In this episode, we meet Jenny Posthumus, Director, Employee Experience Fire and Flower. Jenny tells us about leveraging her five years in the cannabis space into 25 years of practical communication and employee engagement. We discuss the unique challenges and opportunities of finding, keeping and growing your front-line retail workforce into a decisive sustainable competitive advantage with crucial tools that make a real difference.
Welcome to The Voice of Retail. I'm your host Michael LeBlanc. This podcast is brought to you in conjunction with Retail Council of Canada.
There is no question that employee engagement, education, encouragement, and team building within the retail industry are more critical now than ever before.
In this episode, we meet Jenny Posthumus, Director, Employee Experience Fire and Flower. Jenny tells us about leveraging her five years in the cannabis space into 25 years of practical communication and employee engagement. We discuss the unique challenges and opportunities of finding, keeping and growing your front-line retail workforce into a decisive sustainable competitive advantage with crucial tools that make a real difference.
Thanks to Nudge for supporting this episode!
About Jenny
Mrs. Posthumus is a management professional and leader who has found her home in the cannabis industry. She is passionate about communications, employee engagement and continuous learning. She works hard to create opportunities to foster an environment in which employees can thrive. She believes that all organizations can exceed expectations when their employees are given the correct tools and knowledge to succeed. She is dedicated to developing those around her to their full potential.
Prior to joining Fire and Flower as the Director of Employee Experience and Internal Communications, Jenny Posthumus developed her communication, employee development and project management skills as the Director of Corporate Communications for Supreme Cannabis and the 7ACRES brand.
Outside of Fire and Flower she is continuously involved in local non-for-profit committees, local events and fundraising initiatives that give back to the community in which she lives.
Mrs. Posthumus holds certification in Project Management and holds her Ontario Real Estate Sales License.
About Michael
Michael is the Founder & President of M.E. LeBlanc & Company Inc and a Senior Advisor to Retail Council of Canada as part of his advisory and consulting practice. He brings 25+ years of brand/retail/marketing & eCommerce leadership experience and has been on the front lines of retail industry change for his entire career. He has delivered keynotes, hosted fire-side discussions with C-level executives and participated on thought leadership panels worldwide. Michael was recently added to ReThink Retail’s prestigious Top 100 Global Retail Influencers for a second year in 2022.
Michael is also the producer and host of a network of leading podcasts, including Canada’s top retail industry podcast, The Voice of Retail, plus the Remarkable Retail with author Steve Dennis, Global E-Commerce Tech Talks and The Food Professor with Dr. Sylvain Charlebois. Most recently, Michael launched Conversations with CommerceNext, a podcast focussed on retail eCommerce, digital marketing and retail careers - all available on Apple, Spotify, Amazon Music and all major podcast platforms. Michael is also the producer and host of the “Last Request Barbeque” channel on YouTube where he cooks meals to die for and influencer riches.
Michael LeBlanc 00:05
Welcome to The Voice of Retail. I'm your host Michael LeBlanc. This podcast is brought to you in conjunction with Retail Council of Canada.
Michael LeBlanc 00:11
There is no question that employee engagement, education, encouragement and team building within the retail industry are more critical now than ever before.
Michael LeBlanc 00:18
In this episode, we meet Jenny Posthumus, Director, Employee Experience, Fire & Flower, Jenny tells us about leveraging her five years in the cannabis space in just 25 years, practical communication and employee engagement. We discussed the unique challenges and opportunities finding, keeping and growing your frontline retail workforce into a decisive, sustainable competitive advantage with crucial tools that make a real difference.
Jenny Posthumus 00:18
Well, I was incredibly excited when I joined Fire & Flower and discovered Nudge, it's an amazing platform. And it serves as a great platform to have some fun, celebrate achievements, recognize employees and share just very important information. We leveraged Nudge in a magnitude of ways we would leverage it to provide mindfulness and wellness tips, share stories and experiences release external information.
Michael LeBlanc 01:15
Jenny, welcome to The Voice of Retail podcast. How are you doing this afternoon?
Jenny Posthumus 01:18
I'm doing great, Mike, thank you for having me.
Michael LeBlanc 01:20
Well, it's so great to talk to you and I've had the chance off mic to talk about a bunch of things like David Bowie and Stevie Ray Vaughan. So, we're not going to talk about that today. But hey, that's fun stuff to talk about as well. So, welcome, welcome.
Jenny Posthumus 01:32
Well, I greatly appreciate the opportunity to take part in, in this podcast and kind of share some of my knowledge and experience when it comes to the cannabis industry.
Michael LeBlanc 01:43
All right, well, let's, let's dive in. So, tell us about yourself, your personal professional journey and what you do at Fire & Flower.
Jenny Posthumus 01:52
Well, my name is Jenny, as you mentioned, I'm a big fan of David Bowie. So, that's just one note I'd like to throw in there. Born and raised in Bruce County, for anybody who doesn't know what that is. It's located on the shores of Lake Huron in Southern Ontario. Absolutely beautiful place, a little unbearable in the winter. But most of Canada is.
Jenny Posthumus 02:16
(Crossover talk) Yeah very, I, I'm a proud mother of two wonderful children 11 and nine, a boy and a girl and partner to my better half, Brent. We've been together for over 20 years, and he's kind of my rock.
Jenny Posthumus 02:30
Personally, I've been in the cannabis industry for over five years now. But please keep in mind, everyone, each year in cannabis is worth five so now I have about 25 years under my belt. It's been an amazing journey, I found myself gravitating to cannabis because of the excitement surrounding a new industry, the time to make my mark and you know, just something I truly believed in. And I got to help build the building blocks of cannabis, I guess you would say.
Jenny Posthumus 03:01
So, I started off in the LP world, working for a licensed producer. And in the past five months, I switched over to the retail side.
Michael LeBlanc 03:09
So, you over to the bright side now, the good side, as I like to call it. And your career has been really as a communicator, Is that a fair description?
Jenny Posthumus 03:17
Yeah, absolutely. I started off in Corporate Communications, which under my belt, I hold that I held CSR initiatives, DNI initiatives, and employee experience. And then that kind of evolved during my first four years into a training role and ensuring that our people had the proper materials and the tools to be successful. We were in our infancy, you know, if you look back at, you know, 2018 pre legalization, and now we're starting to evolve. We're not baby’s anymore, we're toddlers and we're learning to walk in this brand (crossover talk), new industry.
Michael LeBlanc 03:55
Wi-, with all the great things that come with it and the challenges as well, right? So, and, and what's your role at you just joined Fire & Flower? I think this calendar year, what's your role there?
Jenny Posthumus 04:04
So, my, my title with Fire & Flower, is Director of Employee Experience and Internal Communications, I was given the opportunity at Fire & Flower to combine my two passions and help guide an amazing team in their next steps.
Michael LeBlanc 04:17
Excellent. Well, we're going to get into more about what that means and, and the tools you use a bit later. But for those who you're not the first executive I've had on from Fire & Flower, but maybe for those who international audience or maybe they hadn't heard prior interviews, tell us a little bit about Fire & Flower, scope and scale, what you do and how many people you employ and how many stores, just give us a bit of a bit of a 411 on the business.
Jenny Posthumus 04:40
The most important thing is to remember is that Fire & Flower is just not a retailer, retailer, but we're also a technology company. We have so many facets of the business that make us successful and unique. And it's really the collective efforts and the contributions of our amazing team members and our diverse workforce that truly creates the organization that we have today. when it when it comes to scale, we have over 1000 employees located across North America. The majority of our teams are based in Canada and located in one of our over 100 corporately owned stores and through our stores, that includes the brand's; Friendly Stranger, HOTBOX and Happy Dayz.
Jenny Posthumus 05:21
And we just really pride ourselves on the guest experience. It's our teams in a shop in our shop who deliver that and, you know, an under the umbrella, as I mentioned, technology, we also have our technology arm Hifyre, and we most recently acquired really exciting news, Pineapple Express Delivery.
Michael LeBlanc 05:39
Oh, and, and that's been a bit of this isn't really a podcast about the corporate structure, I really want to get into employee stuff. But you know, you Fire & Flower has been growing both organically and by acquisition, as you mentioned, the classic Friendly Stranger and, and I think you did some acquisitions lately, this week, which has been a bit of a characteristic of, of the business, right, a lot, a lot of startups and then a bit of consolidation and, and a bit of growth. And then, you know, you're able to leverage platforms, as you said, you got a great loyalty program and all that technology, right? That's, is that a fair description of where the industry is at right now? Or certainly where Fire & Flower is at right now?
Jenny Posthumus 06:13
Yeah, absolutely. Like, you know, Hifyre, it plays a major role within our business, just helping us advance and gather the, the data and analytics needed in the Spark program. As you mentioned, there are loyalty and rewards program, it provides us with this unprecedent-, precedented view, and detailed understanding of our consumer behaviors and preferences, which is directly feeded back and fed back to our employees. And that's how they can deliver such a wonderful customer experience, through the understanding of consumer trends and what's going on within the industry.
Michael LeBlanc 06:46
You know, it's always been the case that always, you know, or the, the, it's, it's the classic case in retail, that employee’s matter, it seems to me, it always seemed to me that they mattered a lot in the retail cannabis sector, particularly at the beginning, so much was changing. And there's a whole new industry and all that stuff. So, you know, as you think about the role of employees, and you, kind of, you know, if you're talking to a prospective employer, you're describing the role of the employees at Fire & Flower, talk about how you'd describe that and, and what their role is in ensuring there's a great customer experience, then we'll kind of unpack the tools you use to make sure that they they're great at their job.
Jenny Posthumus 07:22
It's all about the understanding in the industry, with, with1000s of options and different products and a continuous stream of new product releases, we really have to arm them with an understanding of the variety of products that are out there. And that's been working through our LP partners, and really using the right tools and tactics to cascade that information. And always thinking out of the box and always advancing, you know, we really want to ensure that they our employees, our frontline retailers have the tools to succeed. And that begins with knowledge and communication. So, we really leverage our like customer centric approach and our competitive advantage through like innovation, communication, training, education, and Best-in-class technologies to really create that first-class retail experience.
Michael LeBlanc 08:11
And so, when, when you describe customer centric, like (inaudible), you're sitting around the campfire on a nice day, which you know, w-, we're going to have soon in a nice warm day, like how do you describe what that means to people who aren't in the industry or people who aren't into retail? Like how does it feel? How does it How does it feel to walk in to one of your locations that, that makes it stand out that makes it's different, like walk that experience for me?
Jenny Posthumus 08:37
Absolutely. So, I think it kind of all comes down to our sales model. You know, we want to get to know the customer, we want to greet them, every customer should be treated the same when they come in. Make sure you greet them positively what are their wants, what are they looking for, you know, do suggestive selling, make sure that all of our stores are quite similar when you go from store to store across the country, that we have the proper products in place and we have the, we have knowledgeable Canisius as we like to call them, armed with the proper materials so that they can give informed information to each customer that walks through the doors. There's a lot of stigmas around cannabis, which I know you're aware of and we're we really want to break down that stigma. We want to provide open and honest communication with our customers, and we want to provide them great products that suit their needs. And that's just having an understanding of the abundance of products that are out there
Michael LeBlanc 09:41
In addition to this stigma which I think is starting to dissipate but that's not going to happen overnight. You know great work from great retailers like yourself is so helpful in doing that. But you know, as, as you think about a), the rules because it's not like an ordinary retail environment, right there's parameters around which Employees can interact, and what they can say and what they cannot say, by the rules. So, how do you how do you manage to that, I guess that's a lot of education, in ensuring that you, you will, I guess, overcome, not go around, but overcome and still have a very positive experience within the parameters of, of doing it, of doing it both safely and within the rules, right?
Jenny Posthumus 10:21
As the regulations continuously change, and, you know, it's just us having the utmost respect for our regulators, having a firm understanding and sharing that information with our teams, to ensure that we're compliant, and following the regulations set forward to us. We're very lucky to have our PotGuide partners who help us with a lot of the work in regards to regulations, you can actually visit the PotGuide website and see the most up-to-date regulations by province and Canada. So, you know, it's, as I mentioned, again, it's all that collaboration, and working together to that we create that understanding. It, it's a never-ending job, that's for sure, Mike, and something that we always have to stay ahead of. But that's why I'm such a firm believer in, you know, continuous education and growth.
Michael LeBlanc 11:11
Well, it's consistent with the vibe of, of cannabis, right? I mean, that's been the secret sauce for what I've seen his success is, is, you know, there's a whole vibe to, to the culture and the community and, and how do you have a professional selling floor put on top of that without, you know, disrupting or destroying the vibe of what makes cannabis great as a community, right? So, it sounds like that's what you're working through.
Michael LeBlanc 11:32
Let's talk about when you're hiring folks. So, you know, you're everybody's looking to hire people you've got, you know, you're growing, which means you're always hiring, talk about, you know, talk about the business, how you hire, and your how your strategy, your engagement strategy plays a role in, in you know, finding the right people, and then kind of bringing them on board and, and getting them up to your standards.
Jenny Posthumus 11:57
I guess it really, you know, starts at the basics, employer branding, the story of Fire & Flower and how we represent ourselves externally. You know, it's a unique day and age, employees are really looking for those opportunities to grow and be a part of something. We try to attract talent through job postings and advertisements. But we've also found that like online hiring blitzes prove as an effective manner. And now we're at the stage where we can start hosting these in-store job fairs, which really allows us to obtain fantastic team members. We all work together really to build this team and I'm a firm believer that the first point of context that sets the stage for the partnership with our team members, and we have great leaders who support that vision. We have great recruiters throughout the organization and we're really building a strong people and culture department to support everyone throughout the network of Fire & Flower. I'd like to like when it comes to kind of retaining those employees, it's really all about engagement, and the opportunity for growth, (inaudible), to say it again, continuing education plays a major role. And it that's where we have a cohesive training curriculum that comes into play. And it's, it's always an ongoing practice making sure we understand our workforce, their passions, their beliefs, their values, it's of the utmost importance to us, really.
Michael LeBlanc 13:20
Yeah, right on. Now, wh-, where are you finding your people? I, I was in one of your locations and I was talking to the manager, and I said, you know, you're one of the only stores I don't see a help wanted sign on. We kind of had a bit of a chuckle at that, because a, a that conversation was, and this was, I don’t know maybe eight, nine months ago, is that you were you were finding success with folks who are leaving, like the restaurant or food service industries. Is there one industry where you tend to attract people? I mean, people who come over from food service tend to be in my mind, there's very service oriented and, and you know, I think culturally aligned. Am I overstating that? Is that where you have some success with, are you or are you successful across the board?
Jenny Posthumus 13:59
We're, I would say like, you know, we pride ourselves on the diversity of our workforce, our, our workforce is about as diverse as the products that we offer.
Jenny Posthumus 14:09
Yeah. So, from all walks of life, from all areas, but you know, kind of with all, all with one common purpose is that we want to deliver cannabis to the world.
Michael LeBlanc 14:18
Fantastic.
Michael LeBlanc 14:19
Right on, have you ever thought about, you know, you talked about the amount of product that, that are coming through, I mean, we had a couple of big tranches, right when we had the tranche of, of edibles and, and, -
Jenny Posthumus 14:31
(Crossover talk) Yeah, the 2.0 products are fun, the edibles, (crossover talk), beverages and hash, and, -
Michael LeBlanc 14:36
Have you ever, have you ever thought that maybe we should slow the roll down of new products or are new products essential to success and keeping it interesting? I mean, at some point, there's too many products to overwhelm too much knowledge and we're going to talk about how you deal with that. And but are you are you comfortable with the amount of product that come through and that the associates have time to you know, soak time so to speak to absorb it? What do you think?
Jenny Posthumus 14:59
Well, because cannabis is so unique, Mike. Variety is the spice of life for cannabis enthusiasts. You know, I like my Oreos, the same Oreos every time but when it comes to cannabis, and cannabis enthusiasts, they enjoy variety. They want to know what's new, different potency levels for different times different terpenes for different times.
Michael LeBlanc 15:25
Sure.
Jenny Posthumus 15:25
You know, I do believe, you know, there's a, there's a lot, there are very many products out there, 1000s and 1000s. And some will stand the test of time, some will be those true blues, but there's always, always has to be new drops, especially when it comes to flower. Yeah, so, -
Michael LeBlanc 15:43
(Crossover talk), I was describing it like a like a wine store, right? Like you always go back but you're always looking for that new wine and terpenes are like that, right? They had just texture and flavor and difference to the to the product, yeah?
Jenny Posthumus 15:57
You're, you're absolutely correct. I have always related the cannabis industry to wine, actually and I'm, I'm actually glad that you brought that up. You know, there's different wines for different days, there's different price points. There's cannabis, there's wine for different celebrations, just like there is cannabis. When I personally go to pick out a bottle of wine, I like to go to the retailer that's working in that L-, in that LCBO and ask for their suggestions to say, oh, I'm making this for dinner tonight and I'm having a couple of friends over what would you suggest? (Crossover talk), you know, and then that's where that suggestive selling comes into play, specifically at the retail level in cannabis, too. And that's where that understanding of your products comes into play.
Michael LeBlanc 16:42
So important. All right let's talk I mean, this is a lot for you. It's a lot for the employees. Let's talk about the tools you use. So, we're here to talk about, let's talk about Nudge specifically. So, it's a great Canadian company, I know some of the bunch of folks there. And they're making great, great strides and employee communication engagement, talk about how you use a tool like Nudge to achieve what you're trying to achieve in the business.
Jenny Posthumus 17:07
Well, it was incredibly excited when I joined Fire & Flower and discovered Nudge. It's an amazing platform and it serves as a great platform to have some fun, celebrate achievements, recognize employees and share just very important information. We leveraged Nudge in a magnitude of ways we would leverage it to provide mindfulness and wellness tips, share stories and experiences, release external information and press releases. It really serves as a community for our team spread out across the country.
Jenny Posthumus 17:45
And we've just created something really unique. I'm going to brag a little bit here, they have this amazing feature, it's called the cheers feature and it allows for us to celebrate our colleagues and provide them with a little recognition. And it's a peer-to-peer option that's available as well. But from January 1 to April 1 2022, over 2000 badges were sent amongst our colleagues and what they're little, they're just little pins, that lands as a message in your inbox, and kind of celebrate you in different ways. And our top tiers pin was the gratitude pin, followed by high fives between our peers. And this is exactly what we want to see. We want to see our employees supporting each other leaning on each other, saying thank you for providing me with that information. It's, it's absolutely a fantastic tool and it also it allows us to provide bite sized communications and encouraged employees to learn about and potentially try products and provide feedback, in turn, which helps our customer improves, improves the overall guest experience. We've also started launching, we do some crowdsourcing and surveys after we do some PK knowledge and we run some, we run some contests and that allows us to accelerate the knowledge sharing engagement and understanding of our business. And of course, soliciting feedback for our employees directly helps in-house product development, and improves promotional approach to our licensed producers and vendors.
Michael LeBlanc 19:13
And so, the, the employee experience, this is on their mobile phones, just, just a little practical stuff so the, the listeners can get a sense of what the, (crossover talk). Yeah, -
Jenny Posthumus 19:23
It's like a social media network for our, for our teams, you download the app to your phone, you can post on a daily basis, you can reply through open text responses, you can take part in surveys, you can take part in Spark sessions. We're coming into the month of May and our focus is on health and safety. So, we kicked off today as we, we look to jump into May next week as what does safety mean to you and how is it important? And you know, we have over 30 responses and we just launched that yesterday. So, it's really exciting and then we can really take the feedback from our employees and put it into play, I think that's the most important thing, is always listening, to your employees and how you can improve.
Michael LeBlanc 20:08
Right on. So, it's a, it's a BYOD, bring your own device, (crossover talk), since we are talking about wine and whatever bri-, and, and it's a closed environment. In other words, when they log on, they log on to the Fire & Flower version of Nudge, right? So, it's not a broad community, it's a Fire & Flower community, right? (Crossover talk). So, it's limited to that, -
Jenny Posthumus 20:27
Yep, It's our Fire & Flower, internal community,
Michael LeBlanc 20:30
Right on. And, and listen, you and I both know, technology doesn't create community or culture,
Jenny Posthumus 20:35
Traditional communication, sometimes they get bottlenecked and don't get cascaded completely to the ground. This allows me and my team to have direct contact with the frontlines. Ensuring that they're just as up-to-date as everybody else within the business it's incredibly important. As I said, like, we're dealing with kind of new demographics now and we're craving a little bit more in the workplace, we want to be part of something big, we want to know what we're doing and look at the opportunities ahead of us, I think now more than ever, employees want to know the big picture. And that's what we really help support to provide through Nudge and other communication tools.
Michael LeBlanc 21:20
Well, let's tap into your 25 years of experience in the retail cannabis space. Which I know it feels like 25. Let's talk about, you know, advice to the retailer's listening. I mean, from what I'm, as I think about what you're saying, you know, this idea of the people that you hire and their engagement, that there needs to be a broader purpose. But, you know, think about, you know, two starts and, and one stop in terms of your advice to people who do what you do for a living that are listening around creating an amazing engagement and a, and an amazing employee experience. So, two things they should probably start doing, and one thing they should probably not do anymore. Think about doing less.
Jenny Posthumus 22:02
Okay, excellent. Well, I might throw three in the first category (crossover talk), I was trying to play by the rules, yeah. (Crossover talk), -
Michael LeBlanc 22:09
And we're retail it (inaudible), it's okay, we're retailers, who do bonus things, right? It's a DWP.
Jenny Posthumus 22:14
Absolutely, when it when it comes to employees in this rapidly expanding industry. It's a continuous evolution. If I can give any advice, it would to continue to grow and develop your people, find the right tools and tactics and constantly communicate. And if it comes to stop, measure, stop assuming the old strategies work and always challenge the status quo.
Michael LeBlanc 22:36
Right on, all right, well, listen. So, there may be some people listening to them, I want to learn more about going to work for Fire & Flower or maybe learn more about what you're doing, where should they go to learn more?
Jenny Posthumus 22:47
Absolutely, so if you log on to the Fire & Flower website, we have a careers portal, you can reach out to employee experience at fireandflower.com, we always want to find the best candidates, great people make a great company. And that's exactly what we're looking for. You know, the future's bright for us over here at Fire*& and we have all the right pieces to grow and strengthen our position in this industry, while providing the best experience possible for our team members and our customers.
Michael LeBlanc 23:18
What's the best way to get a hold of you or your LinkedIn person if they want to, you know, maybe one
Jenny Posthumus 23:21
Of your colleagues, find me on LinkedIn and so, it's Jenny Posthumus,
Michael LeBlanc 23:25
Jenny, it's been a real treat talking to you. I mean, you've got such an experience. You're, you're just so passionate about what you do. So, it's a real treat to to be on the mic with you. And I wish you much continued success and success to Fire & Flower as, as the as the industry continues to evolve. But for now, thanks so much for being on The Voice of Retail podcast and I wish you a great rest of your day.
Jenny Posthumus 23:45
Thank you very much, happy Friday, Mike. Thanks for having me.
Michael LeBlanc 23:48
Thanks for tuning into this special episode of The Voice of Retail. If you haven't already, be sure and click and subscribe on your favorite podcast platform so new episodes will land automatically twice a week. And check out my other retail industry media properties, the Remarkable Retail podcast, Conversations with CommerceNext podcast and The Food Professor podcast with Dr. Sylvain Charlebois. Last but not least, if you're into barbecue, check out my all new, YouTube BBQ show, Last Request Barbecue with new episodes each and every week.
I'm your host, Michael LeBlanc, President of M.E. LeBlanc & Company and Maven Media. And if you're looking for more content or want to chat, follow me on LinkedIn or visit my website at meleblanc.co.
Have a safe week everyone
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
employees, flower, cannabis, products, crossover, retail, fire, communication, industry, started, people, tools, absolutely, suggestive selling, podcast, employee, talk, ensuring, bit, understanding