Verdelux and New Standard Labs team up to launch innovative new vape brand in Washington state
In an industry full of dreamers, it takes execution to stand out.
That’s what brought together Verdelux, the award-winning edibles manufacturer that has excelled in Washington’s cannabis industry since 2013, with New Standard Labs, a relative newcomer to the space and one of the state’s up-and-coming vape producers.
The two companies are collaborating to launch Lush Vapes, a new product that reimagines Verdelux’s bestselling Lush gummies as fruit-flavored vape carts.
It’s a partnership built on mutual respect and one that relies heavily on each company’s strengths: Verdelux has the sales, distribution and branding; New Standard Labs brings proficiency with devices and formulation.
For Verdelux, it’s an opportunity to expand the popular Lush brand, which already accounts for roughly 60% of the company’s revenue. Meanwhile, for New Standard Labs owner Noah Dotson, it’s a chance to combine his technical precision and hardware expertise with a company he’s long admired, back to his time as budtender before starting his own business.
“It goes hand in hand with my whole business model of not trying to be an expert in every area,” Dotson says. “Verdelux is one of the best brands out there, and I can make some killer vapes, so it seems to be a really good fit.”
With just one full-time employee in addition to Dotson, New Standard Labs was built on partnering with other companies to keep overhead low and maximize its efficiency, so Dotson was drawn to Verdelux’s willingness to collaborate.
On the flip side, Verdelux co-founders Chris Lin and Jeffrey Tomlinson recognized Dotson’s work ethic immediately.
“A lot of people talk about what they want to do, but not everyone can actually execute,” Lin says. “But we were really inspired by Noah’s raw, startup energy to make waves in this business. He’s just hustling and grinding all the time. We knew he was a very good horse to bet on.”
The Lush Launch
Lush Vapes will start hitting retail shelves this winter with a few flavors based on Verdelux’s naturally flavored gummies, including Chelan Peach and Green Apple, as well as an Icy Mint.
Getting the flavor just right was crucial for two companies that both have artisan roots and share a commitment to quality.
“Trying to nail that flavor in a vape can be a challenge because you don’t want it to taste like you threw some artificial peach flavor into distillate,” Dotson says. “So I’ve been focusing on sourcing the best naturally derived flavoring and terpenes I can, to emulate the flavor Verdelux has achieved with the gummies.”
For more than a decade, Verdelux has made a name for itself as an award-winning edibles manufacturer, first with industry leading chocolates before branching out into hard candies, gummies, caramels and truffles. The company’s early success was built on Lin’s background in culinary arts and his desire to bring a high-quality chocolate to cannabis — something the market was lacking in the early days. It’s always been important to maintain Verdelux’s artisan quality, even as it has ramped up production and slowly increased its automation.
New Standard Labs
New Standard LabsBy Garrett Rudolph
New Standard Labs might be one of the smallest cannabis companies in Washington state.
But you’d never know it from a first glance.
Owner Noah Dotson manages to make his small business perform like a much larger company by keeping his overhead low, outsourcing tasks where he can, and working his ass off.
“Yeah, I’m pulling a few too many 70-hour weeks these days,” he says with a laugh.
Aside from Dotson, the company has just one full-time employee. Yet, New Standard has managed to grow its annual revenue by about 10 times since 2023 when Dotson acquired a cannabis processing license and started the company.
Becoming a father in 2024 “put a little pep in my step to make it happen and just keep pushing the boundaries,” he says.
Right now, about 70 shops in Washington carry New Standard products, including vapes, concentrates, pre-rolls and topicals. His goal is to continue the company’s stable growth.
“Any time you try and do too much too fast, you’re going to sacrifice quality,” he says. “So I’m just trying to grow at a pace that makes sense, without expanding too fast and losing quality.”
Before starting his own business, Dotson worked for multiple state-licensed cannabis companies in Washington, learning the ins and outs of the industry from the ground level.
That experience was “absolutely essential” when he set out on his own.
“I don’t think I would have been successful without it,” he says.
He joined the industry at 21, first with a cultivation company, then spent six years as a budtender for the Western Bud retail chain, where he gained valuable knowledge about the supply chain and the importance of bridging the gap between the producers and the consumers.
In addition to partnering with Verdelux to create the Lush line of flavored vapes, Dotson recently launched his newest brand, Slo Gro, a budget cured resin brand with a sloth on the logo.
Dotson is donating a portion of the profits from Slo Gro sales to the Sloth Conservation Foundation, a nonprofit dedicated to protecting wild sloths in Costa Rica through research, education and habitat preservation.
Another challenge in launching Lush Vapes was finding the right hardware. That’s where Dotson shines: he’s fastidious about testing every device possible and pairing every type of extract with the best hardware for that specific product.
“The device is half the battle,” he explains. “The product is huge, obviously, but if you’re not putting it in a good device, it’s not going to be the same. You could have the best oil in the world in a crappy device, and it would never sell.”
Lin says it was also important to have a device that wasn’t too complicated.
“Simplicity is best,” he says. “A lot of people don’t understand how much energy it takes to collaborate like this, But Noah worked hard at it. He brought the prototypes to us, and we were super stoked when we finally saw the packaging and everything.”
True Partnership
Dotson met the Verdelux team years ago when he was a budtender at Western Bud. Not only was Verdelux one of the top edibles brands on the market and something he felt good selling to customers, but the people made a positive impression on him.
“When I met Chris, he was just super friendly,” Dotson says. “He asked my opinion of his product and seemed to really value it, which was huge for me. It made him seem like a real person, not just some suit running a business behind the scenes. I’ve met a lot of owners that are kind of snooty and look down on the budtenders and grunt workers.”
Lin remembers Dotson talking about starting his own cannabis company — but a lot of people are big talkers when it comes to the idea of starting their own companies.
Verdelux
VerdeluxBy Garrett Rudolph
Verdelux started strictly as an artisanal chocolate company, but its creativity and willingness to adapt have made it a sweet success within Washington’s cannabis industry.
Today, the company’s lineup has a confection and a flavor for basically every edibles consumer: Bon Bombs chocolates and caramels, Illuminations hard candies, Lush gummies, Meltaway truffles, and the chocolate-covered-gummy concoction called Bombshells.
Verdelux is also developing more sugar-free options and incorporating minor cannabinoids, such as CBN and CBG, into its formulations.
“Most of the credit goes to the hardworking staff that we have here,” co-founder Chris Lin says.
Lin and co-founder Jeffrey Tomlinson incorporated the company in 2013, about a year before Washington state began granting adult-use licenses. They emphasized professionalism from the get-go, treating those early years like it was graduate school.
Their reputation for professionalism and commitment to high-quality chocolate has earned their company numerous awards over the past decade.
But part of the ongoing challenge for Verdelux has always been balancing the need for production volume with the desire to maintain its artisanal quality. In the early days of the company, all its chocolate was tempered by hand, but the act of dipping chocolate over and over again was unsustainable.
So over the years, the company has implemented some technology to reduce the amount labor required — something that’s become even more important as of late, with the cost of chocolate jumping by 50% during the past year.
“You’re always trying to carve out new efficiencies, while maintaining the quality of the product,” Lin says
Then one day, Lin went to make a delivery, and Dotson wasn’t in the shop. He had taken the leap to start New Standard Labs.
“I think his greatest skill is his creativity in being an entrepreneur,” Lin says. “He’s really innovative in the way he goes about it, and he’s all about building. I’ve seen companies with far greater resources not be intelligent with how they deploy their resources. So I think this is a situation where game recognizes game.”