we’ll do well,” explains Mohseni.

Tamerlane’s intimate knowledge of their clients’ business practices and ongoings helps them to make informed decisions when advising customers, guiding relationships and making connections. While these systemic, behind-the-scenes match makings may go unnoticed by clients, proper client pairing is the building block to establishing productive business relationships. It’s about helping clients build their business by implementing the best practices and connecting all of the right people within their network.

Mohseni says, “What matters is that there’s no time wasted chasing the wrong partnership when we can fast track the entire thing, which leads to more consistent business.”

2. VETTED BUYERS AND SELLERS

Accordinging to Mohseni, suppliers working the entire vertical on their own was just not working. There was no quality verification and a distinct lack of trust and transparency between the buyers and sellers. A lot of this was resolved with partner Big Tree’s grading system, but the need for substantial sales relationships became paramount.

“Early on, there was such low trust,” explains Mohseni. “It was like buying weed off Craigslist. The current environment at Tamerlane’s marketplace is like the early days of Amazon or eBay, with Tamerlane providing that third party trust and transparency between the buyer and seller. We’ve been working on providing that sort of rating system in the cannabis marketplace, and will be able to deliver it very soon.”

When distributing wholesale with Tamerlane, both sides of every transaction are thoroughly vetted. They know everyone is operating legally within their network. Tamerlane has worked hard to build relationships. “It’s more than business. We operate on a personal level. We engage that way to help our clients grow their business,” says Mohseni. “We talk to everyone and know what’s going on. If someone always bounces checks, we’re not going to put a deal together with the guy who needs to pay his electricity bill,” says Mohseni.

3. TRANSPARENCY AND FAIR MARKET PRICES

Wholesale clients get access to Tamerlane’s vast network of vetted buyers, so clients’ inventory gets shown to a wide assortment of potential buyers. This, in turn, helps to secure the best and fairest market price based on the product’s true value. Clients aren’t restricted to buyers within their own community and also don’t have to do the leg work required to get their product seen by more potential buyers — Tamerlane does all of that for them.

Furthermore, graded and certified products provide transparency, fosters trust and builds better relationships between buyers and suppliers. Tamerlane partners with Big Tree Grading to provide material grading, quality verification, certification and appraisal services. As the only quality verified marketplace, Tamerlane is in a position to accurately and effectively help clients distribute their product based on its proven quality and consistency.

4. STREAMLINING, EFFICIENCY, COST SAVING

Utilizing a wholesaler drastically cuts down on time to market costs and supply chain challenges. Tamerlane is the marketplace, the broker and facilitator, managing client’s paperwork and logistics.

“If you wholesale, you package all your cannabis in pounds,” explains Mohseni. “So you’re working at that scale versus using exorbitant labor to break it down further, use extra packaging, etcetera. So your labor cost drastically drops. The seller can then focus their time, money and energy on their core business.”

Tamerlane also handles tedious administrative tasks for its clients. From payment validation to invoicing, they coordinate all third party service provider logistics (packaging, manufacturing, lab testing, grading, transportation, marketing, branding, etc).

“We’re dedicated to putting in the time and energy for you,” Mohseni says. “We’ve got preferential and negotiated rates for our clients. Then they can focus on their own business. They get back to work, and we do the rest.”