Cannacurio Podcast Episode 75 with Tiffany Maggard of Heffernan Insurance Brokers

In this episode of the Cannacurio Podcast, Ed Keating speaks with Tiffany Maggard, Vice President of Sales at Heffernan Insurance Brokers. They dive into the complexities of cannabis insurance—from coverage gaps and product recalls to cyberattacks and vault security. Tiffany shares what operators need to know about working with brokers, why some policies fall short, and how Heffernan helps clients mitigate risk while staying compliant. Tune in to hear real claims, practical advice, and industry insights.

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Cannacurio Podcast Episode 75

Ed Keating: Welcome to the Cannacurio Podcast, powered by Cannabiz Media . I’m your host, ed Keating, and today we’re joined by Tiffany Maggard, Vice President of Sales Heffernan Insurance Brokers, a leading provider of insurance solutions for the cannabis industry. So Tiffany, thanks for joining us today. Thanks for the invite.

Tiffany Maggard: I appreciate it. Absolutely.

Ed Keating: So can you tell us a little bit, uh, about your career? Like, I, I always ask everybody, how the heck did you wind up in cannabis? Because, you know, everybody’s got a different journey and a different story and, and what’s yours?

Tiffany Maggard: Well, I will say the same question for insurance is like Cannabis is like, well, for me anyway, it was by accident. So, um, you know, when I started with Heffer 16 years ago, I didn’t even understand that was a possibility. But, uh, God had plans for me and so I’m super happy to be part of Heffernan. But regarding cannabis is once, uh, cannabis became legal in Missouri when it was voted in, in, in 2019. I started, I don’t know, kind of getting these signs like my neighbor was a applying for a license. We had an attorney friend that was involved, and all of a sudden I’m like, Hmm, Heffernan has a cannabis niche out of our Southern California. Office and in Northern California, and I was like, Hmm, this might be something good to tap into. And so I kind of dove in pretty deep with cannabis and, and started to participate in industry events and just really understanding the, the coverages that’s needed in the cannabis industry. Um, and so I was able to tap into the relationships that Heffernan had already. Um, understanding, uh, the coverages and just really being able to offer value to my clients. Now, it was a long process because in Missouri there were five questions on the application, and so I worked with a lot of, I call them licensed hopefuls. Yes. And so we completed letter. I mean, I spent hours and hours and hours completing these applications with the. With the purpose, like, Hey, if you get the license, you’ll place the insurance with me.

Ed Keating: Well, it, it’s, it’s interesting on the hopefuls, uh, just to jump in, um. When that happened, we, thanks to the state, were able to get access to that data. And early on, if I remember, there were over 3000 applicants for a very limited number of licenses. And obviously most people did not get a license, but mm-hmm. It was an interesting process that, that they ran. So, uh, you know, obviously you, you took advantage of the connections and the expertise within Heffernan. What other skills did you find are really critical when in, when advising? Because it was kind of a new industry in Missouri, and I imagine there were probably more questions and answers in the early days.

Tiffany Maggard: There were a lot more questions than answers. And I will say that insurance tends to take kind of a little bit of a backseat, uh, with new license holders because, you know, they’re looking at the build out and they’ve got a long laundry list of things that they need to um, complete. And insurance is kind of like a check the box, you know? And so basically what I had to do is come in and just. Offer kind of the passion to make sure that I was protecting my clients and making sure that they had the best and broadest coverage. Um, and also to educate, because in cannabis, you know, it’s, it’s d non-admitted carriers and all of the forms are different.

Ed Keating: And so, so what is an admitted carrier that’s, you know, part of the infrastructure of insurance understand case.

Tiffany Maggard: So an admitted carrier is somebody that like files their rates through the state. Um, whichever state, um, they’re, they’re, um, able to write in mm-hmm. But they can only deviate a certain amount, um, from their rates, but they’re also covered by the, uh, insurance. The, in the state, they’ve got a kind of a guarantee fund where, you know, if, if the carrier becomes insolvent, then you can report your claim and there should be funds available. To pay out a claim. Now, it rarely happens. Carriers don’t really go insolvent in my career. We’ve, I’ve seen it happen twice, two or three times and, and some in the cannabis industry, um, in the beginning, but basically, um, and non-admitted as part of the excess and surplus lines. And so they’re able to deviate their pricing and structure, but it’s also for the, uh, the riskier. Uh, got it. The riskier risk, which, um, and so the, it, it’s. You know, it, it’s not the vanilla risk, it’s those risks that, um, you know, just require a little bit more creativity with the forms. Makes sense. Um, it just, it just gives them more flexibility to be able to write the insurance, but it doesn’t have the protections of having, um, a state kind of guarantee fund.

Ed Keating: Got it. So, so in terms of Heffernan, you know, as an insurance broker mm-hmm. How does an insurance broker fit into the whole process? Like, are they, are you the ones that are dealing with the. License holder and then you’re gonna go try and find coverage through people that you represent. How, how does all that work help our, help our listeners understand insurance Because yeah, I know there’s some complexities to it.

Tiffany Maggard: There are, um, and, and basically as a broker, we’re the middleman and so we are looking with the, or working with the license holder, but then we’re also working with the carrier and each one of those relationships are as important as the other. Um, at the end of the day, our, our, um, priority is our client, but we also have to protect the carrier as well because we need the carrier to stay in business and be able to have a profitable, um, you know, profitable year so they can continue to write in the cannabis space. And so that, that’s super important. Um. You know, and again, each carrier offers different forms. So our job is also to educate the license holder, the insured, um, so they understand what’s covered and what’s not covered, because there are a lot of exclusions, um, on a cannabis form. And so you just have to kind of learn the nuances of each carrier and understand the client and make sure we, we meet. You know, where we can provide them with the best coverage. Like for instance, like a manufacturing company. Some carriers don’t like the volatile gas. Yeah. Right. You know, but they’re okay if, if you’re doing the Solventless. So it’s just kind of understanding which carriers make the most sense for each. Um, you know, for each insured and it’s different.

Ed Keating: Well, right, right. So, so, so from an activity standpoint, you know, I’m glad you brought up manufacturers because, um, we had have an insurance client out in Colorado, long standing, and one of the things he asked us to do was try and find out. What kind of extraction types are these manufacturers doing? And it was exactly what you said. Yeah. He wanted to know who’s using the volatile versus the non. ’cause it’s gonna be different. But, um, I was curious in terms of license activities, um, you know. Which ones are most prevalent in the insurance you write and we’ve got the value chain from, let’s say, grow to manufacture to stores. And maybe there’s delivery in there depending on the state. But you know, do you cover all that? You know? Do you know? Do you cover ancillary businesses as well in the cannabis space? Yep.

Tiffany Maggard: Absolutely. Yeah. We’ve, we’ve got access to write anything from, you know, your labs to cultivation, manufacturing, retail, um, security. Um, I ensure some of the, um, kind of the alarm installers. So we’re looking at, you know, from the technology standpoint. So yeah, there are a lot of ancillary coverages. Um, I would say I focus a lot on the actual licensees because I think I can really, um, add value. Um, and it’s important to me is, is. When I sit down with a new client, I make sure that they understand what’s being insured. So on a property policy, it is so much more than. You know, Hey, how much cannabis do you have on site? But it’s like, are you renting the building or do you own the building? Do you have a triple net lease? Um, you know, the tenant improvement and betterments, do you wanna ensure your build out? Uh, you know, and then the difference between like a business, personal property and manufacturing and equipment. So, and sometimes those get crisscrossed, um, but you wanna make sure you have. Your values in the right bucket. So if you do have a claim and it’s triggered, then you will have, you know, it insured properly, right? Um, same thing with business income. You know, it, it’s kind of understanding, you know, just because you insure something at a higher value doesn’t mean the insurance carrier is going to pay out that value.

Ed Keating: Yes. So, so in, in terms of the types of policies, I, I’m not familiar, but I can imagine some of them are, you know, liability, product liability.

Tiffany Maggard: Mm-hmm.

Ed Keating: Crop insurance. Like what, what, what are some of the types of coverages that, that, you know, we see in cannabis it might be different than other, uh, industries that, that, that you guys write for.

Tiffany Maggard: Well, it, I would say, you know, crop is a big one because each carrier looks at. You know, the value of the plant, and each carrier kind of has a different value of the plant, but then you’re, if you think about it, you’re ensuring the plant, right? Mm-hmm. But if you lose a plant in a pre flowering stage, technically that plant at that level maybe worth $25. But at the end of the day, if that plant is fully harvested. It has a different value. And so that’s something I work with my clients, um, with as well is, okay, here’s a plant value, but what’s the difference between the wholesale value? And we try to take that into consideration as well to make sure we are getting a full picture and the correct value. Of crop insurance.

Ed Keating: Yeah. It’s sort, it’s sort of like looking at the inventory as to what stage it’s in, like if it’s in the nursery versus if it’s in the grow room versus if it’s harvested. Those are each gonna have a different, uh, sort of, uh, intrinsic, maybe even extrinsic value. Interesting, huh? Yeah.

Tiffany Maggard: Yeah and a lot of people don’t think that way. You know, we’ve got it covered because we have, you know, the plants covered. But really at the end of the day, you’re looking at the wholesale value. Well,

Ed Keating: yeah. Now, now, now, how do things like recalls come into effect? Because that’s one thing that we’ve been tracking a lot since Yeah. Really since we started Cannabiz, and I think last year, um, based on the report we just published, there were about 94 recalls nationwide that we were able to track, and more than half were in California. Is, is, is, is that a factor, uh, in, in terms of, you know, the, the calculus that you have to do in working with your clients?

Tiffany Maggard: Yes and yes. Answer’s yes. Um, there’s different ways to ensure product recall, but really there’s not a true good insurance solution. Um, on a lot of the package, they’ll have like a product withdrawal expense, but that just covers the expense of taking that product that needs to be recalled off the shelf and destroying it. So it may be overtime transportation costs if you know, postage some, you know? Mm-hmm. Um. But it doesn’t actually cover the product. Now, there, there is a carrier that will write product, um, recall that does in fact ensure the product that is recalled. Um, but there’s a price tag on it. You know, it’s, it’s not affordable to a lot of operators. Mm-hmm. It may be, um, to a, a full vertical or some MSOs that wanna protect, you know, the actual cannabis. S you know, product that they are, um, you know, that they do have to destroy, you know, we had an instance here in Missouri where we had a, a manufacturer that was selling distillate to a lot of operators. Mm-hmm. And so the operators did not know that they were buying, you know, distillate that wouldn’t pass, you know, compliance. Oh my. And so it was, I mean. I mean, I think it was like over 60,000 products were recalled and it hit a lot of different operators in Missouri. Um, but. At the end of the day, they just lost, lost money, um, because there was no way to recuperate that unless it came from the manufacturers. Now, a lot of the manufacturers did refund or work out some type of structure at the retail level, but overall, it’s just not a, you know, not a good scenario. And I felt awful because I had a lot of clients that were affected by that. Uh, and you know, at the end of the day it’s not fair. But, you know, obviously the insurance carriers are, are kind of carving that out because they don’t wanna be responsible for, I mean, technically if it’s not compliant, it’s illegal.

Ed Keating: Right. Good point. Good point. Right, right, right.

Tiffany Maggard: by state regulations. And so, but if you’re buying, or, you know, it’s one thing, if you’re the one and you know, you’re kind of cutting corners. Yeah. You, you don’t deserve anything. But you know, if you’re selling that distillate and it’s going into, I mean, that’s a, that probably affected almost everybody.

Ed Keating: Wow. Wow. That’s remarkable. Now, sort of moving beyond some of the, the, the risk and risk management and, and looking onto. Almost more the operations on the insurance side. You know, one of the things I was curious about is sort of how data analytics. It’s transforming the way that you guys assess and price cannabis risk. I mean, there’s so much data available. You know, we, we all hear these stories about these, you know, grow facilities that are essentially, you know, managed on an iPhone with hardly any employees. Like, do you guys have access to any, you know, data that helps you, you know, get good insight into the, uh, the, the companies and facilities that you insure

Tiffany Maggard: that would, I mean.That would be more on the carrier side because they’re doing, um, the pricing. I will tell you carriers are. They have warranties on their policies. And so with the warranty, you may have to have smoke detectors in a grow room or your, you know, your C 1D ones, you know, need to be in compliant and feel verified. You know, there’s, there’s a lot of different warranties. Your vault can’t be on an exterior wall, and basically what they’re doing is, you know, as the carriers are getting these claims. You know, they’re kind of being like, Ooh, you know, that would’ve could’ve been prevented if, you know, the vault wasn’t on the exterior wall. So they’re starting to put these extra parameters on there, but that’s also to protect the insured and protect the carrier. Got it. On that. So, but you know, looking at it, when I first started. Well, uh, and I would even go back before I was even in cannabis, you know, there were very few carriers that were writing cannabis. And so basically it was a piece of paper. They were just kind of paying money and if they had a claim, they didn’t wanna turn it in because they didn’t wanna get their insurance canceled because they had to be compliant, they had to have insurance. And so now, you know, there’s claims data. So, you know, it was kind of like, how do we price it? And so. You can’t price anything without having the experience. And now that the cannabis industry’s been around, you know, I don’t know, 15 plus years, but you know, more active, you know, a lot more licensees out there. We are seeing claims, you know, and I’ve seen quite a few claims with my insureds. They’ve all been paid out. Nothing’s been declined. Um hm. So carriers are active, you know, in, you know, analyzing these claims and trying to understand and risk mitigate, but also trying to help the insureds, you know, set up a safe operation by, by creating these warranties.

Ed Keating: Well, that makes sense. And, and to your point about, you know, having the data, you know, that’s the world I live in, you know, that can really Yeah. Provide a lot of insight. So, you know, before we were talking about, you know, the role of AI in different things. Is that starting to make its way into the, you know, cannabis insurance space or maybe the general insurance space? ’cause there’s so much data in, in the insurance field. I, I would imagine that it’s, it’s a right field to sort of train a model on.

Tiffany Maggard: Yeah, I think we’re getting there. Like Heffernan, we’ve got our own AI model. Um, you know, we use some resources as well that will help us analyze some data and I think we’re at the beginning stages of it. But Heffernan, we’re always about investing in the technology that’s gonna help our insureds. And so I know that, um, we’re looking into some AI functions. Personally, AI scares me a bit, but I love that it helps me and, uh, you know, in, in, you know, helping my clients. But yeah, I think that that will be coming on more and I think the data will be more impactful as these AI tools because we’re seeing those integrators or disruptors, I guess, you know, coming in and trying to, you know, add that value and make everybody’s job easier. Um. So I’m excited to see how AI’s gonna help. Yeah. Because I think it’s gonna help us, you know, kind of compare policies, um, and forms with each other to simplify it a little bit. But, you know, overall, you know, that kind of is what I’m doing now, you know? Yeah. So that, that actually could bring people up to a different level, just being able to help. But you have to have that passion to want to make sure your insureds are protected. Um. In doing so, so Ai, I, it’s there. Um. But I think that’s with insurance as a whole, not necessarily for cannabis.

Ed Keating: Yeah, yeah. But the, the, the, the data point is definitely an interesting one. Like Yeah. You know, as I mentioned before, you know, we just did a study on the. Almost 2,500 violations that occurred last year. And we dug down into, well, which states did they occur in? Which ones had fines levied against them? What categories got, you know, yeah. Noticed the most, which varied greatly based on state. And I know that if I took those thousands of violations that we have and fed them into a, an ai, uh, large language model, you know, we’d probably come up with some pretty interesting insights. So. We’re, we’re, we’re exploring that as well because, uh, you may learn things that you wouldn’t find just by going through them, uh, in sort of the old fashioned way. So, um, no, I

Tiffany Maggard: think that that’s super interesting. And, and the claims data, I mean, we’ve had some really wacky claims. I mean there, oh, let’s hear one.

Ed Keating: Tell us a good one. And

Tiffany Maggard: thankfully these weren’t my clients, but, um. You know, we’ve had a claim out in Oregon where, you know, they were in kind of a more of a distressed area. One employee working at closing time, three armed gunmen came in and yeah, came in and they, you know, one employee, but they’re like, get out, get out. And you know, he’s like, take whatever you want. Well, he grabs his backpack, he goes. But his keys were left inside. But you know, he’s pacing around the, the premise instead of leaving, you know, and he ended up having a firearm and he, he shot individuals. You know, one of the, I think there was one death and one injury and one escaped. So, oh my goodness. You know, from that perspective, you know, that’s scary. Now he’s gonna be on trial for murder. Because that was not a self-defense situation, you know, he should have exited the premise. Um, but you know, there’s the claim with the robbery, you know, guns were involved, you know, would the carrier pick that up? I mean, then you look at, like, on a cyber claim, um, you know, a lot of you mentioned this earlier, a lot of the operators are using a phone. You know, to control when the nutrients, you know, go in the watering. You know, there’s so many things that you can do by a computer app, but we had a risk, and again, it wasn’t mine, but there was a, um, a cyber attack where they came in and shut down their whole computer system and had a ransom on it. Oh. So. By the time they got the money or, or solved the ransom, they had lost their crop. Well, that’s triggered by cyber. So even if you have, even if you have, um, crop insurance, it wouldn’t be triggered because it was a cyber attack that caused the loss of the crop. So, you know, there’s some things like that. I mean, in everywhere, I was gonna say in Missouri, but everywhere, you know, there’s. The most common is, you know, somebody stealing a car and driving it into a dispensary or mo, mainly dispensaries, but they can, you know, get into the building and, you know, they get in and steal product and get out. And these are stolen cars being picked up by a stolen car. Um, and it’s a whole operation. Yeah. Wow. Wow. Yeah, there, I mean there’s been quite a few claims out there, you know, equipment breakdown. Um, you know, it is just, there’s so much out there. Um, but I will say as well, it’s like looking at it from a Vault perspective, I’ve had several clients that. The, it was accessed, one was with a butter knife and one was ramming through the door. So it, it’s really important, you know, and, and everything passed regulations. They were compliant. But the way that you’re just not looking at some of those, like small details, you know, the, the lock, the magnet lock wasn’t strong enough. It was, you know, they rammed the door in. Whereas if it was opening outward. You know, that’s something that couldn’t happen. So it’s those small little things as well, and that’s what I try to do with my new clients, especially in the new markets that they’re just starting out, is let’s send over what the vault warranties are. Let’s send over what the manufacturing warranties are. So when you’re in that build out stage. You know, don’t put your vault on an exterior wall or, you know, it needs to be this fire resistant, you know, so it’s going in and, and also helping educate. ’cause that’s a big part of what we do. It’s just not a transaction. We wanna make sure that you’re operating in a safe environment, you’re protecting your assets. And so. At Heffernan, we offer, you know, an HR portal, which you know, which is awesome for new operators because they can download an employee handbook. Yep. Yeah, makes sense. They have policies and procedures. I’ve got clients that use training, um, you know, and you can use it on your mobile app. So there’s just little ways that we try to help. We try to get a third party to come in on a cultivation or manufacturing just to confirm that they’re, you know, operating in a safe. Matter. Yeah.

Ed Keating: I mean, it, it seems like it’s a great way to mitigate the risk. You’re not just writing the policy. Exactly. Done. I mean, it is really that ongoing relationship, you know, uh, hopefully to get the renewal of the insurance policy, but also to make sure that they’re, they’re protected. Now, just sort of dig digging into the area of like, trends and, and, and, and, mm-hmm. Customer segments. Um, what is the cannabis insurance space like? You know, the reason why I ask is that, you know, I track every quarter. Where we’re seeing licenses and how that has changed. So nationally, grow licenses are declining, manufacturing licenses are flat, and stores are increasing. And that’s basically because you’ve got places like New York coming online, adding lots of stores, and Oklahoma is getting rid of all their licenses. And that’s shrinking the whole market nationally. Yeah. But what about. Insurance carriers or, or insurance brokers, you know, do you see, uh, a lot of people coming in? Is it people rushing out or is there really no change?

Tiffany Maggard: I would say it’s stabilized. Yeah. Um, you know, they’re, they’re, well, I would say there’s quite a few more coming on board. Huh. But those carriers are looking more for the, the dispensaries. You know, they’re, they’re kind of the easy breezy, like, let’s just get in, take some market share. Yeah. Um, and maybe they don’t have the best forms, but the pricing, you know, is, is competitive. Um, but overall, I would say like the main players are the main players and, um. They have, you know, the experience and, and the forms and, and understanding, um, of the industry carriers change. You know, a lot of ’em share the same reinsurance carrier. Oh yeah. And so they have the requirements, um, as well. But I like to use carriers that have good claims handling. Um, because that’s important because what’s the point of having insurance that if you have a claim and it’s not paid out? So, you know, I make sure that, you know, at the, at the carrier level, I’ve got a relationship with the person that’s in charge of the claims handling. Um, I always go through and kind of, uh, bring up scenarios. Would this be covered? Would you know, is this covered? Would that be covered? Where do you think it would be Now, a lot of it, it, it’s really hard to tell because each, each claim is different, you know. Absolutely different. And so you can’t say yes or no, and it needs to go through the claims processing. But at the end of the day, you know, I had a risk that I was actually surprised that it was covered, you know? And I called and I’m like, eh, I don’t know where, where would this fit? And they’re like, yeah, I think you, you should turn that in. And it ended up being a $200,000 claim. Wow. So that was paid out. So, you know, it’s just important to me is to, to, because I’m an advocate for my, my client at the end of the day that that’s who I’m protecting. Got it. And so, you know, it’s important for me is to have a strong relationship with these carriers and a lot of the intent, you know. They love working with me because they know I’m going in and I understand the risk. I’ll have eyes on the risk. I know the operators, you know, I know if they’re in it for the right reasons. And personally, I will only work with somebody if I feel like they’re ethical, um, you know, that they’re not cutting corners. Because

Ed Keating: that’s actually my next question, which is. You know, as you know, cannabis has been in a downturn for a number of years now, and you know, does that create a situation where some operators, you know, may not be as willing to have comprehensive coverage? Like, will they cut things down or change deductible? I don’t know what the metrics are, but you know, is that happening? ’cause you know, we certainly see it with our clients where times are tight and money is tighter,

Tiffany Maggard: you know? That’s a good question. You know, in Missouri we’re pretty stabilized, you know, but I do write outside, um, of the, uh, you know, in other states. So, um, yeah, it, it’s, it is interesting on, you know, it’s, is, you know, everybody’s trying to cut costs, and I’ll say in most operators, security is the first to go, right? And, and. Whether that’s right, whether that’s wrong, it, you know, it tends to be, but yeah, I would say, I mean, I’ve got really good operators that wanna make sure they’ve got all the coverages. You know, they’ll have their crime and their d and o and you know, because they wanna make sure they’re protecting themselves and protecting the investors. So that’s important to them, you know, and I’ve got other. Other operators that are like, eh, I can’t see there being a loss, you know, here. And so I’m gonna go blank on that coverage. Now some of it goes back to the state, you know, and if they have a requirement for insurance. Oh, right, right, right. And so, um, you know, that’s kind of state specific and it, a lot of it depends on the insured and how. You know, how committed they are to running the operation correctly. I mean, at the end of the day, you know, there’s not a lot of claims, but when there is a claim, it’s a big claim.

Ed Keating: Yeah, that makes sense. Yeah. It’s sort of an outlier or, or, or it’s a big deal. ’cause as you said, there aren’t that many, and, and it sounds like you’ve picked good clients too, so that that must help too. Um,

Tiffany Maggard: I, I mean, I, I. Make an effort to do that. If I’m talking to somebody and I think, you know, I feel like they’re a little sketch or like they’re gonna cut a corner here, or, you know, I, I try to step back and, and just because I, I’ve got a relationship with the carrier as well, so, and I need to keep that relationship strong, but also ethically, I don’t wanna work with somebody. That’s not gonna run a good business. Right. It’s just, it’s not good business to do that personally.

Ed Keating: Well, and, and so that, that leads me to my, my one selfish question in, in, in terms of finding clients, um, you know, how do you use cannabis media to help sort of see what the market looks like, because you know that that’s what we’re trying to help our, our, our customers like you do.

Tiffany Maggard: No, I mean, Cannabiz Media has been a, a big help. Um, I, I always have it open, you know, on one of my tabs, but if I’m, I’m making a call to somebody, I’ll, I’ll go in and kind of look to make sure, you know. How many licenses they have, what area they’re in, you know, understanding. Is it a micro license, is it, you know, ’cause each state’s a little bit different. Yeah. Um, but a lot of it’s just understanding as well is how many licenses are out there and, you know, who are the decision makers and how do I get in contact with them, you know, and then we can, you know, reference that and put ’em, you know, part of a program, you know, every. I have a database of a lot of operators through the whole country that I like to send out, you know, some educational material. Right. You know, it’s just something that’s going to educate, um, and, and hopefully it adds value, but that’s something you don’t have to be a client to get that information. You know, we just wanna make sure as a whole that, you know, information is getting out there and, and you know, cannabis operators can use that or they don’t have to use it, but, you know, we just wanna make sure we’re helping to make a better industry.

Ed Keating: Excellent. Excellent. Well, I’ll, I’ll send you some of that background on that, uh, white paper that we did on the recalls and, and and violations. ’cause that may be useful insight for you to provide to, uh, to, to your clients.

Tiffany Maggard: Yeah, we love that. I mean it, and again, I don’t try to bombard Yep. My, you know, prospects and clients. But at the same point, there’s a, there’s a lot of information out there and there’s a lot of information coming from different places. Um, what I’m excited about, and I don’t know if I can just. Put, put the little plugin for Yeah. Um, you know, moan just had a, an outing in Kansas City and they had a panel on putting the medicine back into cannabis. And so, you know, you start off, you know, each state pretty much starts off as a medical. And so you focus on, you know, helping, you know, inflammation and sleep and you know, chronic syndromes. But then once it becomes recreational, it’s, there’s no difference. You know, the products are. You know, you, you go in, you hope your bud tender knows what works best, right?

Ed Keating: Let’s not forget about hemp.

Tiffany Maggard: Hemp, yeah, exactly.

Ed Keating: Delta eight, delta nine, et cetera.

Tiffany Maggard: So, yeah, and so, you know, it’s just making sure that you know of really putting the focus back on. Medical. Yeah. You know, and there’s some operators out there that are doing a really, really great job at doing that. And it, it’s, it, it’s exciting because whether you’re a recreational user or a medical user, there’s still medical benefits from the plant. That’s right. That’s right. And so, you know, I love that in Missouri they’re starting to put a focus on that. And it’s not all operators. You know, some operators are, you know, produce the product, get the product out, and they may wanna be the cheapest. You know, the best, cheapest, or, you know, the, you have the others that wanna be the craft growers that, you know, really get into the dynamics, but it’s more expensive. So, you know, obviously as the operators, they need to find their niche in the marketplace. But I find it exciting is, you know, now there’s more research going on, um, you know, with cannabis. You know, it still needs to grow significantly more. Um, but that’s exciting to me is, is getting back to the medical component and really helping those that can be served, you know, a lot of those in senior living communities or the elderly. Yeah. You know, that’s intimidating is to understand what products are gonna help you or work for you. Um, you know, so I don’t know that, that excites me.

Ed Keating: Well, that, that, that’s good. Well, Tiffany, it’s really been a, a pleasure talking with you today. Uh, where can our listeners learn more about Heffernan and access your team’s resources?

Tiffany Maggard: Uh, well, we, our website is H-E-F-F-I-N s.com and if you back cannabis, it goes to our cannabis page personally. Um, you know, you can reach me at, you know, 6 3 6 4 8 9 0 1 9 1, or. Tiffany M at H-E-F-F-I-N s.com. Yeah, if I can help any of your listeners, I would be more than happy to. I just feel like cannabis is not cannabis, but insurance is just kind of a last minute check the box and then, you know, so it’s really good to get in that first year with a broker, whether it’s heffer in or, or not, um, is to make sure you’re set up correctly. Because if you’re set up correctly from the beginning. That could, that could, uh, you know, create less pain. In the future.

Ed Keating: Absolutely. It seems like it’s really, it’s not just, as we talked about before, it’s not a transaction, it’s a relationship and mm-hmm. All the work that you all do in sort of the research handholding and risk mitigation training, et cetera, uh, you can really make a license holder’s life a heck of a lot easier.

Tiffany Maggard: So it’s a lot easier and I, I know a lot of my clients appreciate that attention and, and being able to walk through and understand. What is being insured. But I’ll tell you, I do a lot of policy comparisons. Hmm. And there’s just some, you’re like, Ooh, you know, it’s like, oh my gosh, you know, please let me help you.Um, you know, and, and hopefully I’m able to, but yeah, I mean, I’ve got a lot of really wonderful stories about how I’ve been able to help insureds, you know, get outta some sticky situations and, you know, get them the coverage that’s actually covering their risk, but also reducing the premium if you’re with the wrong carrier. It’s just not a good situation.

Ed Keating: Got it. Well, thank you for that. Great advice to end on and thank you for joining us today, Tiffany.

Tiffany Maggard: Thank you, Ed. I appreciate it.