5 Tips Every New CBD Business Should Know

There’s never been a better time to get into the CBD business. It is exploding in popularity thanks to a growing perception about its health benefits for things like pain, anxiety, sleep, and more. That makes this the perfect time to launch your own business before the market is dominated by big brands.

If you are new to launching your own business, or just new to CBD, there are some important tips you should know before you get started. They will help you formulate your business strategy and figure out important details along the way.

Here are the 5 best tips for starting a new CBD business. 

#1) Learn About Local Laws

The CBD industry is still very new. Because of its association with marijauna, it shared the same highly restricted legal status for much of recent history. In 2014, CBD was made legal under the Farm Bill. That bill received an update in 2018 that removed even more restrictions that still lingered. 

The reason why CBD was made legal across the country where marijuana wasn’t is because CBD does not contain any psychoactive properties. Unlike the THC in marijauana, it does not make you feel high or cause any mental impairment. 

Despite being legal in all states, there is still a lot of uncertainty between different local and state laws. Even though it is generally legal to operate a CBD business, there is a lot of variation for regulations on how you can produce it and sell it. If you want to sell in different markets, make sure you know all the right laws and regulations.

#2) Offer Lab Testing Transparency

Even though CBD is becoming more popular as awareness grows, the market seems like a wild west to consumers. Because they’re unfamiliar with it, they’re looking for information and guidance about the safest and most effective products.

First, people are reading about issues with CBD quality. Depending on where and how the plants were grown, and how the CBD was extracted and refined, it can turn out a very poor quality product. If there were contaminants in the soil, it could even cause issues for whoever consumes it.

The second thing people are reading is that any reputable CBD company offers lab test results for their product to certify that it is good quality and safe. If you want to attract customers who are researching CBD, you have to offer this to stay competitive. 

#3) Use Quality CBD Products

This is the second step related to the wild west issue of CBD quality. Whether you decide to make your own CBD products or purchase them through a wholesale CBD program, you need to make sure your products are good quality. You do not want to earn a reputation for having cheap, low quality CBD products.

There are so many other new CBD businesses and brands around, and no one will have brand loyalty to start with. You want to earn that loyalty right away by being the one with a reputation for great CBD.

#4) Build Your Online Presence

If there’s one lesson that the COVID-19 pandemic should have taught any current and newly launched business, it’s to jump into e-commerce without a second thought. The economic hardship that businesses faced was mostly experienced by those who were slow or unable to adapt to selling their products online.

Managing your business online will make it much easier to manage your business in the post-pandemic world. Even if/when it passes, consumer behavior may have changed forever. People are now used to ordering products online. Even if there’s no pandemic, some people may be more reluctant to go to a store unless it’s necessary.

#5) Offer Diverse Products

When you start a CBD business, most of your customers are going to be completely new to the CBD world. It’s a relatively new product on the market, and most people will not have tried it before. They might not know anything besides that it exists and they heard it helps with various health issues.

That means you’re going to have a lot of tire kickers who aren’t completely sure they want it. Since everyone has different tastes, you want to make it easier for people to try CBD. That’s why you should offer as many different kinds of CBD products as you can realistically manage. It makes it more likely you have CBD in a form that appeals to more people.

These tips are just the tip of the iceberg for starting a successful CBD business. But they should help you figure out important details of how you want to run your business. Will you only sell to one local market to avoid the hassle of different regulations? Will you offer lab testing even if your state doesn’t require it? When you figure all of that out, you’ll have mapped out most of the conceptual identity for your business.