While Las Vegas is already a global pinnacle of all facets of culture, the culture surrounding cannabis and its consumption has become a known presence. With cannabis company booths being a regular at the monthly First Friday celebrations in Downtown, an almost endless number of dispensaries supplying a vast inventory of products and plenty of cannabis-centric private parties and events, the cannabis culture is alive and thriving in Sin City, and not just because the city hosts dozens of annual cannabis conferences and conventions either.
A wildly popular event among the cannabis community of Las Vegas since around 2016 when medical dispensaries finally opened, Culture and Cannabis provides an experience of professional networking in a relaxed environment, musical performances from both local and traveling musicians and booths for artists as well as CBD suppliers and social groups among many other organizations.
Most recently atop the Grand Downtown’s Citrus Grand Pool Deck, the sprawling event perfectly showcases the complexity and extensiveness yet the friendliness and creativity of the community of consumers and business professionals. Home-created products and goods are being sold and discussed, business cards are being handed around with the same frequency that drinks are and even if public consumption isn’t allowed due to Las Vegas’ currently restrictive laws, the spirit of cannabis is still incredibly present.
An event planner for over two decades now, 43-year-old JC Coats has a knack for successful event planning. At only 20, the Oklahoma native was hosting monthly raves in Oklahoma City, Kansas City and Dallas. In 2004, the already seasoned event planner set his sails on one of the most exciting cities in the world, planning house music shows with a house music concept event called “Sundaze”; a summer pool party and music showcase of top-named talent hosted in lavish locations such as the Palazzo’s Azure and the exact same pool deck that would later host Culture and Cannabis.
After two decades of clever and unanimously successful event planning for more extravagant nightclubs than any Vegas billionaire could ever visit, Coats decided to start his own marketing and promotions agency in 2016. To attract clients, he relied on the signature skills he knew best, event planning. By hosting business networking events, his company’s marketing abilities were in full display. When an impressed client attended a networking event who worked in cannabis, they brought up an idea with Coats.
Due to the tricky complications surrounding cannabis marketing and its effectiveness, Coats and the client came up with an event where businesses could discuss possible collaborations and advertise directly to their audience while consumers could enjoy one another’s company, combining business with recreation and socialization perfectly. With that, Culture and Cannabis LLC was created.
“It’s a community-driven art, music and cannabis experience.” describes Coats.
During their now 3-year run, Culture and Cannabis’s almost monthly has averaged several hundred attendees that encompass the many personalities of the cannabis culture of Las Vegas. Vendors in the industry, from cannabis artists to glassblowers to more CBD companies that could fill a convention, are readily available to discuss their wares. Jerome Baker Design’s pot-cast The Bakercast is usually being recorded an episode live on location while performers such as Mike Jones and Kurupt rap their hit classics only on the other side of the event. A plentiful amount of lounging room for those wanting to socialize and plenty more for business networking, the very facet that began Culture and Cannabis.
And given the rapidly increasing success of his cannabis-centric events, Coats has devised plans for 2020 that have the potential to shoot the concept of the event into the stratosphere, no pun intended on Vegas hotels. Beyond solely events, Culture and Cannabis will be releasing their own line of THC products in partnership with Solaris Farms in January, consisting of pre-rolls and flower for now.
“Everything Solaris is doing aligns with our community-driven brand and their growing
model is perfect for getting exceptional cannabis to the culture at a great price.” Coats said.
And to celebrate the launch of the product to sport the name of the latest in the string of successful events hosted by Coats, Culture and Cannabis will be celebrating in a way that both shows how very mainstream cannabis culture is becoming and makes the Houstonian within my heart very happy.
On February 22nd at Place on 7th, Culture and Cannabis will be hosting a full-scale product and new year launch party in the heart of Las Vegas, with a performance by the Iceman himself and the man who once mentioned being referred to as George Foreman due to the number of grills he’s directly sold; none other than Paul Wall himself.
Coats also announced an expansion of destination with Culture and Cannabis as well. Our neighbors to the Northwest, the lovable “Biggest Little City in The World” and host of the funniest police department in Comedy Central history, Reno will be receiving an event every quarter, the same frequency that Las Vegas will be receiving theirs. While hosting four fewer events overall, Coats said the quarterly events will lead to “bigger experiences” and a larger focus on each event in particular.
And as recreational legalization expands across the country and public consumption laws around Las Vegas are relaxed a bit in future years, it’ll be interesting to see what the cannabis networking and creative arts-centric idea of Culture and Cannabis will evolve into both within Sin City and on the national stage as a whole.
