Lex Corwin
Company: Stone Road
Title: Founder and CEO
Age: 32
Lex Corwin created one of the fastest growing pre-roll brands in California, launching Stone Road as a small medical cannabis brand in 2016 and topping out at nearly $4 million in annual revenue during the COVID sales boom.
But perhaps more important than Corwin piloting the company’s meteoric rise has been his steady leadership in the market’s ensuing downturn, with the Golden State market teetering on collapse.
“It’s been a crazy ride,” he says. “It’s a really challenging industry, especially in California. I always say COVID was the best and worst thing that could have ever happened for cannabis.”
In 2019, Stone Road was a “small, niche brand” generating about $250,000 in sales. One year later, sales exploded to $1.75 million. In 2022, sales peaked at $3.6 million in California alone. But, like it did with so many brands, 2023 brought a reversal of fortune, with sales sliding to $2.6 million, then sliding again to $1.5 million in 2024. At the company’s peak, Stone Road operated in six states, before Corwin pulled back to focus on California and New Mexico.
In early 2025, Stone Road launched in New York, fueling a reemergence of the once-red-hot brand.
“Our first week in New York eclipsed our entire monthly sales in California,” Corwin says. “It just shows where the market is really going and the missteps that California has made, of which there are many.”
The company’s New York expansion has been somewhat of a homecoming for Corwin, who grew up in New York City before heading to the West Coast for college.
“Launching New York has been an absolute whirlwind,” he says.