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The cannabis industry continues to evolve, especially with legalization taking place all around the world.

Insert CannaGo, the new cutting-edge tech company created by two Atlanta-based alums from Morehouse. Victor Nwadike and Matthew Gaffney are excited as ever to join forces to ignite a cannabis revolution in Atlanta, a place that already has so much history and culture. 

CannaGo is an app created to help consumers find a convenient and trustworthy way to access high-quality hemp products. Their passion and dedication to the hemp industry speaks volumes in their everyday lives, in turn supporting local hemp growers and businesses – all while giving back to the city of Atlanta via donations and community involvement. 

Now, CannaGo is making their mark via the upcoming BudFast, slated to take place on April 20th at the Loft at Center Stage in Atlanta. This immersive experience guarantees that attendees will be able to celebrate CannaGo’s innovative platform alongside live music, food, and nothing but pure excitement. 

Domani and Kaelyn Kastle are slated to headline the musical performances. 

Sheen spoke with Victor Nwadike and Matthew Gaffney about the exciting new venture.

 

Please introduce yourselves and explain how you got into the cannabis space.

Our Founders Victor Nwadike and Matthew Gaffney met both while attending Morehouse College here in Atlanta, Georgia. Victor is a native of Nigeria, by way of Miami and then Tennessee with years of app development experience as a youth where he built numerous apps that ranked as high as Top 100 worldwide in the App/Google Play Stores. He’s also helped transform products at Series A startups from the Bay Area in the Ag-Tech space to Boston based health software companies as well. 

Matthew is a native of Philadelphia, with experience cross sectioning between sales, finance and marketing. His sales experience stems from working startups in the hospitality/multi family-residential spaces landing brands like Hotel Clairmont , Intercontinental-Buckhead; to working with production sets like A League Of Their Own, The WonderYears and even retail sales as young as 16 where he excelled. 

We both met each other at an internship interest meeting at the AUC’s own Woodruff Library Woody, where truthfully we went to score some free pizza. We each have a vastly different experience with cannabis prior to meeting, but united around a common theme we saw of the rapidly growing hemp market here in Georgia, in tandem with sweeping legalization locally as well as nationally. After experiencing some of the painful pitfalls of the cannabis industry as well as some of the benefits the plant offers firsthand we knew there was something there. Hearing experiences of some of our peers as well just made us more confident we could make a difference. 

At its most basic principle, you can get everything else delivered to your home in a flash from cars, groceries, food, furniture and more; so why not your cannabis too? We knew we had to go to the drawing board to be able to do this in the most secure, legal and streamlined way possible and that’s how CannaGo was born.

When did you get the idea for CannaGo and what’s the main premise?

We got the idea for CannaGo from observing the growth of the minor cannabinoid industry here in Atlanta. We were seeing stores on every corner all around the city that were always packed with customers and that validated the market to us. We knew that there was room for growth, and delivery methods were outdated so at the fundamental basis of it all we knew we wanted to make legal cannabis and hemp more accessible.

What are you most excited for with BudFest coming up? How will attendees be able to experience CannaGo?

Some of the things that get us the most amped up about BudFest is we’re excited to finally carve out a safe, fun and freeing space for buds that celebrates them (cannabis/hemp enthusiasts) in a world that stigmatizes and suppresses them. Cannabis is more than a fun thing to do; it’s medicine to some, a relaxant to others, a rehabilitator to more and people need to start seeing it that way. From the most notorious stars, to your local line cook, we all unite around a plant that increases quality of life in a bevy of different ways. 

We’re super amped to have an amazing local lineup of artists like Domani, Kaelyn Kastle, Dri-Jack, Torica, Michael Aristotle and more to help provide this experience, with great local vendors to put together a great evening in Midtown. Attendees will be able to experience CannaGo through the app experience tied into the event experience, giveaways on site and tons of other cool things coming post event to thank all attendees for helping us spread this message to the city of Atlanta and beyond. 

How will this app make an impact in the cannabis industry?

CannaGo impacts this industry because simply, we’re designed specifically for this. We’re not just a delivery app, we bring value to all sides of the marketplace. We make access to the best local and legal cannabis brands a breeze with our software which is very important. However, we prioritize amplifying the great brands in this state to new users that can find value in them and encourage a new way to build brand loyalty without even having to step foot in a dispensary. We remove the hassle of Atlanta traffic, while providing convenience in a space that is severely lacking it. 

We are set on continuing to do so, and as we grow being able to offer better insights and information to our retail partners to allow them to sustainably and efficiently grow through data. We represent a product that was built for the cannabis industry by people who truly advocate for the plant. We’re not just another app coming from an unrelated industry like food delivery, etc. We’re designed specifically to solve the issues that lie in cannabis and make inroads every day in realtime. We’re discreet, secure, and reliable, just like a bud (friend) should be.

The desire to put together BudFest comes from a pure desire to carve out a safe, fun and freeing place for all buds to enjoy. This is embodied through our mascot Bud who is the lifeline of CannaGo. He’s been so well received from people of all ages around Georgia, and helps rally everyone behind that common theme of what it means to truly be a bud. When we looked around at the landscape, sure there are plenty of cannabis/hemp events throughout the city, but none of them amplified the things that are aligned with the plant like the arts, music, interactive touchpoints and food like we do. We saw this as a unique opportunity to bring these things to the forefront in a creative way. We are intent on creating an immersive experience that will become a permanent staple here in Atlanta, that people can come be themselves without fear of judgement and let their hair down to be as free as they should. 

Anything else we should know?

When it comes to the favorite brands on our app, there are none. We value and love each one of our store partners as they each add a unique and large value to what we’re building here. From multi-state operators like Coastal Green Wellness and Malawi Plant & Oil, to local staples like CBD Health & Smoke, Inno Medicinals, West End Joint, Uplifting Artists, VegaSoul and so much more. We have an amazing group of brands to experience on our app and look forward to adding more amazing ones to our ecosystem!