Lars Miller

The most premium experience is clarity. Tell me when to reach for it, and I’ll tell you where it fits in my life.

#cpg #thcdrinks

Does anyone else in CPG battle the desire to eat exclusively whole foods but also love CPG products and wants to try all of them?

#cpg #wholefoods

Something has been weighing on my thoughts recently.

The world is too optimized and taking the joy out of things.

There's cultural flattening of the world. Everything is either monetized, optimized, or templated to death.

#efficiency #optimizationculture

Scaling one beverage brand is hard.
Scaling 7? Even harder.

On the latest Free Spirits Podcast, Evan Eneman breaks down:
⚡ Multi-brand strategy with Iconic Tonics
⚡ Retail vs. DTC vs. on-premise
⚡ Lessons from building with Snoop Dogg

🎧 Full episode: open.spotify.com/episode/6gdX...

#THCDrinks

There’s building a beverage brand, and then there’s getting product to shelves.

Benjamin from Fable Libations didn’t expect the toughest challenges to come from the operational side of the business. But things like shifting temperatures, state regulations, and transport logistics?

In new beverage categories, clarity wins.

Consumers ask:
☀️ What does this replace in my day?
🌙 When should I drink it?

You’ve got 3–5 seconds on shelf. Occasion-based labeling (“morning” vs “evening”) beats complex formulations every time.

🎧 open.spotify.com/episode/2YCg...

98% of internal meetings don't need to happen. I will die on this hill.

NFL still drug tests for THC.

Micah Hyde knows the risks of attaching his name to a cannabis brand. But silence? That’d be cowardly.

His why:
👊 Athletes who could benefit
👨👩👧 Fathers who need balance
💡 People who deserve options

🎧 open.spotify.com/episode/1DY2...

An interesting piece of consumer psychology I was reading this morning is that excitement now outranks stress as the top BFCM emotion.

Which in today's world is really intriguing piece of data.

If your copy still sounds desperate, you’ll lose to brands selling joy.

#ConsumerPsychology

Herbal's Newsletter Your go-to newsletter for cannabis beverages

The future? Standing tall BESIDE alcohol as a complementary choice in our ever-expanding adult beverage world 🌈

Ready to dive deeper into beverage industry insights?

👉 Subscribe to our newsletter at herbalprofiles.com/subscribe

#THCbeverages #cannabisdrinks #beverageindustry #hempdrinks

Herbal's Newsletter Your go-to newsletter for cannabis beverages

Consumers are mixing and matching based on:
• Mood 🌙
• Occasion 🎉
• Need state 💭

For brands, this changes everything:

❌ Stop dunking on alcohol
✅ Respect the overlap
✅ Think coexistence, not conquest

Your THC drink isn't competing with that rosé in the fridge - it's joining the party 🥂

THC drinks aren't killing alcohol - they're expanding your fridge! 🍻✨

The data just dropped and it's wild: THC beverage drinkers actually drink MORE alcohol than the average person (55.7% vs 42%) 📊

This isn't replacement culture, it's addition culture 💫

Something I hear from founders a lot:
Big-company pedigrees are impressive… until the pace becomes the problem.

If you’ve only operated inside rigid systems, the question becomes:
Can you handle ambiguity?
Can you build without a playbook?

In emerging CPG, agility > prestige.
#CareerAdvice

Formulating a protein bar and commercializing a protein bar are two different careers.

Hiring managers look for people who understand:
• protein variability
• mixing + curing times
• texture management
• how a formula behaves in a real plant

The “science” is only half the job
#FoodScience

Retired Barista ☕ Expert Recommendations: The best beans, brews, and tools for your next favorite cup. 📖 Fascinating Coffee Stories: Learn the history and culture behind your morning ritual. 🔬 Brewing Science Made…

Filter coffee wants uniformity.
Espresso wants controlled chaos.
One extracts slowly and evenly.
The other needs a messy mix to pull flavor in under 30 seconds.
Same beans, totally different physics.

retired-barista.beehiiv.com

#HomeBarista

Retired Barista ☕ Expert Recommendations: The best beans, brews, and tools for your next favorite cup. 📖 Fascinating Coffee Stories: Learn the history and culture behind your morning ritual. 🔬 Brewing Science Made…

Hard water is overconfident.
Soft water is timid.
Great water sits in the middle‚ just enough minerals to pull flavor, not enough to choke it.

retired-barista.beehiiv.com

#BrewBetter

Companies don’t just want formulators they want people who can take a product from lab to line.

It’s not enough to develop a great product
You need to know how to scale it, run it, troubleshoot it, and keep the line moving at 2 batches/hour.

Ops fluency = career rocket fuel.

#CPG #Hiring

My podcast popped off this year — and I’m still processing it.

⬆️ 879% audience growth
⬆️ 999% listening time
🔥 Top 20% of ALL Spotify video podcasts
🏆 2025 Rising Star + Most Shared + Most Talked About

Huge thanks to everyone building in this space!

Watch the latest → youtu.be/6AD3RdawlAY

I have spent some time contemplating the nature of the internet these days. And I hate that websites have gone away and apps have taken over. But that's the world we live in these days.

Mobile browser shopping dropped from 57% → 45%.
Desktop from 51% → 44%.

#EcommerceGrowth

Retired Barista ☕ Expert Recommendations: The best beans, brews, and tools for your next favorite cup. 📖 Fascinating Coffee Stories: Learn the history and culture behind your morning ritual. 🔬 Brewing Science Made…

Got gifted a La Marzocco Micra this month. Incredible machine.

But the truth is: the grinder and the puck prep still decide 90% of the story.

Gear matters ‚ a ritual matters more.

retired-barista.beehiiv.com

#CoffeeCulture

Some of the highlights of 2025:

iii Points with Cann
High Spirits brand refresh
CannaDataCon
Ghostwriting for founders
Sponsors for my newsletters

Not bad for a side project.

#CreatorLife

Retired Barista ☕ Expert Recommendations: The best beans, brews, and tools for your next favorite cup. 📖 Fascinating Coffee Stories: Learn the history and culture behind your morning ritual. 🔬 Brewing Science Made…

Most home baristas think “espresso grind” means “as fine as possible.”
It’s not.

You’re building a system: fines for flavor, big particles for flow.
Get the balance right and 30 seconds becomes magic.

More - retired-barista.beehiiv.com/subscribe

#CoffeeScience

Your event photos might be making your brand look smaller than it is.
📉 Bad lighting.
📉 Awkward angles.
📉 Zero story.

Don’t just document the moment—elevate it.

📸 This is how I turn events into brand assets:
larsmillermedia.com/transform-yo...

You could scroll this app for hours trying to catch up on the cannabis & hemp industry…

Or you could just subscribe to my newsletter.

herbal.beehiiv.com/subscribe

Online sales of non-alcoholic drinks grew +208% YoY.
That’s what happens when you’re not trapped in the 3-tier system.
Digital shelves are the new back bar.
#DTC

Even though I quit drinking entirely a little over 2 years ago, a stat I love is 92% of non-alc buyers still purchase alcohol.

People largely aren’t quitting drinking; they’re just being more thoughtful and curating the experience that fits their needs.

#BeverageTrends

$925M in annual sales.
+22% YoY growth.
Non-alcoholic beer, wine & spirits aren’t “alternatives”, they’re mainstream.
By end of 2025, NIQ projects the category will clear $1B off-premise.
#NonAlcoholicDrinks

No. But they do lose potency.

This ban would ban CBD too. Just FYI. And all the other minors.

Photo of a common meme of a man standing up alone to speak out at a public forum.

People should be allowed to have a THC seltzer if they want to