Mother-and-son entrepreneurs Kate and Travis Andrews are lighting up Unadilla’s business scene.
The pair, with Kate Andrews’ mother and Travis Andrews’ grandmother, Lois Green, launched Greens Greenery, a cannabis dispensary at 54 state Highway 357 in Unadilla, in mid-July.
The business was founded in 2022 by Travis Andrews, and Kate Andrews and Green are the license holders for the dispensary.
“We don’t have any financial backers or investors,” Travis Andrews said. “It’s just me and my family and friends and we built this from scratch.”
Kate Andrews said that her son inspired the business.
“My family has been in the bar business for over 40 years,” she said, “ … and my son brought this idea to us when New York started legalizing weed, so we chatted about it and figured out all the ins and outs as far as the law.”
Travis Andrews, a 35-year-old Unadilla native, said he has “been in and out of the business” for more than 20 years.
“I was 13 the first time I grew or sold weed, and Mom wasn’t too happy about this,” he said.
He said that he went to college in Philadelphia for mathematics and business management and paid his tuition by selling marijuana, “and other things.”
“I went to jail in Pennsylvania and I served my time, and got out and got clean from everything,” he said. “I haven’t drank or anything, except for smoking weed, in 12 years. My 12-year sobriety date was a day after our grand opening.”
Travis Andrews said he had been interested in pursuing legal marijuana sales since high school telling friends “this is what we were going to do.”
“I was 9 years old when the first legal marijuana sales happened in the country (in California), and I had seen the writing on the wall,” he said. “I thought New York state would legalize a lot earlier, with how much of a liberal state we are, generally speaking, and how we follow suit with California in a lot of ways, so I thought it would come a lot sooner, but … this has always been a passion of mine and I’ve always been involved in some degree.”
The dispensary, Travis Andrews said, offers “everything that’s in the field of marijuana — that could be anything from flower to concentrate to drinks to edibles and everything in between.”
“We offer a safe, clean space to acquire said things, and a lot of people have always had to deal with back-alley transactions, so that’s part of the draw,” he said. “We know where everything comes from, how it’s produced, and we get lab reports for percentiles (of) bacteria, molds and heavy metals — everything you can imagine.”
He added that customers are taken through the products during a curated walk-through, where they can discuss what kind of high or experience the customer could expect.
“We’re very knowledgeable about how all this interacts with the human body and the cannabinoids and terpenes found in marijuana naturally,” he said.
For people who aren’t familiar with the cannabis industry, Greens Greenery marketing director Amy Brazie has put together many informational brochures.
“People like the fact that they can come in here and our staff is very knowledgeable about the product, and can help them with what they’re looking for,” Kate Andrews said.
Specialty strains and vaping products, Travis Andrews said, have proven customer favorites.
“The old-school or heirloom strains are definitely really popular — your Blue Dreams, your Durban Poisons and your Sour Deisels — strains that were very popular in the late ‘90s and early 2000s that have made resurgences,” he said, “but the big thing today is vape pens and pre-rolls. They create the convenience factor of consumption.”
Greens Greenery patrons, Travis Andrews and Kate Andrews said, are diverse.
“There really is no demographic,” Travis Andrews said. “It’s all ages, all races. We had a 92-year-old come in one day who had been smoking since 14. There’s no one younger than 21, because that’s the only way you get into the building … but 65 to 70% of the population (consumes cannabis). Now these people just don’t have to hide in their backyards.”
Older customers are looking for medical relief or help sleeping, and the younger customers are looking for a recreational high, he said.
“It’s really hard to pinpoint a specific demographic, because it’s all age ranges,” Kate Andrews said. “It’s little old ladies, and it’s for all different reasons. And we are getting quite a few tourists.”
People have visited from Cooperstown, Afton, Walton, Delhi, Norwich and Binghamton, Travis Andrews said.
Travis Andrews said community feedback has been “overwhelmingly positive.” He said he plans to expand, while deepening connections with the region’s growers.
“We’re allowed up to three stores,” he said. “This will always be our central hub, but eventually we’d like to have two other stores in more populated areas.”
All of the marijuana farms that supply the dispensary are relatively local, he said, drawing product from Cortland Harpursville, Greene, Delhi, Endicott, Elmira, Deposit and Luzerne
“We’re about to pick up the first microbusiness in the state, and that’s right out of Bainbridge,” he said. “I started with four product lines, now we have 15.”
Travis Andrews said he plans to add delivery and on-site consumption soon, as the license allows for both.
The veteran- and women-owned dispensary is open from 10 a.m. to 9 p.m., Monday through Saturday, and noon to 7 p.m. on Sunday.
A Greens Greenery website is forthcoming. More information can be found on the “Greens Greenery” Facebook page or by following @greens_greenery607 on Instagram. For general information on cannabis, visit the state Office of Cannabis Management website, www.cannabis.ny.gov.