It’s been said that being active leads to feeling better and functioning better in more ways than one. Between hitting the gym, sometimes multiple times a day, catching any live music she can and traveling between three different stores as part of her job, Anna Spollen (@cannaspollen) takes that advice quite literally. Having hobbies, like fitness and going to shows, helps balance the day-to-day with something different and keeps her in touch with herself.
“You need something to go to instead of staring at your computer screen. I’m in a tiny little apartment, so what can I do to get myself going?” she said. “In a way, it almost keeps you young.”
Moving around has been something she’s known a thing or two about since she was young. Born and raised in Virginia Beach, Virginia, she and her older sister were homeschooled by their grandmother after a medical scare led to Spollen being held back a year. When her family moved to Severna Park for her father’s job, her new home felt familiar, being by the water, but it took some adjusting. The family moved back to Virginia Beach for a short time before coming back to Severna Park permanently so Spollen’s newborn baby brother could receive specialized medical treatments. Spollen said when she moved back here, she made a promise to be “authentically” herself and more outspoken than she was before.
“I was always one of those kids who was super sheltered,” she said about starting to attend public school. “I quickly made a lot of friends, and some of them followed me throughout my years in Severna Park.”
With her father’s line of work and family enacting strict house rules, Cannabis was something Spollen was told to stay away from. But when she tried it, she said it was a way to help her with sleeping and a racing mind. She added that it also helped with the mental pressure she felt from expectations her family had for her, especially with helping raise her younger siblings, who were also in and out of doctors’ offices.
“Trying it really was a turning point for me,” she said, adding that Cannabis helped steer her away from the temptation of other substances that were being passed around among her peers in Severna Park. “I had an ex who was extremely addicted … I was so scared and didn’t want that to happen to me.”
With tensions between her and her parents eventually coming to blows, Spollen moved in with her grandmother. The environment was looser there, and she quickly took advantage of the newfound freedom.
“She was more so like a mom to me. She picked me up when I was falling down so many times and held my hand through a lot,” she said. Spollen added that her grandmother was accepting of her use of the plant and, in a sense, helped shape her way into the Cannabis industry.
Not long after settling in, Spollen was involved in a car accident that left her bedridden and unable to graduate high school in person with her class.
“It took probably about a year to learn to walk again,” she said.
After graduating and recovering from the accident, Spollen found herself moving between jobs, like bartending, and at markets, often contemplating if she should’ve taken a safer career path like the rest of her family.
Her passion for Cannabis never waned, however, and she applied for a budtender position at Nature’s Medicine and was hired soon after. Spollen said she became a sponge during the first few months of the job and worked her way to earning the first of two trophies — Favorite Female Patient Counselor in 2022 — at the Maryland Cannabis Awards. She ended up taking home the Favorite Maryland Cannabis Industry Worker award at the same event in 2024.
“I’d always been so passionate for Cannabis just seeing how much it shaped my life,” she said. “The joy of these people genuinely coming in to see me and want my recommendations … I told myself this is worth it, and just knowing I am making an impact, that was cool.”
After about a year of budtending at Nature’s, Spollen moved between a few different dispensaries and positions. She shifted to working in social media management, then to an extended stint as a lead wellness guide with MariMed. That led her to being a retail marketing manager before she finally settled into her current position in marketing with Holistic Industries.
“I loved being a budtender, but I have so much more to offer,” she said about moving up in the industry. “I’ve always been customer-facing in a way. I always want to help people, and I like to make people feel like this is something bigger than just a corporate company.”
Before jumping into the Cannabis industry, Spollen would Hula-Hoop between shifts at work and in her downtime at festivals, recording tricks for a dedicated Instagram page to show her skills. Even though the page has since been revamped with different product reviews, the content nonetheless shows Spollen’s hustle outside of work to keep herself busy, which is her escape from work.
“Sometimes I’ll bring my hoop to the gym. I’m so focused on PRs. I’m a geek at the gym,” she said. “Unfortunately, I do have an addictive personality, and addiction runs in my family, so I have to watch myself from doing too much.”
As a consumer who prefers dabs, Spollen’s ideal terpene profile consists of something more sedating — specifically something linalool-heavy — that helps with her migraines. She also said she keeps a pack of edibles in her gym bag as part of her workout recovery, and they also help her get to sleep.
Before attending this interview, Spollen got a workout in at the gym and said afterward that she must pivot right into a work meeting. It’s constant motion for her, no matter the day. She said that when she feels like she wants to stop, she channels the doubt instilled in her from her parents and gets back on track, in part, due to her persistence.
“That’s also probably a downfall,” she said, adding that playing sports early in life made her competitive and eager to prove herself. “My dad loves Frank Sinatra, and I always quote him in little ways. I wanted to show them, as that Frank Sinatra song goes, ‘I did it my way.’”
