Queer-owned cannabis brand Cann is celebrating pride month with a new campaign with a star-studded cast. The campaign launched in tandem with Cann's new Lite cannabis-infused beverages, featuring four delicious and unique flavors, with help from its recent Series A funding round of $27 million. Luke Anderson, co-founder of Cann, joined Cheddar News to discuss this latest round of funding, what to expect from the new drinks, and how to promote inclusivity within the cannabis industry. 

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Queer-Owned Cannabis Brand Cann Launches Pride Campaign

queer owned cannabis brand can is celebrating Pride Month with a new campaign starring Kesha Patricia Arquette, sarah Michelle gellar and several other stars from Rupaul's drag race. The campaign launched in tandem with cans, new light cannabis infused beverages Featuring four delicious and unique flavors with help from its recent series, a funding round of $27 million dollars here to tell us all about it is luke. Anderson, co founder of can luke, Welcome to the show. So what does it mean to you to launch this campaign of course in celebration of Pride Month. Yeah, as a queer owned company, we have a duty to tell the story of, of queer acceptance and we have seen so many companies just throw a rainbow on their logo and then you know, come july 1st, it's it's back to funding anti gay politicians. Um there are very, very few brands that are as radically inclusive in their work. We have just as many straight allies as we do trans women of color in the campaign and taking a nod from Britney's iconic Pepsi commercial. We're trying to make a statement that the cannabis infused beverage is just like a regular drink that people should consider as something that belongs in their fridge. So we made an original song and we actually rented the same rooftop, but instead of a Pepsi sign, it's a can and find it on weed maps sign. So tell us more about these light products. What can customers expect when we take our first steps. It's delicious and it's only 10 calories. So a lot of people love can, but they don't want any added sugar in their diet. We, we made four flavors, honey do mint, cloudy, apple rhubarb, golden, citrus bark and tangerine hops that have zero added sugar, but they taste just like the most delicious drink you've ever had. Uh, if you're going to spend 100 calories on a spiked seltzer, you can drink 10 of these before you have the same impact on your body and it, it's not about promoting diet culture, it's just about limiting sugar. Sugar is a drug and if cannabis is going to be villainized and named a federally controlled substance, whereas sugar just runs freely through people's veins and causes so many health problems. Maybe we should, you know, think about what is a drug and what isn't. That's a really good point. Let's talk about that $27 million Luke. We're becoming a mainstream global brand, 80% of adults want to drink less alcohol and 60% of American adults are curious about cannabis but don't know where to start. This is a, an America first brand, but it truly is a global brand. We just expanded to Canada. We're looking at Mexico, we're looking at europe anyplace where there's legal cannabis and there are people falling out of love with alcohol is a perfect place for can't be like you mentioned, you guys are a proud queer owned company. How can we better promote inclusivity within the cannabis industry luke? It's about ally Ship. It's about straight people and, and people of every position on the gender and sexual identity spectrum. Getting involved in the movement. We are only able to be legitimate in the eyes of the law and as anti gay sentiment and bills like don't say gay or gaining traction. It's, it's on companies that have queer leaders to be loud and proud and make pride a celebratory occasion, but one that that has authentic storytelling and that includes people who don't identify as queer. The goal is one day we don't need pride campaigns. But for now while we're marginalized, we do and we, we need to make sure we're telling stories from every intersection of the queer community, include by people, include trans women of color, include older, younger, every every shape and size. It's not as myopic and as specific as gay anymore. And we have a duty to brought me the aperture. Well said luke Anderson, co founder of Can I Can't wait to try this. I love the 10 calories. Thank you so much