Forbes Interview with Curidor™ Founder, Parker Sullivan

Warren Bobrow, contributor at Forbes.com, sat down with Parker Sullivan, the founder and co-owner of Curidor™, to talk about his life experiences, grassroots approach, and work in the cannabis industry. In the interview, Sullivan discusses his background, the challenges of starting a cannabis business, and the importance of sustainability and ethics in the industry.  Below is an excerpt where Parker provides insights into his passion for preservation, the future of the Curidor™ brand, and the mindset of a successful cannabis entrepreneur. Read the full interview on Forbes here.

Warren: Please tell me about yourself? Where are you from? What brought you to the plant? Why cannabis instead of law or medicine?

Parker: I grew up in the conservative South as the oldest of six boys. My weekends and holidays were spent surfing on the coast or working on the family tobacco farm upstate. After earning my B.A. in Fine Arts, I decided to venture west in search of new opportunities. I was drawn to Sonoma County for its organic farming practices, beautiful surf, and overall appreciation for the land.

My passion for plants and their medicinal properties led me to pursue a postgraduate degree as a Master Herbalist. With my background in row-cropping tobacco, I quickly assimilated into the Californian cannabis scene and began cross-pollinating cultivars. In 2014, I created Banjo, a well-known cultivar in the commercial cannabis market that was ranked as one of the top 5 strains of 2020 by Leafly.

As California’s cannabis market became more competitive, I recognized a flaw in the industry – the lack of preservation techniques. Despite people paying top dollar for high-quality cannabis, the flower can degrade prematurely due to poor post-harvest techniques such as drying, curing, and storage. This inspired me to create Curidor™, a line of products that helps preserve cannabis by expanding its shelf life by 12 times. I envisioned my product helping everyone from large-scale growers to boutique dispensaries to DIY homegrowers to preserve their prized goods.

Warren: Please tell me about Curidor? What are your six and twelve month goals? What obstacles/stigmas do you face? 

Parker: In 2015, two of my best friends passed, and it changed my whole life. Up until that point, I was working 60 hour weeks, saving up to buy a home, and I realized that life really is too short. I had this idea of Curidor lingering in my head for over a year at that point, and I knew I was onto something. Fast forward to 2017, where I’m living in Santa Cruz and driving to Santa Rosa, a 3-hour trip on a good day, to fulfill Curidor™ orders. By harvest season of that year, I was making this trip literally 3 times a week, running myself thin as a one-man band. But what astonished me is that despite having no real framework for advertising, mostly from word of mouth, sales kept pouring in. That’s when I realized that this was turning into a real business.

In December 2017, Curidor became the “Official Climate Control System of the Emerald Cup,” and to this day, they still use the custom Curidor™ display cases that I built for the annual competition. This exposure helped launch our partnerships with some of the biggest names in the industry. 

We have just rolled out production of our new model, the Curidor XL 2.0, and looking at the year to come, we’re bringing a suite of accessory products to market to complement the Curidor™ system. Our aim is to further educate consumers on proper storage techniques.

[The Curidor™] is truly revolutionary. It preserves the fragile flower of cannabis and makes the degradation nearly indistinguishable from freshly cured products. You cannot tell one flower from another, from many months prior. How cool is that?

Warren Bobrow

Warren: What market intrigues you the most? How do you intend on piercing that market? What makes you better than your competition? 

Parker: The Do It Yourself market, where I see Curidor as having generated the most success to date, most strongly counters the “buy cheap, buy often” plastic-fantastic mentality that has become so commonplace today. The lack of soul, substance, and quality in any big-box store only solidifies our belief that the pendulum is inevitably swinging the other way. We’re seeing a trend of consumer demand going back to localized and artisanal production of goods. As states begin to legalize marijuana, we’re seeing consumers get increasingly savvy with homegrowing. Our products have proven to aid our customers with post harvest in innovative ways that are at the forefront of the market. 

Having a humble and grass-roots approach I would say is the key to success in the cannabis space. Only through experience, integrity, and innovation are we able to continue putting one foot in front of the other for Curidor™. Using unbiased scientific data and ongoing research, but most importantly customer feedback, we honed our focus on providing high quality and eco friendly products that will aid our customers for years to come. 

Warren: What is your passion? 

Parker: Anything that I consume, I like to grow myself- from cannabis, to tomatoes, to raising animals. I own a first generation 4runner and nothing makes me happier than being able to keep her runnin’ on my own. 

My passion lies in Preservation. My focus when I create art is to use materials that I’ve reclaimed to give them new life. I love making furniture from wood I’ve salvaged along the Sonoma Coast. Each piece has its own history that can be retold by being upcycled into something new. This theme of conservation transcends not just my artwork, but my entire life; Curidor™ being the apex that ties my business in with my passion.

Curidor is a series of climate controlled systems that have been proven to increase the shelf-life of terpene-rich organic material for over 1-year without detectable loss of terpenes or potency.

We have partnered with one of the most prestigious labs to make case studies of flowers cellared in the Curidor, vs in a jar at ambient temperatures. Over the span of a year, the flowers in the Curidor™ retained their full terpene profile, color and potency.
Learn More About the Curidor

Share this post

Tagged

Leave a Reply