Women to Watch: Cristy Aranguiz

AMERICAN DREAM | With $10,000 and tireless work ethic, Cristy Aranguiz co-founded Cannabis & Glass, opening the company’s first retail store in Washington, then expanding successfully into Oregon, Iowa, Minnesota and Florida over the course of the next decade

Cristy Aranguiz says her superpower is talent acquisition, the ability to build a team of professionals to handle every task needed to succeed in the ultra-complex cannabis business.

But it almost seems she has a preternatural knack for all types of building — whether it’s building the Cannabis & Glass team, the company culture, a loyal consumer base or the impressive footprint the privately held enterprise has amassed.

Aranguiz is the CEO of Cannabis & Glass, a company started with $10,000, a little luck, a lot of ambition, a tireless work ethic and healthy dose of blind optimism that can be the blessing and the curse for young entrepreneurs. Today, the multifaceted cannabis enterprise has seven retail locations in three states, plus a cultivation facility, and licenses in hand to expand into two more states.

“It’s just a bunch of really hardworking stoners working toward an amazing goal of bringing affordable cannabis to as many states as possible,” Aranguiz says.

Perhaps more impressive is that Aranguiz and her partner, Tate Kapple, still own 100% of the company and have never taken on an investor.

“We’ve really had to buckle down and make sure that every dollar that we spent was appropriately allocated,” she says.

Humble beginnings

When Washington residents voted to legalize adult-use cannabis in 2012, Aranguiz saw that as a sign to move all the way across the country and take a shot in the dark to join the burgeoning industry.

In 2013, Aranguiz and Kapple paid a $250 application fee and entered Washington’s retail lottery — and won. They used $10,000 they’d earned from a side hustle they had in Washington to open the first Cannabis & Glass location in November 2014.

Aranguiz was just 22 at the time, with little business experience to speak of, but she approached the industry from the eyes of a consumer.

“Focusing on the customer has always been our guiding light,” she says. “We understand if we were going to shop at a dispensary, what would we want that to be like? What do we want our customer experience to be like? And then the same thing with our employees: What do we want the employee experience to be like?”

Building the right company culture and having the right people on board were keys right from the beginning, as were affordability and the quality of products.

“We don’t want to sell garbage cheap. We want to sell a product we stand behind and people are happy with,” she explains.

Cannabis & Glass has expanded steadily over the past decade, avoiding the pressure to get too big too fast. From their single store in Spokane, Aranguiz and Kapple acquired two more retail licenses, bringing the company up to three stores, the maximum number allowed in Washington at that time. Next came Oregon, where they got involved in the political process to overturn a ban and open a successful shop in Ontario, on the state’s eastern border with Idaho.

Then it was Iowa, a limited-license medical market, where Cannabis & Glass and its Iowa subsidiary Iowa Cannabis beat out several big-name MSOs to win one of two state licenses in a merit-based application process — a scenario that would be replayed several years later in Florida.

Florida homecoming

Florida is a triumphant homecoming for Aranguiz, the daughter of Cuban refugees who grew up in Miami-Dade County.

Cannabis & Glass applied for the Florida license more than two years ago. The state finally scored the applications and awarded licenses to 22 companies, including Cannabis & Glass, triggering lawsuits against the state that have put a hold on new licensees from opening.

“So until the state resolves that litigation, we’re entirely on pause,” Aranguiz says. “It gives us some time to work on Minnesota, and hopefully by then, Florida will be ready to finally move forward.”

Aranguiz holds 96% of the Florida license, with Kapple owning the other 4%.

“I’m definitely the only Latina woman on a cap table for a Florida license, so as a Florida native, that feels incredible,” Aranguiz says. “It’s just fucking awesome.”

In the meantime, the company has focused on Minnesota, where Cannabis & Glass expects to have its first adult-use shop open before the end of the year.

Divide and Conquer

Once operational, the Minnesota and Florida expansions will give Cannabis & Glass a footprint in five states, each with a substantially different set of regulations. Three are recreational states, two are medical-only. One state prohibits vertical integration, three states allow it but do not require it.

Meanwhile, Aranguiz is dividing her attention between the operational side of the business and the startups in Minnesota and Florida.

“The interesting thing, as CEO, is that we have an existing, mid-eight-figure business in Washington, Oregon and Iowa that needs to continue to run,” Aranguiz says. “It requires relentless dedication, honestly. I work seven days a week, but I love what I do.”

Part of what allows her to oversee the complex organization is understanding her own limitations and bringing in various experts, including lawyers and accountants, to help manage different aspects of the company.

The other part is the yin and yang of her relationship with Kapple. While Aranguiz spends her time on culture building and the human element of the business, Kapple focuses on the financial picture.

“We divide and conquer,” Aranguiz says. “So it’s literally two partners working toward the same goal and getting there twice as fast.”

Aspirations and Inspirations

Even with a lot of support, Aranguiz has had to grow into the role of business executive over the past decade-plus. She’s recognized the need to constantly evolve, and that the skills required to be successful in a $1 million company are often very different than those of a $10 million or $100 million company.

“Oftentimes, that growth is really hard, because it’s something you’ve never done before,” she says. “You make mistakes. Sometimes you have to apologize because you get things wrong, and there are real stakes on the line when you have almost 200 employees. There are real families that rely on us.”

It’s a lot to handle, but she still feels like there’s “unlimited opportunity” within the cannabis industry, and she also hopes to be an inspiration to young women considering a life of entrepreneurship.

“I don’t have a business degree,” she says. “I did not finish college, and here I am, every day, learning new things, trying new things.”

One of her inspirations in business is Sara Blakely, the CEO and founder of SPANX and the youngest self-made female billionaire, according to Fortune.

“She’s not a hyper financial, technical person. She’s not a lawyer. She just believed in her product,” Aranguiz says. “And she built an amazing company along the way, and I just want to follow in her footsteps and hope that other women follow in mine.”

And though Aranguiz hesitates to talk politics, she says it’s impossible to avoid the current climate surrounding immigration.

Her parents, who emigrated from Cuba to Florida, made immeasurable sacrifices for her to be where she is today.

“I literally feel like I am the American dream story,” she says.