From cherries and apples to ginseng and peaches, farming has been a generational thread tying the Geen family together for more than 100 years.
Based in the Okanagan, the family has translated their innate farming abilities in their home of Kelowna, B.C., to the modern-day cannabis industry – founding SpeakEasy Cannabis Club Ltd. in 2013.
The family recently released a short film documenting their history, from the humble beginnings of Charles Howard Geen’s arrival to Kelowna in 1903 – where he started growing fruit trees – to the purchase of 2,200 acres of land in Rock Creek’s fertile “Golden Mile” in 1995.
The short film comes as SpeakEasy will soon be breaking ground on a historic venture: cultivating one of the largest outdoor cannabis harvests in Canada, of about 70,000 kilograms of sun-grown cannabis, set to start this month.
“The Golden Mile is one of the most fertile areas in Canada as it’s a perfect climate with tons of sunshine, lots of heat, cool at the right times, not too extreme and very little rain. The land is beautiful for growing cannabis,” Marc Geen, founder of SpeakEasy, said in a statement.
“Licensed producers made a massive assumption that simply getting on the shelf would lead to success. Cherries are one of the hardest crops to harvest, cannabis is no different. Agriculture at this level is an art and these consumers are no different than wine connoisseurs, you simply can’t cut corners.”