This transcript was generated from the episode audio and may contain minor errors.
[Music]
Hello, what's up? Welcome back. My name is Chris Guillebeau. This is Sadduce School. Special episode for you today.
This is episode 82, but it really should be called episode 420 because marijuana is now legal in a number of US states and cities. In my city of Portland, Oregon, there are now something like 150 dispensaries, where as long as you are 21 and older, you can go and purchase a substantial amount of marijuana. It really is like walking into a high-end wine shop. People take it really seriously. And it's also a big business with a lot of people making a lot of money in different ways.
So today you'll hear the story of a Colorado bartender who takes advantage of this formerly forbidden freedom to write a statewide marijuana guide. Then he self-publishes that guide, makes $15 on every copy he sells. He sold 2,000 copies so far. I'll tell you exactly how he does it right after this brief message and after I run out to the store to pick up some snacks. [Music]
Bartenders tend to hear a lot of stories.
In Colorado, Johnny Welsh is no exception. But along with the tales told to him and slurred confidence, he started sharing a story of his own in a self-published book called "Weed-galized, True Tales from the High Country." Johnny is also a fitness trainer and he dabbles in construction and carpentry. So while working multiple jobs and gigs has been a part of his life for a long time, making an income while writing a book has not been. At least not until the Centennial State became the first state of the union to legalize marijuana for all adults, not just for medicinal purposes. Didn't take long before a lot of his bar-side banter became focused on weed.
A lot of people had a lot of stories and questions. Not only were once closeted users telling him about how cannabis affected their quality of life during chronic illness, but many people were finding an entrepreneurial spirit in this newfound industry. His entire town was impacted by the new law and so Johnny went around interviewing people. He talked to the owner of the head shop. He talked to the proprietors of a new bud and breakfast.
He even talked to the county sheriff. His goal was to create a quality product, a lonely planet for potheads, chronicling the experience of legal marijuana in Colorado. Now this took a lot of work. Along with devoting his free time to chasing down people for interviews, who for some reason were sometimes a little slow to respond, he also had to put the book together. Johnny had to pay multiple editors and since he self-published he had to pay for printing.
Finding financing was tough. Apparently banks were not interested in the first ever self-published lonely planet for potheads. So he paid for everything himself, even dipping into some retirement money because he believed this was a Rocky Mountain opportunity that shouldn't go up in smoke. Just how much did it cost? Well, when all was said and done, he spent $12,000 on editing and publishing consulting and then $18,000 more on travel expenses, paying CPAs, a studio to build his website, and other research for the book.
I'm not sure what kind of line items go under other research for the book, but we'll just let that go. Since he was self-publishing, Johnny wanted his book to stand out a little bit more than the standard way that most people choose when they're doing this on their own. So Johnny incorporated his own LLC called Peak One Publishing and he hired a printing company based in Minnesota to print Weedgalized. It cost about $5 to print each book. He opted for thicker paper, which makes the book look and feel like the high quality product he wanted and he sells it for $19.95.
So far he sold about 2,000 copies for $40,000 in income, but remember he spent almost $30,000 to research, write, and edit the book. So that's a $10,000 profit, which is great, but even better now that those expenses have been paid for, he really is earning $15 on each copy sold from now on. So was his hunch right? Was the book worth it? The short answer is yes.
In addition to sales in novelty shops and gift stores, Johnny now sells about 30 copies a month to strangers just while he's doing his bartending job. He's also been featured on ESPN Talk Radio and has gone back to that printer in Minnesota to reprint Weedgalized seven times. His only regret so far is not getting his book stocked at the 7-Eleven where purchasers often go after visiting the dispensary. [Music]
Whatever your thoughts are on it, medical and recreational cannabis is becoming a massive industry. There are many opportunities to make money both directly and indirectly.
Aside from all the actual dispensaries that are popping up, the related industries are huge too. There's a great need for banking services. Since a lot of people in this industry can't even have a traditional checking or savings account, it affects the wellness industry, education, it really is kind of a Wild West in terms of all the stuff that's changing. Some form of medical or recreational marijuana is now legal in 24 states. And again, whether you're for or against, there's definitely a lot of attention on this big change.
Now let's talk briefly about self-publishing. I may have gone through his costs too quickly earlier. I wanted to point out that it doesn't actually cost $30,000 to self-publish a book, or at least it doesn't have to. And you can in fact do it for much cheaper than that. There are a lot of resources that will allow you to have that book available and even a shorter period of time for a lot less money.
CreateSpace is a popular one, I'll link it up. But having said that, I actually like what Johnny did in terms of investing in the process and figuring out how to have a quality product because the reality is a lot of these self-published books that come out, they really aren't that great. And I know people are like, oh, but it's so great. It's like democratization of authorship and anyone can write a book. Well, yes, anyone can write a book, but it doesn't mean it's gonna be good.
Anyone could decide, oh, I'm gonna be an industrial engineer or whatever, but most of us would say, well, it's not quite that simple. So at least in this case, investing in a quality product, recognizing that he hadn't written a book before, he was definitely gonna need some help with editing and publishing. Obviously he took some risk in doing that, especially in regards to withdrawing some of his retirement money, but it was something he believed in. And as we see, it's been a big success. So I hope you enjoyed this story and I hope you consumed Simon School responsibly.
It is legal in all 50 states, at least for now. To see the show notes for today's episode, go to SimonSchool.com/82. You can get a copy of Weakalized. You can see the printing company he used, international listeners. If you're coming to the US at some point, you may wanna decide which states you're gonna visit based on this information.
So I'll include a map. You can get some free rolling papers. Okay, there actually aren't any free rolling papers, but everything else will be there. Thank you for listening. Inspiration is good.
Inspiration combined with action is so much better. So I hope you take action over there. SimonSchool school listeners, go to the store, buy an extra large bag of Cheetos, put a towel into the door. It's high time you got to work on your household. I'm Chris Guillebeau.
I'll be back again tomorrow. [Music]
