Originally published at Dope Magazine
BY SHWA LAYTART - JULY 12, 2018
ShowGrow – Long Beach, CA
Long Beach is known for its diversity; with musical influences from punk rock to hip-hop, there’s never been a time Long Beachers weren’t fired up. For the city’s half million residents, the best place to pick up their cannabis delights is ShowGrow. The Long Beach location is one of three ShowGrow locations, with additional stores in Santa Ana and Las Vegas. Two new joints are coming soon to downtown Los Angeles and San Diego.
CEO David Barakett and his team at the Long Beach location have created a customer-friendly environment in their dispensary, and they take this philosophy to the streets.
Since the company’s inception, the ShowGrow team has performed community outreach by feeding and clothing the homeless, donating money and goods to local charities and volunteering their time.
“Our employees love to volunteer with the community. We all do. We’ve been doing it from the beginning so it’s a big part of who we are,” Barakett shares with pride.
One of the saddest things to see inside a beautifully designed dispensary is a lack of variety, which thankfully isn’t an issue for ShowGrow. Their flower selection is one of the largest I’ve come across, with strains like Lime WiFi and Calm 101. The store boasts a stellar selection of concentrates from Moxie and pre-rolls sourced from high-quality, small-batch farmers like THC Design and Lowell Farms.
According to Jess, a highly knowledgeable and longtime ShowGrow budtender, their top-selling vapes—which they have a plethora of—are Select and ROVE. Cases in the center of the room contain a sweet selection of edibles, and there’s a wall of CBD products in every form—even for your animal friends! But one of ShowGrow’s most innovative features is their free, custom-built ShowGrow app, where members can receive updates on new products and events, earn points with each purchase and pre-order items for express pick-up. They also have their own YouTube channel, where they do monthly lifestyle videos.
To say the least, ShowGrow’s innovation and commitment to customer service act as a blueprint for the future of Southwest dispensaries.
