Kody Griffis was recommended by his teammates because of the way he strives to learn all aspects of the business and helps others on their road to education. In a popular tourist destination like Lake Tahoe, a budtender has to be ready for the various types of customers who walk through the door needing help on any given day. Kody told Leaf Magazine that the job has helped build his confidence when talking with strangers and encouraged him to be a better football coach.
Now in a leadership role at Tahoe Green, Kody first walked into the store as a summer intern. Having grown up with one of the Tahoe Green owners as a family friend, he watched how they treated their employees like a family and how the employees were constantly presented with new and different scenarios in which they needed to connect with someone. Why did Kody want to work in a dispensary? “To get out of my shell and to practice being more outgoing and talkative around people,” he said. He spent the first summer helping out any way he could in every department and worked hard to prove himself to the team and the owners, and the next year he returned as a full-time budtender.
In Tahoe Green, he found a place that would allow him to spend hours being required to interact and talk with all sorts of new people. After two years full time, he told Leaf that the experience has given him the skills to emerge from his shell and the confidence to feel comfortable as a leader at work and for the local youth football team he coaches. Kody said both jobs are about saying the same things over and over again but broken down in a way that works for different people. “Not just repeating a script, but being an active listener and teacher,” he said.
All of the skills that budtending has given Kody are what he wants to eventually use to break off from the industry and coach high school football full time. His advice to new budtenders and new running backs is the same: “You can’t learn anything if you aren’t putting yourself out there. Be confused and ask questions, but also be confident that just because you don’t know the answer, that doesn’t mean people think less of you.”
We asked Kody about his favorite way to consume Cannabis. “I’m a really big fan of edibles, but it can be hard to time taking edibles. You can’t do it too late at night or you wake up groggy, or too early in the afternoon or you can get sleepy. Right now, Drops 250-milligram jellies made with rosin are really potent for me,” he said. “If I can’t take an edible, I usually prefer to smoke, and I’m more of a sativa smoker, so 7 Leaves Super Lemon Haze x Durban Biscotti has been perfect for me — and it looks so nice.”
