How Two College Drop Outs Built High Rise, The Biggest CANNABIS MARKETING Agency in CALIFORNIA
The High Rise was started in 2011 when 23 year old Erin Coffey decided to embark on a passion project inspired by skateboarding, streetwear and cannabis. Erin scraped together $1,500 while working at Etnies Skatepark teaching skateboarding lessons and put in his first order of stickers and t-shirts. He started from scratch, knowing very little about the business. He bought a sewing machine and heat press in his kitchen and went to work testing and trying new things. As Erin paid his dues and learned from his experience, a whole new world of social media was emerging. Facebook was king and a new app called Instagram was creating ripples before the wave. Erin was an early adopter of IG, which was a whole new look for a small up and coming brand. This changed the game for High Rise, he could now reach consumers far beyond consignment sales at his local skate or smoke shop. As Erin began tinkering with Instagram the inventory and shipping boxes filled his living room and the brand grew legs. It was time to take the next step.
High Rise got an official office, the back room of a streetwear store in downtown Santa Ana. Around the same time Erin reunited with a friend he used to skate with when he was a teenager, Derek Fukuhara. Derek was from the same town and a few years older, they used to make local skate videos together before Derek when on to pursue a professional skate career. While traveling the world on tour Derek wasn’t only in front of the camera, during his downtime he would occupy his time behind the camera. This would evolve into him shooting ads, catalogs and editing video parts for the company that turned him pro, World Industries. What Derek brought to the table was media. Erin had his apparel, internet navigation and vision and Derek could bring the content to life for Erin to share with the world. Together they ran it up, Erin got The High Rise consistently on the Karmaloop home page, Quavo from the Migos rocking High Rise on a magazine cover and Miley Cyrus with her boyfriend wearing his hat all over tabloids. Things were taking off and in Erin’s mind, there was still so much more to do with the brand.
The buzz was circulating around the local scene, and people with new brands were constantly picking Erin’s brain for production advice. With everything Erin had learned in the first few years of The High Rise he decided to start a production company and moved into his first real warehouse. He took on new clients and did everything from screen printing, embroidery, DTG, and headwear, all the way to overseas custom orders. New clients lead to new contacts and this lead to Erin picking up big box stores like Forever21 and Hat Club. The experience was starting to pile up.
The merch was moving, and always looking at whats next, Erin was on Youtube searching for cannabis content and saw there was a gigantic void. There was only a handful of creators and they were getting hundreds of thousands of views. This was the perfect way for Erin and Derek to make videos together again and market The High Rise merch. They launched High Rise TV on YouTube with a world record hot box, hot boxing 305 grams of concentrates at Daddy’s Pipes dispensary in Sherman Oaks. The hot box was followed up by a series called 2 Girls, 1 Bong hosted by Macdizzle420 and Joya, now two of the largest cannabis influencers. Mac and Joya’s undeniable chemistry took the YouTube cannabis community by storm bringing High Rise TV over 100,000 subscribers in 6 months even landing them in a Skrillex music video. The new following on High Rise TV got the attention of brands who wanted eyeballs on their products. Erin and Derek began using their new platform to help spread brand awareness on top of creating fun captivating content for their subscribers. This continued as Erin expanded the merch business into two more larger warehouses. The team was cranking out content and merch and Erin launched another new online store selling dad hats. Using Facebook ads with Derek’s content, the orders started to pour in so fast that they couldn’t keep up. With multiple orders coming in by the MINUTE. Erin was swimming in orders, clients, employees and overhead. A lightbulb went off and they decided to use the experience of building High Rise and hundreds of their clients brands to get back to what they loved doing themselves, creating.
They worked hard day in, day out and the word began to spread. By the end of the first year they had created content for over 60 brands in the cannabis space including the likes of Gary Vee, 2 Chainz, and even K-Swiss. As the client list grew, so did their team. Erin and Derek found a small, humble and hard working team that wanted to grow with High Rise Agency. Steven Fish and Jaxon Case-Barnes took the videography and editing to the next level bringing a whole new look to the cannabis industry and cannabis marketing in general. Kimi Blair took over the day to day tasks for Erin and Derek and they poached COO, Josh Esparza from a start up brand and used his experience to connect with clients on the corporate side of cannabis. Out of that master bedroom of the 3 bedroom house in Long Beach, this small yet mighty team created content for over 350 cannabis brands in nearly 3 years. The networking that comes along with that client list created its own community. A community that lacked a physical space for people to connect and share experiences.
What better place to connect than Beverly Hills. In the summer of 2020, as a full service cannabis agency, High Rise settled into a $10 million house over looking Beverly Hills. The High Rise Mansion, a hub created to bring the cannabis community together to build the future of the industry. A place where bud tenders meet brand owners, buyers meet reps, marketing directors get face time with influencers. The invaluable connection that moves the needle closer to whatever goal someone is trying to achieve in cannabis. High Rise Mansion acts as a playground for creative minds to meet and execute. As a shoot location, the house is in a constant flow of creativity for some of the biggest brands in cannabis. Product shots in one room, a lifestyle shoot with a model on the balcony and meetings by the pool happen simultaneously before a music video gets shot at sunset. Erin and Derek say the word they hear the most from guests is “hospitality”, their main emphasis being providing a safe and chill space, having fun over trying to look cool. Good vibes and creativity is the energy their team leads with, all while trying to bring value to everyone around them. With this outlook, High Rise Agency has created an extensive cannabis network unlike anyone in the space.
Utilizing this network from bud tenders to CEO’s, along with the hundreds of thousands of followers across The High Rise social media platforms has led to exponential connections and opportunities. In an emerging industry with unlimited potential Erin and Derek haven’t stayed in their lane. With their ability to strategically pivot and provide value they have paved their own lane as leaders in the world of cannabis marketing, branding, and media. In a time with where creating, sharing and innovating are keys to success, The High Rise seems to have it all on lock.
