James Zachodni, Co-Founder & CEO of Farechild Events – Interview Series

Few esteemed cannabis professionals have had as fascinating a career trajectory as James Zachodni, Co-Founder and CEO of Farechild Events. From his beginnings in nightlife to co-founding the influential DOPE Magazine in 2011, which featured vital interviews and articles with cannabis’ strongest advocates and employees before being sold to High Times, Zachodni has made a significant impact on the industry. In April 2019, he founded Farechild Events with fellow legendary cannabis event planner and businessman David Tran. Since then, Farechild has hosted numerous illustrious cannabis-centric events, such as The Emjay Awards and the recent 420 State Fair in Las Vegas.

Tell me about how you first got into the cannabis space and your professional experience before that.

I was publishing a magazine called DList Magazine which was focused on nightlife and fashion components here in the Northwest. We had copies in the Seattle and Portland markets. We started it in 2007 and in 2011, I got a call from David Tran, who I was doing other nightlife business with, which led to the creation of DOPE Magazine.

DOPE Magazine started because of the lack of anything related to marketing resources or advertising outlets for any cannabis businesses in the Seattle area. It started that way but it became more of a true publication with tons of journalistic integrity and everything else you’d expect from a magazine. That’s how I got into cannabis was with magazines doubled with the need for some kind of marketing outlet for cannabis business in Seattle.

What were some of your best and most cherished highlights during your time with Dope Magazine? And what were some of the most journalistically important stories that the magazine covered as well?

We had an eight-year run with DOPE so that’s a tough question. Obviously, publishing the first magazine was cool since we published it out of thin air. Granted, I did have a magazine background but finding stories and a especially cover story for the first issue was a challenge because almost no one wants to put their face on the cover of a first issue. Interestingly though, we had some political connections and we actually got the mayor of Seattle at the time to be our cover feature, which was important because he was pro-cannabis and led ultimately to the legalization movement that happened in Washington state in 2012.  We handed out the first issue at Hemp Fest, a long-running festival which had a couple hundred thousand people coming out to this park every year during August in Seattle.

Once we started DOPE Magazine, we found that this would be the best place to start the magazine. So, we printed 10,000 issues of our first edition of the magazine and David and I would stand on the sidewalk of the festival and hand out magazines to anyone that would take one.

As far as journalistic integrity, we had tons of great interviews for DOPE. Tons of celebrities and politicians and we’ve had everyone under the sun. It’s hard to hone in on one specific interview that changed the game in a sense, but we definitely had a great interview with Bernie Sanders during his presidential run. We had a very insightful interview with Gary Vee where he lent his thoughts on the cannabis space and what it looked like moving forward. There’s almost too many to name off the top of my head.

Some of the early ones were the most interesting, because they came on very early and lent their name and credibility to the magazine. So names like Steve DeAngelo, Eddie Lesko, Rick Simpson and other big names in the industry.

How did Farechild Events come into existence? As someone with ample event planning experience, what need for the cannabis industry and events do you believe that Farechild Events fulfills?

Farechild was the brainchild of David and I, because we knew that there had to be life after DOPE Magazine, because High Times bought us out at the end of 2018. So, we started thinking about the most interesting things we did with DOPE Magazine, and it really came down to the live, in-person events that we started hosting pretty much right away once the magazine started. Our background was in nightlife and hospitality, so we realized the cannabis space could use some well-produced events. We brought that expertise to the market by taking what we did for the nightlife industry and brought it to cannabis and I think people really responded well to very polished and well-run events.

When we saw that opportunity as a bigger opportunity, that’s where we created Farechild Events because we realized we could take all these lessons we learned over the years through cannabis when it comes to navigating the rules and regulations surrounding public consumption and all the hard to learn things that most event producers don’t even have to think about. When doing cannabis events, you have to think about all these extra layers.

We took that and also combined another ping point which was ticketing events and the fact that there wasn’t any great ticketing options because larger companies like Ticketmaster and Eventbrite would frequently shut down cannabis events on their platform. So, we created two verticals within our business, which was event production and the ticketing side. This allows event producers the platform to use our platform freely without having to worry about their events getting shut down.

Because the company says it caters to “unconventional events”, I wanted to know what have been some of the most memorable Farechild events so far in your opinion? The Champs Afterparty at The Lexi was a particularly fun event I remember.

The MJBizCon afterparties have always been pretty marquee, but I think the best event I remember that was a bit outside of the box. It was our first event that we produced as Farechild, which occurred on 420 of 2019. We created an event called “It’s Lit”, where we took the idea of doing a food and cannabis event, but not a traditional sit-down dinner at all. We created a sort of experiential food and cannabis event where we partnered up with local cannabis-friendly chefs. We engaged them to create different dishes which could not only be infused, but could also glow in the dark. They used all-natural ingredients that glow under black light and nothing chemical.

So, we created an Asian street market-inspired food market, where each booth was decorated in Asian-inspired pop culture themes and media. The whole place was under black light, so everything was glowing and people dressed up and matched the themes. The food would also glow because of the ingredients they chose, so we had six or seven different food stations you could go to.  It was all-inclusive, and you could go outside and there would be dab stations set up with brands doing sampling. We’d love to do another one of those events soon, and it was quite an endeavor for our first event.

From your years of experience with event planning and nightlife, how would you say that cannabis events are different between the major cities with legal cannabis (Seattle, Portland, Las Vegas, Denver, etc.)

The biggest difference is the regulations and how those differ from city to city. The crowds seem to be similar and there’s not too much difference when you have cannabis enthusiasts. There’s a pretty common thread through them and it’s not like people in Seattle act one way and people in Vegas act another way. It’s more about playing around what each city offers. Seattle is actually really behind the ball for allowing permits and other matters that allow for cannabis events, while California actually have permits and venues that will allow for open consumption and sales. So, there’s a huge difference between what you’re allowed to do. In other states, there’s more rules that you can play with. It’s all about understanding those laws and regulations that change state to state and forming the idea of your event around rules so you can do it properly above board and not doing shady stuff that can get you, your sponsors or attendees in trouble.

Overall and regardless of whether the event is cannabis-affiliated or not, what are the most crucial aspects of implementing and executing a successful event?

Event planning 101 really is just about organization and making sure that you have all the proper checks done before it goes live. And that goes down to the very beginning of it, where creating an event is making sure that we’re planning and budgeting it out. As you get more experienced, you learn that there’s more important areas to put money, such as staffing and registration. Making sure there’s proper signage and a good amount of restrooms and air conditioning. The little things that people breeze through at first but matter most to the guest experience. Something as small as enough trash cans can make a huge difference. It’s not always about if you have the coolest DJ and fancy drinks.

Do you see federal rescheduling changing the way that Farechild promotes and organizes cannabis-related events?

Absolutely. There’s obviously going to be a lot of changes down the pipeline.  I don’t know how that will roll out when it comes to exact rules and regulations, but definitely when it comes to interstate commerce, sponsors and getting bigger MSO’s incorporated into the national picture. Obviously, it doesn’t make sense right now for a cultivation in Washington to promote an event in Nevada because they don’t have any product there.  But if interstate commerce becomes a reality and other aspects, it opens up a lot more opportunities for events to bring in sponsors, which is the fuel of events.

If the banking system changes, that can obviously change the way that people can monetize and charge for events.

Thank you for the great interview, readers who wish to learn more should visit Farechild Events.