Seattle’s Jared Mirsky is carving out an empire in a seriously niche arena. The 33-year-old entrepreneur’s company, Online Marijuana Design, provides marketing, advertising, and brand strategy services to—you guessed it—pot companies.
It’s a brave new world for such things in the Pacific Northwest, where Oregon and Washington recently legalized recreational marijuana use. And here’s Mirsky, right in the thick of it all. Last year alone, he and his team generated over 100 new clients.
We spoke with him about how he rose to success with a 22-employee company—all hinged on marijuana—how Yelp and the Huffington Post propelled his career, and advice for his fellow entrepreneurs.
How did you get started in branding and graphic design?
When I was younger, early teens, I was doing club promoting. Through that experience, I started teaching myself how to do graphic design because we were spending about $3,500 a month in design work for our flyers. We were doing three clubs a week for like three years straight. It got to a point where we were starting to see the benefit of doing some things internally. I started designing my own flyers, and before I knew it, I was getting paid more to do the design work than the promoting, so I eventually just quit promoting. I was pretty soon a full-time freelance graphic designer. And I fell in love with it.
At that point did you decide to start your own company?
I eventually started a company called Mirsky Media, which is a graphic and web design agency. It was just me and a couple other people. Yelp really helped put me on the map because we were ranked number one in all of Seattle for graphics and web design. And there are a couple haters on there, but that’s just Yelp for you.
That really gave Mirsky Media a jump-start and helped me understand how to create processes and procedures internally to run a more effective and efficient agency. At that time, our core competency wasn’t branding—it was just graphics and web design. As the years progressed, I started learning more and more about the branding process and developing brand strategies, creating marketing plans, and, of course, creating and assembling the right team.
How did you get involved with the marijuana industry?
About seven and a half years ago, I had gotten into designing websites and graphics and such for dispensaries within the cannabis industry. And not long after, I was interviewed by the Huffington Post as being one of the branding guys of Seattle to really touch down on good cannabis design.
I think there’s a lot of people out there trying to design in this area, but are still very novice. I think there’s a lot to differentiate a good designer from a great designer, including the quality of detail that you put forth and carry through with customer service. I had established a name for myself as being the most well versed in the industry, in terms of how I attribute my skillset and understanding the needs of the cannabis businesses.
Once that article came out, I was like, “Screw it, I’m going to create a niche-based business that focuses primarily on the cannabis space.” And now I have about 22 people on my team.
Do people look at you funny when you tell them what you do for a living?
It’s funny talking to people about what I do because they don’t take the industry seriously. Sometimes people are a little judgmental, if you will. They don’t realize that it’s a real industry, and it’s going to become very traditional at some point, much like the craft brewing industry. It’s been interesting being a pioneer in the industry: being at the forefront and showing people what really good cannabis brands should look like.
What advice do you have for Seattle entrepreneurs?
It would depend on the business, but with any business, you need a brand. Coming from a brander’s perspective, make sure you follow all the initial branding steps, either with an agency or on your own. Just make sure you go through the entire brand strategy process. By doing that, you’ll find out whether or not your business makes sense, you’ll find out whether your business has enough opportunities to make money, or from a marketing perspective, whether there’s too much competition.
Most times, people fail to execute. One of the things that I do that I think most people don’t is if I have an idea, I will run some numbers on it, determine whether it’s a good idea, and I’ll run with it. I’ll seek advice from people who have experience, and make sure that I don’t try to do too much on my own that I don’t know. Sometimes, you’ll find the best decisions come from asking for help. And I know I’m not an expert in everything. So it’s good to know when to ask questions.
It’s important to find a mentor. Asking the right questions could very well come from working with a mentor. If you’re starting a business and you have this great idea, don’t be afraid to ask for help.
What do you wish you knew when you were first starting out?
The more effective and efficient you can be, the better. You’ll have a happier client. Always be transparent. Don’t [talk nonsense]—it will come back to bite you in the ass. Always be realistic about your expectations, and also be extremely transparent about what those expectations are.
If you can learn how to truly communicate with a client and make sure that they understand everything you’re doing, you’re golden. Make sure they understand your processes and procedures—that’s everything. And be honest. It’s huge.
Photo Credit: Ana Raab