Our Honest Take: The Massive Research Gap in Cannabis

We’ll be honest with you, there’s a lot we don’t know.

As a science-forward company, we struggle with this. How can we call ourselves science-forward when there is so little robust science to be had in this industry? Our consumers have so many questions for us: Will it help with this ailment? Will it interact with that medication? and many of them, we can't definitively answer.

But there’s a crucial reason we persist despite this knowledge gap: our commitment to safe, effective products, regardless of the regulatory landscape. To build genuine trust, we need to talk about the elephant in the room: what we don’t know, and why.

Why Scientific Inquiry Was Stunted: The Schedule I Hurdle

You would think that a plant that has been used by and evolving among humans for thousands of years would have a significant body of scientific inquiry behind it. However, the legal history of cannabis in the U.S. has created a formidable barrier.

• The Early Ban: The plant was outlawed in the United States since 1937. For context, scientific understanding at this time was just beginning to grasp concepts like vitamins and blood types.
• The Schedule I Classification: In 1970, when drugs were being “scheduled,” marijuana was legally stated to have no medical benefit, no acceptably safe levels, and a high potential for addiction.
• The Current Roadblock: Marijuana still holds this "Schedule I" classification. This status makes the scientific study of cannabis compounds (like THC, CBD, and CBN) extremely difficult. Research requires DEA clearance and navigating extensive, expensive red tape just to obtain the privilege of studying this ubiquitous plant.

Scientific study of the plant has been stunted for nearly a century, leaving a massive gap in public health knowledge.

A Booming Market Meets a Knowledge Deficit

Meanwhile, the market and consumer adoption have surged without any corresponding change in the stranglehold on research.

States have trudged on without the federal government’s blessing: medical programs sprung up, and today, about half of the US has "recreational" or "adult-use" cannabis programs. With the 2018 Farm Bill essentially opening state lines to all kinds of hemp products (loopholed or intentional!), consumer use has skyrocketed. By 2022, more Americans reported using cannabis daily than alcohol (Caulkins, 2024).

This is the key problem: All this market activity has erupted without any change in scientific accessibility. It means this popular plant is less studied or regulated than food, drinking water, supplements, or nearly anything else folks consume on a daily basis.

We believe that scientific inquiry is a crucial element for the health and safety of all our consumers, even if that research ends up showing us some of the drawbacks of the plant. Without it, it’s difficult to determine:

• How much to use.
• Which cannabinoids are best
• How often to use them.
• For what ailments, and for how long.

Our Commitment: Trust, Transparency, and Experience

Since definitive scientific answers are often unavailable, our approach is built on two things: transparency and industry experience.

What we do know, we know from being in this industry for almost a decade. We have sold millions of products; high THC, high CBD, and everything in between, and we’ve listened to our customers’ stories.

• Anecdotal Evidence & Preliminary Research: Most of our product suggestions and formulas come from synthesizing these anecdotal stories with the limited, preliminary research available. This allows us to make the best, safest products we can manage.
• The Regulatory Line: We keep all psychoactive products strictly limited to the adult-use regulated market in California. We believe the psychoactive components carry too much risk to ship out without the proper safeguards and state-level verification in place.
• Online Hemp Products: Our online store products are crafted based on what we have found people respond to most effectively, while carrying minimal risk.
• Our Best Advice: Because clear dosing guidelines are often missing, you’ll notice we often tell folks to experiment carefully and find their own path. It’s the best, safest guidance we can offer in this environment.

We are a cannabis company, and we are used to pivoting! You can trust that when more information becomes available, when federal changes make research more accessible and robust, and when conclusions can be substantiated, we’ll be the first to update our products and advice. We want to provide products that are safe, effective, and make your life better.

Cited:

Caulkins JP. Changes in self-reported cannabis use in the United States from 1979 to 2022. Addiction. 2024; 119(9): 1648–1652. https://doi.org/10.1111/add.16519