Kevin Murphy left Wall Street for cannabis in 2011, grew his company, Acreage Holdings, and sold it this spring for billions. And he says there’s plenty more room for growth.
The average cannabis consumer may not have heard of Kevin Murphy, but they’ve surely seen the headlines he’s made as the CEO of Acreage Holdings, the largest vertically integrated, multistate cannabis company in America. Last year, he got former House Speaker John Boehner to join his board of directors—despite Boehner’s having claimed to be “unalterably opposed to the legalization of marijuana.” Then Murphy’s company produced a cannabis Super Bowl ad; when CBS rejected it (to nobody’s surprise), Acreage spun the moment into PR gold. And in April, Murphy made headlines again when he sold Acreage to Canopy Growth for $3.4 billion. It’s been a great run for this former Wall Street investor, who first got involved in cannabis in Maine eight years ago. Acreage’s portfolio includes cultivation, processing, and dispensaries—but despite now being one of the industry’s major players, he believes there’s still plenty of room for small businesses with big ideas.
You made a good deal of money on Wall Street. Why get into the cannabis business?
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