“The cannabis industry will be talking about this book for a long time.”—Forbes

From the cofounder of MedMen comes the unfiltered tale of the mainstreaming of an outlaw industry: the growers, dealers, lobbyists, tycoons, and titans of the industry that created corporate cannabis.

Adam Bierman wasn’t planning on selling weed—or developing a network of cannabis stores, or safeguarding his money in shoeboxes, or facing off with gangs in dark corners of parking lots, or taking on the public markets and justice system itself. But, of course, not everything goes according to plan.

Weed Empire is an inside look at the story behind MedMen, America’s first cannabis unicorn and the world’s first globally recognized cannabis brand. It’s the underdog story of how a kid from the suburbs entered the cannabis scene and later reimagined weed for the mainstream, jumping at an opportunity to shift the conversation about legalizing marijuana. It’s also the tale of how a one-room studio dispensary eventually turned into a public company valued at more than $2 billion, led by a CEO with no college degree—with politicians, entertainment moguls, and Wall Street heavyweights on his team.

An unconventional but intensely authentic memoir, Weed Empire is a cautionary tale of the high cost of ambition, documenting MedMen’s decade-long rise as well as all the slog of passing cannabis legislation, and the exhausting battle to start a public company, bring a dream to the world, and hold a family—and himself—together through the madness.