By Sharon Letts Libby Cooper, Co-Founded Space Coyote in San Francisco, and in just 18 months the company became one of the top 20 pre-roll brands in California, quickly becoming the fourth highest infused pre-roll brand on the market, found in more than 300 dispensaries. Before founding Space Coyote, Cooper was Creative Director at Eaze, […]
By Sharon Letts
Libby Cooper, Co-Founded Space Coyote in San Francisco, and in just 18 months the company became one of the top 20 pre-roll brands in California, quickly becoming the fourth highest infused pre-roll brand on the market, found in more than 300 dispensaries.
Before founding Space Coyote, Cooper was Creative Director at Eaze, California’s largest retail platform. Cooper has built and launched multiple cannabis brands, including cannabis cup-winning products. Cumulatively, those brands she helped launch have sold more than five million in revenue in the first year of operations.
But, her journey into the cannabis space and becoming one of the fastest growing woman-owned and operated cannabis companies really began as a young adult, and innately knowing the plant was beneficial.
Recreation or Medicine?
The first time Cooper partook of cannabis was in High School, but she emphatically states that she does not condone smoking cannabis for teens. Ironically, though, she did feel its positive effects at this young age.
“Though I smoked with a group of friends for recreational purposes, I felt a surprising amount of relief from the chronic stomach pains I had suffered from since my earliest childhood memories,” she shared.
Her parents would tell her stories years later of her being a picky eater, often regurgitating her food. This, she said, transformed her into a tiny kid, with a perennial upset stomach with pain.
“When I smoked weed for those first few times as a teen, I suddenly had a huge appetite and the strength to play harder when she went into team sports. It wasn’t until the end of high school that she was diagnosed with Celiac Disease.
“I fondly called it the ‘OG gluten-free diet,” she laughed. “All dots connected in that moment. The relief I felt from cannabis, along with the benefits that didn’t hinder my athletics, but enhanced them. I actually went on to be a Division 1 Track and Field athlete in college, using cannabis throughout my sports career, even though it was not allowed at the time and we were always threatened with random drug tests.”
This writer has interviewed numerous adults who first began using cannabis in adolescents and as teenagers, because it worked for them. Many with undiagnosed disorders on the Spectrum, ADD or ADHD, and/or myriad ailments where the plant helped more than pharmaceuticals at a young age.
Why then did she add the fine print at the beginning of her story – that kids should not partake? Because of the stigma, because of the rhetoric, “What about the children?” Well, this writer has news for everyone, the kids are alright, and if it works for them at a young age, they probably need it in some way.
The biggest challenge Cooper faced was in finding her protocols and dosing with cannabis, in light of the failed war on drugs and the lack of educational information on the plant.
When she hit 25, she was able to explore the optimization of her diet and lifestyle, adding Ayurveda, an ancient Indian medicine, helping to guide her through, what she calls the “seasons and time in your life, and the factors that put your health in different directions throughout the days, weeks, and years.
“Eating the proper food, including eating seasonally and locally, with correct food combining, completely changed my life,” she added. “On top of this, following Ayurveda I nearly cut out all packaged and processed foods. Keeping cannabis as both my medicine and my recreational vic completely transformed my body. It didn’t happen overnight, but now, in my late 20s, I’m the strongest and healthiest I’ve ever been.”
Feeding the Muse
Space Coyote offers up a variety of smoking options, including joints made with hash, live resin, and non-psychoactive THCA.
Its Poolside Hybrid Hash 5-Pack, is the latest product collaboration with Poolside, a daytime disco band from Los Angeles.
The song to match the vibe, I Feel High, was written by Poolside’s leader, Jeffrey Paradise, and Ben Browning from Cut Copy, recorded in Los Angeles. The song was already written and and included on Poolside’s new album, Low Season, released in February, 2020, when the Space Coyote team created the perfect pre-rolls for seshing to the song.
As a company, Cooper said that Space Coyote explores the “psychedelic side of weed,” focusing on a potent smoke, no matter if the partaker is a patient or is looking to open their third eye and find its muse.
Paradise said he had always wanted his music to match up with a certain type of high, and conveyed this to Cooper and team. The Poolside Hybrid Hash 5-Pack was the outcome.
“We told the Space Coyote team that we’d like the high to compliment a daytime hang session, spent lounging by a pool, listening to mellow music – which is what I always want my music to do,” Paradise said.
Each pre-roll in the Poolside 5-Pack’s reusable tin is loaded with a half a gram of infused cannabis, blending Sour Cookies Hash from Nasha Extracts with MAC flower from Sticky Fields. Also an artist, Cooper worked with Paradise in creating the artwork for the pack.
Paradise comments on the Space Coyote’s website describing the product, “Only one thing is better than chilling out listening to groovy music, and that’s chilling out listening to groovy music while smoking a great joint,” he penned. “I’ve always heard that people like to listen to Poolside music when they smoke – now they can smoke with Poolside when they smoke!”
Daily Dose, bypassing cyberland in the a.m.
Cooper said there’s much power in listening to your body’s needs and knowing that you can and will heal.
“My dosing schedule varies based on how I’m feeling,” she explained. I’m not waking and baking unless it’s Thursday, when I livestream on Facebook and Instagram with my cofounder, Scott Sundvor to about 400,000 viewers.”
If she doesn’t need to medicate in the morning, she ignores social media and focuses on her morning routine, then drives straight to work.
“On a good day I’m smoking for pleasure in the late afternoon when I’m done with work,” she said. “In the past I needed to consume cannabis to ease my stomach pain and boost my appetite at the start of the day.”
Ingesting regularly keeps symptoms at bay, allowing Cooper to enjoy her partaking, without the urgency of needing to medicate for a flare-up. It’s prevention at its finest.
“When my tummy is bad I’ll typically eat an edible or take some tincture in the late evening, after dinner to soothe my stomach for sleep,” she said. “The most common time of day for me personally to experience pain is immediately upon waking up, so by taking a medible or tincture the night before, I can actually lesson and often stop the discomfort from happening at all.”
A favorite mode of partaking is with infused joints at the end of her day.
“I unwind with a nice infused joint at the end of the day, but my most favorite time to get lifted is listening to live music,” she said. “During COVID, times have certainly changed, but I love to recreate the concert feel at home with big speakers on loud, and a joint in my mouth. I play psychedelic rock and dance around the living room with the lights on low.”
Cooper truly believes in smokable, potent products, affirming that women can be stoners and being a stoner is celebratory.
“There’s nothing quite like releasing stress through movement – and the use of cannabis can aid you in fully letting go of inhibitions,” she concluded, knowingly.
For more information on Space Coyote visit, www.spacecoyote.org
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