Ashby, Massachusetts is a picturesque New England town tucked away in the Willard Brook state forest. It’s the type of town that could host the protagonist of a Stephen King novel about a middling journalist stumbling upon a supernatural serial killer and taking them out with the help of local police. The area is chalked full of history, beauty, and enough outdoor hiking trails snaking through the forest to keep one busy for an entire summer. United Cultivation (UC), a cannabis retailer with cultivation and manufacturing capabilities, lies just off Route 31 and hosts its own multi-acre fantasy factory that is starting to gain traction in Massachusetts’s growing industry.
The dispensary is housed in a large building resembling a modern barn, the beautiful wooden double doors stand tall and welcoming. UC is a fully vertically integrated business, meaning they control cultivation, processing, distribution, and retail – everything from seed to sale.
You can’t miss the tie-dyed bug out front, like something a holographic Jerry Garcia would drive on stage during a Grateful Dead reunion concert.
The highlight of shopping at United Cultivation stores is their menu – it looks like a binder full of mint condition Pokémon cards that help consumers find the products best suited to their needs. They carry their own brands and have more in the works. They make sure to highlight many other Massachusetts cannabis brands as well.
An important portion of their business centers around manufacturing and packaging products for other brands in and out of state. This creates unique and interesting business opportunities for them and their clients.
Growing the United Cultivation Business
The business has to be cared for and attended to meticulously if it’s ever going to reach full maturity, much like a cannabis plant. United Cultivation can facilitate good business opportunities through its “repack” strategies.
Repack means that they can help other brands manufacture products with their equipment, package them, and sell them in their retail space. This co-packing model ensures UC’s retail shelves are always filled with fire and provides a slew of networking solutions.
They scout out the best growers in Massachusetts to work with. It’s important to them to give all the props to the farms that fill their retail space. There is a big push for quality control to make sure that the products that are scouted are the products shipped to Ashby for repackaging. C
hristopher Stephenson is the head of cannabis operations at UC and he oversees the purchasing and shipping process of any wholesale arrangement.
The upcoming United Cultivation partnership with Beard Bros is one partnership Matthew Besonen is particularly excited about. Beard Bros has an outstanding presence on multiple fronts within the cannabis industry. They have one of the best media presences in cannabis, if you’ve been on Linkedin for all of 30 seconds you’ve seen their posts.
They also manufacture and sell RSO and tinctures in California and thanks to UC, in Massachusetts soon. “Beard Bros signifies our first wholesale and I’m super excited,” Besonen said.
Beard Bros’ entire California Rick Simpson’s Oil and tincture lineup will be available at United Cultivation retailers in the near future. This includes two RSO dablicators and three different tinctures, Besonen said. Their dablicators contain full-spectrum cannabis oil and their tinctures contain various cannabinoid combinations for different medical uses.
Examples include 20:1 CBD to THC, a high THC tincture which is 20:1 THC to CBD, and a nighttime tincture which is a 2:1 THC to CBN formulation. Minor cannabinoids like CBN will be a major focus for UC in the future. Besonen wants to explore bringing minor-cannabinoid-based products to the vape and beverage spaces as well.
Ispire, a vaping technology company based out of Venice California, is another business partnership Besonen is excited about. Ispire designed its patented Ducore vaping technology to have clear benefits for consumers and processors.
Ducore is a dual-core ceramic coil atomizer made for cannabis. The dual-core atomizers are supposed to offer great flavor and better hits, and their anti-leak, anti-clog features are immense selling points for consumers.
These features also extend themselves to the processors as well because Ducore’s membrane system allows the vape pods to be easily filled. This technology allows for no capping, no touching, and follows a similar process that the nicotine vape space has used for years.
Besonen mentioned their partners can take advantage of their Ispire access as well. Through potential repackaging and manufacturing partnerships, UC can fill Ispire carts with extracts from processors around Massachusetts.
United Cultivation Product & Retail Plans
During this year’s recent NECANN Cup competition in Boston, UC won first in the “best solvent extraction” for their Jelly Donutz (Hella Jelly x Runtz) live resin. A promising start to the year that will continue with more major moves heading into the rest of this year and 2025.
United Cultivation is also set to open a brand-new retail location in Bolton, Massachusetts which would be the third location joining Ashby and Groton.
Bolton’s shelves will be stocked with the same local brands that make Massachusetts’ cannabis industry one of the more intriguing prospects in the entire country.
High Mark Provisions is a brand started after Grayson Gaunya watched his grandma soothe her Parkinson’s disease symptoms with cannabis.
Kapnos Cannabis takes its name from the Greek word kapnos meaning smoke, and provides enticing strains like Eastern Rebellion, Key Lime Kush, and classics like Tropicana Cookies and Cherry Pie.
Nova has some great ZZZonked and hashables products. Many people believe that Coast and its ratio gummies and chocolates are the best in the state. California-based Jeeter has its infused pre-rolled joints getting some serious traction.
According to the United Cultivation team, some of the top growers in the state include Impressed, High Mark Provisions, Originals, MAC, Fresh Connection, Harbor House, Bountiful, Advanced Cultivators, and Botanist.
These are the type of grows they like to spotlight through their Uniquely Curated offerings
To send the summer off right, UC is helping host a summer concert series at The Range concert venue, restaurant, and bar in Mason, New Hampshire. UC’s third series with The Mason will benefit Hidden Battles, a nonprofit organization that strives to assist with mental health efforts for veterans and first responders.
