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Joe Kryszak of Stirling CBD: 5 Things I Wish Someone Told Me Before I Started Leading a Cannabis or CBD Business

An Interview With Candice Georgiadis

The health benefits I have seen have been amazing. I personally had cancer last year, and cannabis products were one of the only things that made me feel better.

As part of my series about “5 Things I Wish Someone Told Me Before I Started Leading a Cannabis Business” I had the pleasure of interviewing Joe Kryszak.

Joe Kryszak is the founder and owner of Stirlingcdboil.com & Stirlingprofessional.com. Joe completed his undergraduate at San Diego State University and received his MBA in 2002 from Pepperdine University. Joe has run billion-dollar businesses at HP, Lenovo, and Amazon. In 2014, Joe launched Stirling with the goal of providing a healthy, natural alternative to over-the-counter and prescription medication.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Can you share with us the story about what brought you to this specific career path?

Growing up in California, I have always had a passion for Cannabis — it was a part of my social upbringing. During the 1990’s while I was attending SDSU, the cannabis industry was not a consideration — of course it was not legal anywhere. Luckily I had some amazing opportunities to develop myself and in traditional corporate America. After some amazing successful years of corporate experience at Fortune 500 companies like Black & Decker, HP, and Amazon, I determined it was time to follow my passion and help lead the wave of holistic health solutions for people. The CBD / Cannabis industry was the logical place to put my energy and passion.

Can you share the most interesting story that happened to you since you began leading your company? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?

Unfortunately, the Cbd/Cannabis industry is full of what Californians call “posers.” In my 8 years in this industry, I have met more unprofessional & unscrupulous people than I have met in my 30 years in the corporate world. The good news is that my experience working with all types of people with different backgrounds and skillsets makes me an excellent evaluator of talent. The biggest lesson I can tell people who want to enter this business is? Trust but verify, and then verify again. A bad partnership in this industry means you are doomed.

Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?

A potential partner indicated that they had extracted one of the “Holy Grails” of Cannibionodis. However, he was unwilling to prove this by getting his product tested — he was adamant that all 3rd party testing was a scam and the testing companies could not verify his solution. We passed on the partnership, and he quickly got bought out. Just 3 months later, that partnership blew up, and the potential partner returned to us with a radically reduced fee. We passed on him again…Trust but verify — and then verify again!

Are you working on any exciting projects now? How do you think that will help people?

We are working with leaders in the retail, extraction, B2C, and telehealth communities to develop a complete solution for people who are interested but nervous about CBD. This will open up a whole new avenue to this amazing solution.

None of us are able to achieve success without some help along the way. Is there a particular person you are grateful for who helped get you to where you are? Can you share a story?

I continually lean on people who are smarter than me in specific areas. As we are in over 200 Chiropractic offices, I have contact with people who love, own, and practice healthy solutions. I appreciate all the partnerships I have made and will continue to lean on them for product advice.

This industry is young dynamic and creative. Do you use any clever and innovative marketing strategies that you think large legacy companies should consider adopting?

The biggest way to fail in this industry — spend too much $$ with marketing companies. Marketing companies continually overpromise and underdeliver. Learn the basics of marketing and do a deep interview of any marketing company before you sign up with them.

Can you share 3 things that most excite you about the Cannabis industry? Can you share 3 things that most concern you?

Excite:

  1. The health benefits I have seen have been amazing. I personally had cancer last year, and cannabis products were one of the only things that made me feel better.
  2. The continued adoption of cannabis by all demographics, races, and ages. It is great to see so many diverse communities adopt cannabinoid products.
  3. The discovery and development of new cannabinoids. For instance, we just launched a Water-Soluble CBGA/CBDA powder that is getting a lot of attention in the press.

Concerns:

  1. CBD companies continue to make health claims that their product can cure/prevent diseases. This is a sure-fire way to attract the attention of the FDA and have them come down on all CBD companies.
  2. There will be a continuous shake out of the industry. 1000s of CBD companies will start this year, and 1000s will close

Can you share your “5 Things I Wish Someone Told Me Before I Started Leading a Cannabis Business”? Please share a story or example for each.

  • This is not a get-rich-quick scheme — and you will have bigger competitors who can outspend you. Find your niche and attack it.
  • You will spend far more time making your company successful than you expect
  • Trust is earned in this industry.
  • Marketing companies are better at marketing themselves than you
  • This business is like a good golf shot — “Keep your head down and follow through.”

What is the best way our readers can follow you on social media?

https://www.facebook.com/InfoStirlingOils/

https://www.instagram.com/stirlingcbdoil/

This was very inspiring. Thank you so much for joining us!


Joe Kryszak of Stirling CBD: 5 Things I Wish Someone Told Me Before I Started Leading a Cannabis or… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.