Creating an Empire, Working with Snoop, and Getting the Most Out of People with Martha Stewart

Martha Stewart headlined at T&C 2021 and gave attendees an up close and personal look at her empire, her passions, and her life.   In this episode, host Roland Frasier sits down with Martha and a long list of questions (something he’s famous for and Martha compliments him on). They talk about everything from CBD gummies to peacocks to Snoop crashing her daughter’s tea party and a whole bunch more.   Listen in for an entertaining conversation with one of the most brilliant entrepreneurs of our time.    What do we need to make a good cocktail?   You shouldn’t skimp on the quality of the booze you buy, Martha says. Your bar should be elegant. If you’re going to drink, you might as well drink the really good stuff. Her liquor of choice is Casa Dragones tequila. She has a new wine coming out, but the details are hush hush. She’s pretty excited about the name. Stay tuned.    Tell us about some of the new things you’re doing now.   They just soft-launched Martha.com, where you can buy all of Martha’s products plus other people’s products that she’s curated. She has two words that help her choose the products: Need & Want. There are a lot of things that look great, but do you need it and want it? If you live by those two words, you won’t waste money. You’ll save money. You won’t clutter your home, and you’ll have good things.    What did you mean when you said “it’s a good idea to re-pot yourself every 10 years?”    I think change is good, Martha says. When you’re through changing, you’re through. Change often enough that you surprise people and keep them on their toes. Make sure you stay out there, not back here. Look to the future. It can get very boring doing the same thing over and over again. Branch out, try new things, look ahead, adapt and adopt.    What’s your favorite Snoop story?   Snoop called one day and asked Martha if he could come over. Her daughter and her friends and kids were over at the farm. Snoop said he was bringing three people, then showed up in his Mercedes bus with a group of eight. They were all sitting on the terrace of her farmhouse and Snoop asked, “what’s that building down there?” (It was Martha’s stable.) “I’m going to go down there and look for some grass,” he said. Every adult followed him.   Tell us about creating this category of entertaining that didn’t exist before.    I looked for the void, Martha says. At that time, she wanted a magazine that taught people how to run a home, go to work, take care of the kids, be a well-rounded woman, homemaker, business woman. She was making all these painstakingly handmade Christmas decorations and realized that a lot of women would love them for their homes but didn’t have the time to make them. “Let’s make it for them,” she said. That’s how the product line started.    What is Canopy?   Canopy is one of the largest cannabis companies in the world, and the founder told her, at the behest of Snoop, that she should be getting involved. She’s in the CBD world; Snoop is in the THC world. Her gummies are the #1 gummies in America right now, and she has new products coming out for the holidays. She tried hard to emulate the French confection that you get at the end of a dinner in a restaurant in France.   You’re on the board of AppHarvest. Tell us about that.   Martha says she’s very concerned about feeding the world. She wants everybody to have good food. She visited acres of greenhouses in Russia where everything is grown because the climate is so cold. AppHarvest is doing the same thing in Appalachia (Kentucky). It’s a very central location so that people can eat fresh tomatoes instead of shipping them from far away. It’s sustainable agriculture using a fraction of the water.    You were one of the first people to realize...