EXCLUSIVE: Cannabis Industry Gets Its First Next-Day Market Insights Service, Co. Backed By Big Investors

Hoodie Analytics, a U.S.-based cannabis data and technology firm delivering insights into market performance and competitive intelligence, announced today the close of its inaugural round of fundraising at an undisclosed amount, along with key positions on its strategic advisory board. 

The inaugural round was led by Greenlight Ventures, Arcview Ventures Seed Fund, Entourage Effect Capital, Satori Investment Partners, and individual investors Bart Swanson, Steve Weisman, Brian Schinderle, Lorne Gertner, and Jim Belushi. The raise positions Hoodie to massively scale out its product and sales efforts. 

Why It Matters

Hoodie tracks over 3.5 million daily unique offers in over 8,000+ dispensaries in the US and Canada. Hoodie combines this unparalleled coverage with first-of-its-kind, next-day insights so businesses can access market trends and data within hours. 

"Hoodie solves a major problem for the cannabis industry at large. Every day we are out of stock in a dispensary means customers and patients can’t get the medicine from 1906 they depend on,” said Peter Barsoom, Co-founder and CEO of 1906. “We finally have a platform our sales team can use to ensure dispensaries are always in stock."  

Fast Times

Before Hoodie, businesses waited a week or more for market intelligence only to receive lagging information and analysis. The historical lack of mature market data and analytics is explainable given the rapid growth and fragmented nature of the cannabis industry due to a patchwork of regulatory differences at the state and national level.

The Hoodie executive team boasts alumni from several of the world's most successful data analytics firms including IRI, Nielsen, NPD and Numerator.

“The cannabis industry was long devoid of an all-encompassing view into the marketplace. Thankfully, Hoodie created the tools to remedy these issues,” said Chris White, Partner and Chief Strategy Officer of Satori Investment Partners. “Satori is proud to support the Hoodie team and we're excited to see what's next.”   

“We founded Hoodie to close the last mile of actionable product insights. We are aiming to create a nexus of industry data: a product graph to connect all industry players together and speed up critical insights. Not only for cannabis brands but for consumers as well,” said Wes Shepherd, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer at Hoodie. “Our core competency is processing massive volumes and a variety of data. Where we differ is that we can build applications equally well. We can deliver insights to people in a variety of roles whether it’s a brand’s salesperson or a dispensary inventory manager or even a webmaster looking to create a product locator for consumers to find their products.”

Hoodie’s aim is to track every product, in every dispensary, in every state and province, every single day, and combine this data with ease-of-use as its guiding principle, ensuring that even the busiest salesperson is able to maximize their brand’s sales and efficiency and every consumer can locate their favorite products reliably.

“We are extremely close to this goal already,” said Kris Walker, Hoodie’s President and Chief Commercial Officer. “It’s amazing to have so many cannabis brands, dispensaries, and MSOs embrace us thanks to our total market coverage, our unparalleled granularity of information, and our next-day turnaround of insights.”

More On The Financing

Hoodie’s inaugural round also marks the first investment out of Arcview’s new Seed Fund, which operates with sponsorship from Entourage Effect Capital.

"We are thrilled to make Hoodie Analytics the inaugural investment of the Arcview Seed Fund along with the support of Entourage Effect Capital,” said Jeffrey Finkle, Chief Executive Officer of The Arcview Group. "Hoodie cracked the code with tracking at nearly every dispensary. It's the broadest suite of competitive intelligence tools that help dispensaries and brand sales teams make smarter decisions and drive revenue."

As part of the financing, Gregg Steinberg, Jim Belushi and Lorne Gertner will join the Hoodie Strategic Advisory Board.