Chris Visco has done a little bit of everything in her career, from running a wholesale manufacturing company to owning a marketing firm to becoming a political strategist, but it was her extensive retail background that gave her an edge over the competition in Pennsylvania’s medical marijuana market.
She sells cannabis now, but she’s sold a wide assortment of products in the past.
“Being a retailer, it doesn’t matter what you sell,” she says. “You have to understand how to read a market, how to look at trends, how to take your ego out of the business and offer the consumer exactly what they want.”
Visco is the CEO of TerraVida Holistic Centers, a company with three top-selling dispensaries in Pennsylvania and a license to operate in West Virginia. TerraVida recently agreed to a merger with Verano that will not only expand the combined companies’ retail footprint, but also solidify its supply chain with Verano’s established brands and production capacity.
TerraVida was already wholly committed to a higher level of patient care when Visco was diagnosed with breast cancer about a year-and-a-half ago, giving her a new perspective as not only a cannabis purveyor, but a cannabis patient.
After having surgery in the spring, she’s now cancer-free and planning to open three additional TerraVida locations by the fall. Each new location will take the same careful approach in catering their service to their customers.
“We really drill down to make sure we’re creating an environment for the best possible patient experience,” Visco says.
— Garrett Rudolph