Adelia Carrillo, Direct Cannabis Network
“When it comes to cannabis exploration, I would say to educate yourself and to really see how cannabis helps you.”
Describe yourself and what you do.
I am a tech geek who loves entrepreneurship and innovation mix that with hardworking, loyal and big hearted. I believe in empowering others and striving to make a positive difference and impact not only in the cannabis industry but in the world.
What is your cannabis business origin story?
I started my journey in 2014 through personal research and education. After seeing a real need for the industry, I began building a team and developing Direct Cannabis Network.
Direct Cannabis Network is the leading digital B2B news network highlighting the latest tech, entrepreneurs, and innovative companies through original content. Our mission is to create an entrepreneurial ecosystem that elevates the ideas, connects the communities, and raises the expectations of the cannabis industry.
My goal is to make sure that we don’t lose sight of the real value and connection cannabis brings to us. I preach that we entrepreneurs should always be working together to continue building the industry in a positive direction, from the generation of family growers to small businesses to ancillary and tech companies. We have the opportunity to make this industry a role model for others industries to strive to be, and we can do it.
Beyond this mission, I hope to be someone that other women and men can look up to, to follow their dreams, to push themselves and to never give up.
What is your personal cannabis origin story?
About three and a half years ago, I was re-introduced to cannabis, this time in a medicinal way. My fiancé and I found out that we were pregnant. Quickly after, I began showing health concerns that put me on bedrest. The complications worsened, and I had to have an emergency surgery.
After the surgery, I was given a lineup of prescriptions that didn’t help with my recovery. Due to the prescriptions making me feel worse, my fiancé suggested I turn to cannabis.
As I began my trial and error of testing out medical cannabis, I noticed that cannabis helped me physically and emotionally.
During that transition, I also began doing research specifically in areas I am passionate about. I quickly realized I couldn’t relate to the media outlets available at the time and couldn’t find much on startups, tech, and innovation and saw a real need for an ecosystem for the cannabis entrepreneurial community. This began the development of Direct Cannabis Network.
What is your Superpower?
I believe my superpower is authenticity. I know where I excel in my attributes, but I also know what I am not good at and that is the power behind building a team and becoming a good leader.
I strongly believe that in building a successful business, you must know yourself, what are your strengths, what you excel at and what you are not good at and who your ideal client or customer is.
What has been your greatest obstacle in this industry or with your business to date – and how have you overcome it?
The greatest obstacle was growing a business in an industry that is still so new. Being a specific niche media site, we saw that the audience we were building our site for was still in development and saw that our growth in the beginning was going to be slow but steady. Although we didn’t originally scale like other media sites would in other markets, we knew that by growing our voice organically and building relationships with the audience and client’s would allow for us to really focus on building the perfect product for market.
It took a lot of patience, tests, meetings and reaching out to make sure that we were on the right path. Now as we have grown and been able to really build our brand and product for our audience, we are now scaling and seeing the development grow and increase quicker than ever before. Our learning lesson was staying focused, testing out everything and gathering a lot of data.
Being an entrepreneur is tough, but you should never lose faith in your vision and must always remain humble and be open to pivoting and always challenging yourself and team to keep moving forward.
What is your vision for women in this industry?
I would love for more women to step into leadership roles, whether it is starting your own company or pushing yourself to reach out to the other companies and applying for positions that you know your talents would be an asset to the company.
For women looking to enter the industry, I highly suggest reaching out to other’s, whether it’s for friendship, mentorship or guidance.
When we continue to help each other, we can truly help be the leaders in the industry. When it comes to cannabis exploration, I would say to educate yourself and to really see how cannabis helps you, whether you medicate or use recreational or just are an advocate in the plant. Cannabis really helped me find myself, and pushed me to be completely confident in who I was and helped me emotionally and physically and I believe it can do the same for you.
Connect with Adelia
Website: Direct Cannabis Network
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/DirectCannaNetwork/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/_dcnetwork_/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/_dcnetwork_
her canna life: high-minded women 