Overview. This is the conference where you not only make sure you’re around the city when it’s happening, but you actually attend. Benzinga Cannabis Capital Conference has become the center of gravity for Cannabis industry founders, executives, investors, and other insiders. Benzinga expects 600+ companies, 2,000+ attendees, and 150+ speakers. This will be my third time (NYC 2021, Miami 2022) and I view it as essential to attend.

Access. The environment makes it easy to run into investors and executives (or ex-NFL players like Ricky Williams and Calvin Johnson) that otherwise may be hard to reach. The best way is to probably wait by the stage after speakers wrap up—it’s usually only a handful of people that do this. So if you’re looking to get a conversation going with Charlie Bachtell (Cresco Labs), Emily Paxhia (Poseidon), Matt Hawkins (Entourage Effect Capital), Nancy Whiteman (Wana Brands), Chris Beals (WM Technology), or any of the other speakers, make sure you’re in the first few rows during their panel and approach them after. You’ll also run into others just from being at the conference and networking events over the course of the two days.