Successful Post-Exit Entrepreneur, Futurist, Educator, And Philthanropist Lorne Gertner Reveals His Secrets To Success (#251)

Jeffrey Feldberg: [00:00:00] Welcome to the Deep Wealth Podcast where you learn how to extract your business and personal Deep Wealth. 

I'm your host Jeffrey Feldberg. 

This podcast is brought to you by Deep Wealth and the 90-day Deep Wealth Experience. 

When it comes to your business deep wealth, your exit or liquidity event is the most important financial decision of your life. 

But unfortunately, up to 90% of liquidity events fail. Think about all that time and your hard earned money wasted. 

Of the quote unquote "successful" liquidity events, most business owners leave 50% to over 100% of the deal value in the buyer's pocket and don't even know it. 

I should know. I said "no" to a seven-figure offer. And "yes" to mastering the art and the science of a liquidity event. [00:01:00] Two years later, I said "yes" to a different buyer with a nine figure deal. 

Are you thinking about an exit or liquidity event? 

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After all, how can you master something you've never done before? 

Let the 90-day Deep Wealth Experience and the 9-step roadmap of preparation help you capture the best deal instead of any deal. 

At the end of this episode, take a moment and hear from business owners like you, who went through the Deep Wealth Experience. 

Lorne Gertner is a serial entrepreneur who has cut a highly successful and idiosyncratic path. Through the business world, an architect by training Gertner has for the past 50 years applied his passion for design, creativity and entrepreneurship towards building companies that are at the forefront of the consumer Zeitgeist.

Gertner has a knack for putting together [00:02:00] teams that have the right measure of imagination and investment. From clothing to cannabis, he has a history of incubating unique of the moment brands that epitomise style in both the products and service. 

Tokyo Smoke, Cronos, BDP Quadrangle, pink Tartan and Toronto Fashion Week are just a few of the household names and success stories that Gertner has assisted to bring to life. 

In addition, Maclean's Magazine, nicknamed him the Godfather of Cannabis for his early involvement and influence in the Canadian cannabis market. Through his private investment company, HG two. Gertner has facilitated over $1 billion of transactions and over $3 billion in value for shareholders in the real estate, cannabis and retail industries. 

For almost a decade gertner has been teaching at the Daniels faculty of Architecture Landscape and Design at the university of Toronto imparting his [00:03:00] strong belief in the intersection between architecture design and entrepreneurship to make the world a better place.

Welcome to the Deep Wealth Podcast, and wow. Do I have a guest lined up for you? And I, I know I say that every episode, but I really have a guest lined up for you. We have a futurist, a business entrepreneur who's had many successful exits, a philanthropist, an educator. The list goes on and on. You heard some of it in the official intro, but we have the individual himself here in the live with us.

Lorne, welcome to the Deep, Wealth Podcast. And Lorne, before we get things going, there's always a story behind the story, and I know you're a story behind the story. That could be an episode in and of itself, withhold that you've done, but from a 30,000 foot in the air overview for our listeners, what's your story, Lorne?

What got you to where you are today?

Lorne Gertner: I think what got me to where I am today was going to architecture. Being brought up in a nurturing household that had strong [00:04:00] values and taking those values, going to architecture school. Going, you know, into the women's clothing business and having the ability, after doing a couple of things to realize that what I really wanted to do more than anything was make the world a better place and to make a whole bunch of money doing 

Jeffrey Feldberg: Well, Lorne, lot to unpack there, but two things really stand out and we'll get into your magnificent achievements in our conversation. Architectural school, becoming an architect, most people would not associate that with later on going to achieve what you've achieved in the business world. And so what was it from your training as an architect that you brought with you into the business side, to the entrepreneurial, the wacky, crazy world of entrepreneurs that made the difference.

Lorne Gertner: I think that architecture school taught me how to solve a complex set of issues in an organized way. And that was something that was a process and architecture school taught me how to build a [00:05:00] foundation, how to build a house, which is, you know, I can make analysis analogy that that's.

What we all do when we build a building, we build a house. I mean, it's the same process. And then really the combination of realizing that I wasn't a creative person in the sense of drawing and doing all of that, that my creativity was really on a business sense, and that really came from going to work in the women's clothing business and realizing that the combination of design and business created margin

And margins, how you make money.

So it was that thinking that got me.

Jeffrey Feldberg: And so you have the skills to organize, to build, to solve complex problems. You have the creativity side that you later discovered, but you said something else. Lots of people talk about it. Very few actually do it. You said? Well, I also found that I. Really make a [00:06:00] difference out there. Help people and make money while I'm doing that.

And you know, talk is cheap. Most people say that they don't do that. What was it? What were some of the things looking back that you can say, yeah, you know, these strategies or when I did this and this, it really, it did help people and at the same time I profited, I made money from that. I had. 

Lorne Gertner: Said to me a long time ago when I was predicting the future, you know, or whatever. You know, one calls it is they said, you know, the only difference between, you being a visionary and being a bomb is how much money you make. And you know, I thought, funny thing, but I got it.

Right. And I realized that unfortunately or fortunately or whatever the world is, you know, your success is viewed on how much money you make. And so, I knew that was part of what drove me. You know, it was winning, but it was also making a whole bunch of. 

Jeffrey Feldberg: And what a [00:07:00] combination I mean, to me that's really at the heart of being an entrepreneur. We solve people's painful problems, help enough people get what they want, and eventually we're able to get what we want and create a win-win. And really I think we need more of that today than ever before.

Lorne Gertner: In my case, it just, by the way, I wanted to add, it's a love for me. never really had a job.

It's my life. It's what I love doing. And the more I realized that, and the more I understood that, the more I was able to be successful doing that.

Jeffrey Feldberg: And so not to oversimplify things, if I were to say that famous saying, when your play is work and your work is play, you're really one of the most fortunate and wealthiest people out there. Was that for you? W would that really epitomize what it was like for you?

Lorne Gertner: Oh yeah. I mean, for it is now, right. You know, I mean, I worked incredibly hard and sacrificed a whole bunch of things to get to, you know, where I was able to Exit businesses as opposed to just make money in businesses.

Jeffrey Feldberg: In speaking of business and industry [00:08:00] and the whole change of ties, that happens all the time. I mean, Lorne, you're a futurist. Plain and simple here with us in present day and the most recent accomplishment, and we're gonna hear about your ones that you're working on now, which I'm sure are gonna be magnificent in terms of what you do with them, but you got into.

The whole cannabis, the CBD industry, well before it became the flavor of the day. I mean, you were one of the early pioneers in the industry, and whether it's cannabis and cbd, or as we'll talk about into the psychedelics that you're into now, and we'll put that off to the side for just a moment. Is this something that you're born with, Lorne, that you can really see the future today?

Or are there certain things along the way, certain strategies or traits that you picked up that you've applied that really help make that possible?

Lorne Gertner: What an interesting question. I think it's something that you learn.

I mean, Maybe it's something you're gifted with for sure, but maybe you learn how to use it

And it's built on certain things that occur, right? And [00:09:00] so, I'd always like smoking weed. I'd always found, this goes back to, you know, when I was a teenager and I always felt that it helped me call it self-medicate.

And then I read a futurist book,

And there were a bunch of things happening in the, call it the nineties, around change. 

Jeffrey Feldberg: Okay. 

Lorne Gertner: in the eighties I read a book by a woman named Faith Popcorn. She was a futurist. And she said a bunch of things that sort of stuck with me. One that cannabis was gonna become a part of our life.

Okay. And to that, I can't remember what year, she said maybe 2030, there would be no single majority in the us Right. And so it started to make me think about things and then there was late seventies, the LADA Commission on Drugs, there was the whole thing around all of that got me to be thinking about all of that.

Right. And then in, I can't remember, I think it was [00:10:00] 1998.

Canadian government was forced through a constitutional issue to provide medical cannabis and I'm following all of this and, you know, I'm interested in all of this because even in the early nineties, When it was happening in Israel, when it was happening in Colorado, when it was happening in California, I had connections to all of those different places.

So as all of that stuff started to happen and I was in a position to be able to raise capital, I. Government gave it an rfp. I bought the company that won the rfp. I started putting all the pieces together and then I think, you know, it's public knowledge. I did took this company public in 2002 and then I did nine down rounds 

Jeffrey Feldberg: Hmm 

Lorne Gertner: from 2002 to 2010.

Because it just, nobody understood what we were trying to So 2010, it changed in that the Canadian government decided to [00:11:00] give out commercial licenses. We were fortunate enough to get some of those licenses, create another company in order to have, you know, national distribution. And so pieces started to fall into place.

Along the way and I was in a opportunistic position to take advantage of all of those opportunities with the belief that, again, what we were doing was making the world a better place.

Jeffrey Feldberg: And so, Lorne, you're being driven by, I'm gonna make the world a better place. It also happens to be a personal passion of yours. You've had a lot of experience with that. And again, I'm gonna remove the industry because I want to get into psychedelics momentarily. But back in the cannabis days, you know, a friend always reminds me, he always says, Jeffrey, timeliness is next to godliness.

And so in your case, if you had gotten in too, And you're way ahead of the curve. Well, that's gonna present issues because you're having to provide capital. There's opportunity costs and waiting. Get out for far too long. Isn't the business model. . But if you get in too [00:12:00] late, you've missed the boat and it's much harder and you have different barriers to entry and all those kinds of things.

So you have this ability to get in early enough, but it's not too early, but you also exited, which is where most people fail. And that's what we're all about here at Deep Wealth on exits and liquidity events, because I know in a number of the conversations offline, we've. what you're sharing in the cannabis space.

Lorne, you got out before the bubble burst, and I would say you got out right near the top, if not at the top of the bubble before everything just in the cannabis space really came tumbling down. So what is that? Is that again the futurist

side? Is it lucky? Is it what? What's going on? 

Lorne Gertner: I think we got in, you know, you can't time the market. , right. And when I, you know, was in it I thought I got in too early. I paid the price for being in too early. But I also, it allowed me to be a pioneer. It allowed me to be, you know, one of the 12 [00:13:00] people in the world that changed the world through cannabis.

And I wouldn't have had that seat at the table in the way I had it. Had I not gone in it.

I mean, other guys went in it earlier than I did and didn't have the success I had and stayed as long. I think it had to do with my ability to take one company and go the medical route, take one company and go the recreational route and take one company and go the brand retail.

Jeffrey Feldberg: And hence the Godfather of Cannabis, which is your nickname. And as people know you and you know, had a wonderful achievement with that. And let's talk about exits for a moment, because that's our wheelhouse here at Deep Wealth. And as the listeners heard in the introduction, you've had over a billion dollars in transactions, but you've tripled that you've had.

3 billion in value that you've created for shareholders going across different industries. So when is the time for you, Lorne, that you know? Okay. It's been a good run. It's [00:14:00] now time to start planning for our Exit or liquidity event. What does that look like, the thought process for you?

Lorne Gertner: I mean, always having an Exit from the beginning, like always thinking like, when I started whatever I started and I started many things other than cannabis things. I always knew what my Exit was.

And didn't necessarily know the timeframe of that Exit, but knew who I was building it to Exit.

Somebody taught me that early on as they were building businesses, said, you know, if you know who your EXO is, then you can target it,

Right? And I think the Tokyo Smoke case, we knew the canopy was who we were gonna sell it to,

You know? And so we looked at what they were lacking.

We had a brand, they were lacking a brand.

so we knew that. The second thing is that there's an old adage in, you know, the stock market, which I think applies to business, is buy on rumors, sell on news. And so, cannabis, you know, [00:15:00] in, call it the recreational Canadian.

I can't remember right now what year Trudeau was elected.

But he was elected on the fact that he was gonna legalize cannabis. I mean, it wasn't anything else. I mean, it wasn't, that's my belief. And I could go back and tell many stories on why I believe that, why I'm convinced of that. And so right after that, now there were all these rumor. 

When's it gonna happen?

What's it gonna look like? What are the regulations? And it took them a while to do that, I think a couple of years. And finally they said, okay October 2018, we're gonna legalize cannabis. After that, that's the news.

And so we sold called Tokyo Smoke 90 days before that, 120 days before that.

And literally cannabis stocks went up. And then day of legalization, they went down down, [00:16:00] down, down, down, down, down to today.

Jeffrey Feldberg: . Wow. Crazy timing. You got out figuratively speaking, days before the announcement, everything comes tumbling down. But you're also in it because Trudeau, if memory serves, came in in 2015 late 2015, and you are in the industry in 2002. So you were, quote unquote, an overnight success, a 13 year overnight success building and getting towards that

Lorne Gertner: right, but Company that I started in 2002. I didn't Exit till 2016.

The company that I started in 2013, I didn't Exit till 2017.

Jeffrey Feldberg: Okay.

Lorne Gertner: Okay. The company that I started in 2014,

I exited in 2018, but in the first six months of 2018. So each one. the Exit was prime because the rumors were nuts.

Right? And so, [00:17:00] it's, the timing was everything.

Jeffrey Feldberg: And timing is everything. I get that earlier you said. I really follow my passions and I look to really make it a better place the world, and at the same time be able to profit from what I'm doing. Lorne, so many business owners fall into the trap where their passions will blind them. and when it's time to get out, it's just, well, you know what?

I love this business. We'll keep it going for a little bit longer. We'll see what happens. It's gonna keep on going up. The bubble's gonna go even further out. I have more runway. And they actually don't, the bubble bursts and they lose that value creation that they had done. So how do you immunize yourself?

Lorne Gertner: I think that couple things. One was that my son, who was my partner and co-founder in Tokyo Smoke he was focused on that,

Right? He said, you know, we're gonna sell this thing. Okay. Before legalization and a year before he had said, we're gonna take this public before the end of the year and the year before he [00:18:00] said, we're gonna be the Starbucks of cannabis.

So there were three sort of things. And then he said we're gonna sell this business to can.

And we're gonna get out of it. And you know, I think at the time the board was five people.

 There were two of us that for the most part would've kept the business.

And I was one of those, my son didn't start the business. I had started it then we co-founded it, but he hadn't been in the cannabis business for 25 years and he'd been around it. He knew my passion for it and my knowledge, but he didn't have the attachment that I had.

And so in the end, they won. We sold the business. I look like a hero. But in some ways he's the hero. In that, you know, I believed in the business. I believe in the business. And the good news is that we sold tookus smoke to the right people.

I, yesterday I was in [00:19:00] Yorkville we walked into the Tokyo Smoke Store.

I mean, it's in New Yorkville.

In 2014, a Dream and it's Center Ice Corner Best store in Yorkville. And it was my vision. I came up with the name.

So in terms of all of that, I had the win-win. In the case of my Exit before that, , it wasn't me, it was the stock market. It had just gone so crazy and my shares were worth so much money and at that point it wasn't my company.

There were other guys running it. And I thought, you know, I wanna buy a house. I wanna buy a whole bunch of things. I'll never have this kind of Wealth and paper. I might as well get.

And in the other case it just happened, you know, it was 16 years in the making,

Jeffrey Feldberg: And so Lorne, would one of the takeaways be for someone like yourself who's so passionate about things with a passion, can keep you in the game to surround yourself, whether it's a formal board of advisors or an informal board or mentors or people [00:20:00] around you who approach it and see things differently that aren't blinded by the passion.

Is that one of the strategies that you're following just to make sure that you

get out when,

when you.

Lorne Gertner: right a thousand percent. I mean, it was a formula. It is a formula in that we get an idea, I get an idea, I have a vision, and first thing I do is build a board.

And second thing I do is build a board of advisors, and they're my mentors. They're the people that keep me on the rails because as a creative person, you can go off the

rails, right? And I need to stay on the rails to achieve the success.

Jeffrey Feldberg: And so, Lorne, for our listeners who are saying, okay, you know what, Lorne's very successful number of incredible exits. He's saying to build a board of advisors and mentors, I'm gonna do that. What should we be looking for in terms of personality for a board member? What do you look for

Lorne Gertner: I mean, I guess it starts with shared values.

Do they share the same values? You [00:21:00] know, are they in my world you know, for your Jewish listeners, it's really simple. There's three Jewish words for your people that aren't one's I'll explain them. One's called a mench. Be a good person.

The second is called Sacl. Have street Smart.

All right. And the third is sadaka. Give back to the community. Build a community and support that community and give back to it. So it was, find people that had those shared values to begin with, and then find people who had deep industry expertise.

And then, you know, in my case I like to say put them all in the room and get outta the room. But it's a little bit in that sort of idea is get the smartest people in the room around a great idea and they'll figure it out.

Jeffrey Feldberg: And so where is that line? You're not too much in control, but you're not letting others run it either. There's a balance. So if you have the smart people, you're not the smartest guy in the room. Terrific advice for our listeners, and reminds me, I believe it [00:22:00] was Jim Rohn who said, we are the average of the five people we spend the most time with, and so in your instance in your case, Lorne, you have all these smart people.

You're really learning from them and they're helping you, mentoring you, guiding you. What's that, that, you know, it's a little bit of a pull and a tug kind of balance here of how much is too much and when is it too little in terms of what they're doing or what you're allowing them to do with your business and what you're not allowing yourself to do with your business.

Lorne Gertner: it's the entrepreneurial spirit. , you know, in that I would never have done any of the things that I did if I would've been of Right mind. It's a funny thing to say, why do people invest in things? Right? It's the same kind of thing. I had this idea, And you know, it's that driving force.

And that call it, in my case, addiction to winning. But in that, in those days, just that wanting to win so badly,

[00:23:00] That kept me, you know, doing that. And so, there's many times when I said to these advisors when I didn't listen to them, why didn't you scream at me?

You know, and lots of times we agreed on things, but there were times when they disagreed with me and, you know, maybe it was my ego, maybe it was whatever, I just kept pushing ahead. Right? I was stupid. I should have listened to them. But it's that strong headedness that says, I can do this, 

Jeffrey Feldberg: Sure. Lessons learned. Hindsight's always 2020. And so from hindsight to foresight, let's talk about psychedelics now because I know this is a big passion of yours, and you're into this in a very big way. , and you've been into it for a while. It's only now you're starting to hear more of it. So what's been going on in that brilliant mind of yours, Lorne?

That futurist side, that entrepreneurial side, wanting to help society, pay it forward, educate all those things. What are you seeing now in the world of psychedelics and where we're heading with that?

Lorne Gertner: [00:24:00] I mean, I think it's, you know, again call it My roots in cannabis. They go back to the sixties, right? I was a teenager in the sixties. And there were influences. There were things happening, and one of the things that was happening was psychedelics. I was a little young for it.

But I'm a voyeur.

And I was in call it maybe the right place at the right time. So I saw similar to cannabis, the early signs of efficacy,

I saw how people forgetting about recreational, how they were treating me, included their mental health. And so what happened was cannabis became a schedule one drug

And psychedelics became a schedule one drug.

There's a whole bunch of reasons. It was the war on drugs. It was Nixon wanting to keep the people down from, protesting about Vietnam and peace, love, and all of that. And psychedelic. Stopped [00:25:00] completely.

Cannabis continued to grow as a medicine, as a recreational product.

Psychedelics stopped. And so, you know, as cannabis was becoming commonplace,

Psychedelics. Handful of people from those days, maybe more, that continued sort of what I'll call underground research.

Jeffrey Feldberg: okay.

Lorne Gertner: And they started to prove a real efficacy

On different psychedelics. And it wasn't just like this idea that, oh, you know, here's a drug you're gonna take a trip on.

Here's a drug that's gonna help.

And they started to see things like, you know, igan being given to people in clinical trials and in countries where it was legal, where it was curing them of their addiction.

Right. And then they started looking at psilocybin

And a company called compass Pathways was created.[00:26:00]

They got fast tracked cuz it's a breakthrough therapy and they're in phase three clinical trials for psilocybin and post-traumatic stress. And so I started to see all of that happening and I thought, you know what I wanna be part of that movement.

Jeffrey Feldberg: okay.

Lorne Gertner: and it was not dissimilar to cannabis is that I wanted to have a seat at the table

When they write the book about North American cannabis. I will certainly be one of those 12 or 20 people that made that happen. And I made a decision about four years ago that I wanted to be the same in the psychedelic space.

So that was like, get my 10,000 hours. Experiment with all kinds of things that I'm not a hundred percent comfortable with, but I'm a healthy normal.

And I thought, how can I preach all of this without, having the experiments?

[00:27:00] I can tell you, for me, it was life changing and I've done a lot of things in my life. But these were life changing moments for me

As a result of that, I'm, you know, deeply involved. I have a private company that's creating a drug.

We have a patent with a microdose of psilocybin combined with another natural molecule called Eugenol. And we believe it will replace SSRIs.

And today 30 million people are taking SSRIs. SSRIs, by the way, are what is the current treatment for depression? So, it's Lexapro, doesn't include Adderall, but adderalls in that same basket.

Jeffrey Feldberg: So Lorne, is this like a 2002 fast forward, circa today, all over again when it comes to psychedelics? Is that where we are or are we further ahead with that now?

Lorne Gertner: I think we're further.

And I think the reason we're further ahead is pandemic for sure. Because, the amount of people that are [00:28:00] suffering or began to suffer or suffered severely was off the charts. I mean, myself included. I mean, I was locked up for a year. you know, you're locking up an. Right. In a cage, right? And so I think it affected everybody. The second thing is through the pandemic, we actually saw a drug developed in under a two year period,

Right? So we're all of a sudden accepting, or we found ways to develop drugs quicker than we ever have. And because this is still coming back to most cases, a plant.

It's something that's existed for thousands and thousands and thousands of years. It's not like we, we have to prove that you don't die from it. Nobody's ever died from psychedelics. Nobody's ever died from cannabis. 

So I think we'll be able to develop a drug faster. I'm about to turn 68 and I'm hoping perform 75.

We'll see all of.

Jeffrey Feldberg: Oh, that'd be terrific. There are some predictions here now, and for the listeners who are saying, okay, this sounds interesting, whether it's the business side or on the personal side, you [00:29:00] know, I wanna learn more about this. I'm wondering, I don't know if you happen to catch that documentary, Louis Schwartzberg put out a short while back, fantastic.

Fungi, would that be a good place for someone to start 

learning about the history and, 

Lorne Gertner: right.

I would say that. 

Is a great place to start because Paul Stamens is a genius. And I happen to know Paul. I sit on a board of advisors with Paul. And so that's certainly how to Change Your Mind. It's another Netflix by Michael Pollan. I sit again on that same board with Michael Poll.

I think also there's a Joe Oliver thing. There's so much happening. I would say the Joe Oliver podcast is one of my favorites. There's just current. There's a lot of information happening every day. I've never seen something happen so fast in my lifetime. Take halt. And again, maybe it's the pandemic, but the amount of people that are microdosing from what I [00:30:00] know compared to marijuana for medical is almost two to one.

Jeffrey Feldberg: Wow. And so, Lorne this is, we're really at an interesting crossroads here. Society wise. Industry business. All that rolled into one. You've been here in this very same situation, different industry, but very similar set of circumstances. Not to put words in your mouth, from what I'm hearing between the pandemic and I'd even put in there, even the legalization of cannabis has really perhaps fast tracked the road for psychedelics.

So you're saying hopefully in the next five, seven years we're gonna start seeing some legalization and changing and perhaps different medications coming out with this. What do you see societal wise? What's it gonna look like? You know, here you go. I'm giving you the magic wand. You wave the magic w. , what does society look like?

How have we changed because of psychedelics? What does that look like for you?

Lorne Gertner: I'll sort of put it this way, and I'm reading books about doom and gloom, and all we do is you're doom and [00:31:00] gloom. Every day we watch the news, it's doom and gloom. We've got a war going on. We've got, you know, recession, we've got all this for me. And people always say to me, Hey, what does it feel like when you micro.

And I see it is like a happy pill.

So I believe that happy people create a happy world

Jeffrey Feldberg: Okay.

Lorne Gertner: And happy houses create happy people. I just believe in happiness and I believe that psychedelics will allow people to be happier.

To me that's a key to how we're gonna address, the world that we're about to come into.

Jeffrey Feldberg: . And talk to us about that. So perhaps we're leaving now the world of psychedelics and into what's ahead. The pandemic absolutely was a game changer. What are you seeing ahead for us, Lorne? Society-wise? Business-wise for us as entrepreneurs, founders, where are things heading?

Lorne Gertner: Somebody said to me I go with the cockroach theory is that I think that [00:32:00] America, but Canada and America is going to become much more self-reliant on what we do.

Jeffrey Feldberg: Okay.

Lorne Gertner: And so, I believe we'll make a lot more manufacture a lot more will rely less on the world. So I think that globalization was the result of so much piled on top of so much. And, you know, certainly for me, who's the son of an immigrant you know, what happened in the forties and the fifties and the sixties with television and cars and all of those things was an incredible period of growth. And then the past 10 years on steroids, you know, I mean, remember. Apple, the iPhone's only 15 years old.

There's been 35 iterations of the iPhone . Okay? And that iPhone is in 15 years more powerful than anything we had all combined 15 years ago. So, huge believer in ai, huge believer in that we'll [00:33:00] deal with our population going down.

And on aging population, a lot of what we did in our generation will be done by ai.

So, I'm pumped because I think we will have the ability to live longer and will have the ability, hopefully in my lifetime to solve all cancer.

So I think, you know, despite the whole world of climate control and all that, I still think we'll solve a lot of that because we're getting smarter at that.

Jeffrey Feldberg: . . And ai. That's a whole other conversation that's not just an episode. I mean, we could do series on that. It's just a game changer. 

Lorne Gertner: yeah, it's in my disruption model, right? So if, what I think I'm good at as a futurist is that ultimately I'm a disruptor. I look for where I can disrupt things. And years ago it was the clothing business to the fashion business. It was, from builders [00:34:00] to design-based developers and community builders.

So in every case it was looking at how we could fix things

And make them.

 And in my case and in all the cases, and it really hasn't come up in this conversation to the extent that it should have. It's making the world a better place through design excellence.

So it was always saying, how can I use design to make any of these industries any of this disruption to use design to make it better.

Jeffrey Feldberg: And. tailing on that and picking up on that. Lorne, if we go to the cannabis industry, and I'm picking that specifically because when you're in the women's fashion, well, you could say, well, design fashion go hand in hand, but better design and cannabis don't necessarily go hand in hand. So for our listeners, the benefit of them, can you give an example of what you mean that you would put better design into your solutions when helping people.

Lorne Gertner: Well, I think Tokyo Smokes a great example of it, right? Why do people go into the [00:35:00] Tokyo Smoke Store? Because it's designed so well, It, I mean also cuz they've become part of the community. But part of the community was cuz it was designed so well, it has a dna, it has my dna.

And so I think that it, it's and cannabis is for sure true. It just hasn't gotten to that point in the market. If you 

Jeffrey Feldberg: Mm-hmm. 

Lorne Gertner: truth,

Jeffrey Feldberg: And so when you say my dna, what does that mean for Tokyo Smoke. So when I walk into a Tokyo smoke store over any of the gazillion others that are out there, what's standing out for me?

Lorne Gertner: Clean, white, natural uncluttered. I mean, just a whole bunch of things. And you can look back to club Monaco, Joe Fresh different things that influenced me. Even, you know, Philip Johnson in the glass house, it was always about this very clean aesthetic. And if it was up to me Jeff, I'd paint the world white, you know?

Jeffrey Feldberg: You know, Lorne, as you're talking [00:36:00] about this, perhaps you are to Tokyo Smoke and the cannabis industry in terms of the stores, what Apple is in terms of the stores that they put out there, and others have tried to follow suit, but miss that elegance and that simplicity and when you walk in, you just look around and it transports you into a whole different world.

Would I be on base, off base with that?

Lorne Gertner: No, no, No. I think that was very much in Steve Jobs dna.

And man, its lasted a long time. By the way, he's often been quoted as saying that he would never have come up with the iPhone or the Mac. Had he not done psychedelics,

I think in his case he specifically refers to L S D.

Jeffrey Feldberg: Wow. There's a story behind the story on that one. Huh? Lorne

Lorne Gertner: Yeah.

Yeah 

Jeffrey Feldberg: And so, Lorne, let me ask you this, because this has been fascinating. We can continue to go down many rabbit holes we're gonna need to start wrapping up. But before we do that, as you [00:37:00] look back at your many successes, where you've taken your passion, your curiosity, your flare for design, your desire to help people, Are there common factors or strategies for people today, business owners, founders, entrepreneurs today?

They're hearing you speak and they're saying, you know what? I want to take a little bit of Lorne, bottle it up and put that into my business. What would you be telling them business wise of some things that they could before going on to the next meeting or email or call from this episode? They can do one actionable thing today or more if you choose.

What would that be on the business side to really make a difference in the business?

Lorne Gertner: Be one with the product. Never quit. Never quit.

 Understand your product, know your, like you, Jeff, you know your business. You are one with your business, right? I'm one with my business. I'm one with cannabis. I'm one with psychedelics. It's part of me.

And I think if you're going to create something, [00:38:00] it has to be part of you, and whether it's your senses or your music or any of that. And the other thing is you have to know when to pivot.

Okay? It's generally not what it starts out to be.

Jeffrey Feldberg: Sure.

Lorne Gertner: right? And that ability to pivot after you've told the story so passionately to so many people, and now you have to pivot and tell a news story to all those same people.

That, that scares people,

Jeffrey Feldberg: What you're calling pivoting, we call X-Factors that go on to create market disruption. It's step two and you know, as you're talking about being one with the product, you're have me reminisce because Lorne, much like you, there's so many similarities in how you're approaching things that I'm reminded of The company Apple that we were talking about, Steve Jobs, when they came out with the iPod.

And it, I mean, there are other music players that were out before, but that really was part of their dna, how they designed it, how they were all into music. Microsoft came along later with [00:39:00] probably a device. Most people won't even remember or have heard of the Zoom, which came and disappeared. But the iPod transformed into the I iPhone.

But to your point, and I think it's a great takeaway for the listeners, when you're one with your product, it's really your ethos. You're the product, the products you or the service, the offering, whatever that is, your DNA is into it. It's DNA is into you, and you meld that together. That's where the magic happens.

Would you agree with that?

Lorne Gertner: Uh, A hundred percent. If you put all those pieces together, magical will happen.

What that magic is, who knows? Right? And what you're able to do with that magic is, part of my success I think is that I'm a great storyteller

And part of it is because I'm curious and I hear stories, and I like to tell those stories in order to create disruption.

Jeffrey Feldberg: Absolutely. And that's a big tenant here at Deep Wealth Storytelling. It's actually step three of our nine step roadmap when you're speaking to your clientele or your future investor or buyer. And we've had evaluators on the [00:40:00] show, Lorne, and they say the same thing that you're saying and the same thing that we're saying.

One evaluator came on, he said, you know, Jeffrey, before I look at the audited statements, the financials, I want to hear the origin. because for me, 80% of the value is the. The numbers, the data, all that other stuff helps back it up. And yes, you have to have something real to get these astronomical values out there, but the origin story is everything.

And being a storyteller, Lorne, yeah, we're right there with you. That is part of the art side of business, of building a business, changing society, having a terrific Exit all rolled into one. Speaking of access, Lorne I mean, I would just love to go down these different rabbit holes and consider this an invitation and perhaps offline we can talk about having you come back speaking about AI or other things future-wise, that, that are gonna impact us.

But let's start to wrap up, and I wanna give you one of my favorite questions. I'm gonna set it up for you though. Think of the movie Back to the Future. And in the movie you have that magical DeLorean car that will take you to any point in [00:41:00] time. So Lorne, here's the fun part. It's tomorrow morning. You look outside your window.

Not only is the DeLorean car curbside. Doors open. It's waiting for you to hop on in, and you can now go back to any point in your life when you're a young child, a teenager, a young adult, whatever point in time that would be. Lorne, what are you telling your younger self in terms of life wisdom or lessons, or, Hey Lorne, do this, but don't do that.

What would it sound like?

Lorne Gertner: So funny when you asked that. I don't want to go back to the future. I mean, in some ways I just want to go right to the future. 

Right? 

So I mean all the lessons learned 

Jeffrey Feldberg: well, Lorne, this is your question. Flip it. Go to your future yourself. , you're gonna tell yourself 

Lorne Gertner: yeah, , my future self is to continue to predict the future. I don't think that's something for me that's gonna stop.

As long as I am able to keep connected to the world and surround myself with young people and see what's on the street I want to continue to do that. But in the short term, it's [00:42:00] really about mental health and wellness. And I mentioned the other sides to me is, you know, call it philanthropy and that's a gain around, you know, mental health and wellness around education. And around art and I guess, you know, somebody, I once went and saw a lecture that was meaningful to me and it was a architect that I have credible admiration for.

And you said a copy of a copy as an original. So that might sort of sum it up for.

Jeffrey Feldberg: Fascinating. Wow. That is mind bending Lorne, but I would expect nothing less from you. Well, Lorne, it's official. This episode is a wrap. Really want to thank you for sharing your insights, your wisdom, and as we like to say here at Deep Wealth, may you continue to thrive and prosper and keep healthy and safe.

Thank you so much.

Lorne Gertner: Thank you. 

Sharon S.: The Deep Wealth Experience was definitely a game-changer for me. 

Lyn M.: This course is one of the best investments you will ever make because you will get an ROI of a hundred times that. [00:43:00] Anybody who doesn't go through it will lose millions. 

Kam H.: If you don't have time for this program, you'll never have time for a successful liquidity 

Sharon S.: It was the best value of any business course I've ever taken. The money was very well spent.

Lyn M.: Compared to when we first began, today I feel better prepared, but in some respects, may be less prepared, not because of the course, but because the course brought to light so many things that I thought we were on top of that we need to fix. 

Kam H.: I 100% believe there's never a great time for a business owner to allocate extra hours into his or her week or day. So it's an investment that will yield results today. I thought I will reap the benefit of this program in three to five years down the road. But as soon as I stepped forward into the program, my mind changed immediately. 

Sharon S.: There was so much value in the experience that the time I invested paid back so much [00:44:00] for the energy that was expended. 

Lyn M.: The Deep Wealth Experience compared to other programs is the top. What we learned is very practical. Sometimes you learn stuff that it's great to learn, but you never use it. The stuff we learned from Deep Wealth Experience, I believe it's going to benefit us a boatload.

Kam H.: I've done an executive MBA. I've worked for billion-dollar companies before. I've worked for smaller companies before I started my business. I've been running my business successfully now for getting close to a decade. We're on a growth trajectory. Reflecting back on the Deep Wealth, I knew less than 10% what I know now, maybe close to 1% even. 

Sharon S.: Hands down the best program in which I've ever participated. And we've done a lot of different things over the years. We've been in other mastermind groups, gone to many seminars, workshops, conferences, retreats, read books. This was so different. I haven't had an experience that's anything close to this in all the years that we've been at this.

It's [00:45:00] five-star, A-plus.

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Deep Wealth is an accurate name for it. This program leads to deeper wealth and happier wealth, not just deeper wealth. I don't think there's a dollar value that could be associated with such an experience and knowledge that could be applied today and forever. 

Jeffrey Feldberg: Are you leaving millions on the table? 

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