NoCo Hemp Expo showcases Colorado’s growing industry

LOVELAND — Hemp businesses and enthusiasts gathered in droves at The Ranch in Loveland to promote their industry, inform the public and network at the fourth annual NoCo Hemp Expo on Friday.

About 5,000 people are expected to attend the event over Friday and Saturday, which includes educational panels, 70 speakers and more than 100 vendors.

Those vendors were promoting a variety of hemp products, from clothing using the fiber to coffee blended with hemp seeds to wellness supplements such as tinctures and pills made with CBD hemp oil.

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One of those hemp-oil companies, Broomfield-based Bluebird Botanicals, attended the expo during the midst of a growth spurt. This summer, Bluebird plans to relocate from its separate office and operations facilities to a larger joint location in Louisville. Brandon Beatty, owner of Bluebird, said the new location is expected to be three times the size of its two smaller facilities combined, and Bluebird plans to sign the lease next month.

Bluebird also used the expo as a chance to debut new product, because of the importance of the event.

“We like getting our name out there and showing everyone what we’re about,” Quinatzin De La Torre, president of Bluebird, said of why the company attended the NoCo expo. “We do this as a company to provide peace of mind to our customers, talking to them and showing how our products go through a third-party analysis.”

Not only does the expo help companies meet their customers, but it’s also an opportunity to promote the entire hemp industry.

“This event provides general education where people get to learn what you can do, and it provides networking amongst us, since this is often the only chance we have to see each other face to face,” said Zev Paiss, board member of the Colorado Hemp Industries Association.

The Hemp Expo also serves as a bit of a debut for the Colorado Hemp Industries Association, which formed a few months ago as a chapter of the National Hemp Industries Association, which Paiss founded.

The chapter works with local legislators and connects farmers and businesses who may not know each other.

Paiss said that as hemp grows nationally and becomes a more common crop, Colorado has the benefit of a head start with the passage of Amendment 64.

“What we passed was one of the most liberal laws, and other states are more restrictive,” he said. “Our department of agriculture has also been helping farmers dealing with issues. It’s a very innovative environment here. So states like Kentucky might grow more hemp because of their climate, but I would consider us the Silicon Valley of hemp.”