What's up, party people? My name is Sunny Ray. This is the Sunny Ray show. So, my next guest, his name is Jay Frank. He's been forging change since 2022 across three lanes, a cannabis cooking show, symbiotic, a social impact as a service SaaS model, and changemakers on the cusp. With that said, I'm going to bring Jay on. Jay, how's it going?
It's great. Thanks for having me on the show, Sunny.
Yeah, happy to have you here. So, I guess music, cannabis, and social impact as a service. I mean, I'm pumped. So, I guess take me to the deep end. What's changemakers about? What are you building? Like, what problem are you solving?
Well, from my perspective, facing the world as it is today, you know, the imbalances, the friction, the lack of hope, I see massive opportunity to be the change we collectively seek within business modeling and whatnot. I you look at the framework, you know, all hands on deck, all systems check, and all mediums, too, with a few different ways to go after innovation and business exploration. With tiger by the tail vision as a Trojan horse within businesses usual. So, I appreciate the to share with you and the audience. Thank you very much.
Yeah, Jay. So, I guess take me back to the moment baked stopped being.
Like a fun idea and became you know, a business you were willing to build and what made it feel real?
Absolutely. Well, back in 2020, I left the company I started in '97 as a technology distribution firm to create a social impact as a service model which was slowly rolling and during this time frame in my personal efforts personal activities, I would often partake with cannabis and as an amateur chef, just having fun, being myself, I would often cook dishes that were pretty wild. And after a long time of collecting images and dishes via cannabis creation exploration, I noticed the destigmatization or the normalization of cannabis and the popularity of cooking shows and I saw the wide-open opportunity to create a show that was not so serious as the other cooking shows that allowed chefs to explore at the lane of fun and funny creativity showcasing exploratory dishes via thematic and dramatic cooking competitions in New York City, the melting pot and I put together a pitch deck and everybody seemed to like it. And then when I approached one of the leaders in the cultural cannabis space, named Justin, had a conversation, it was well received and nothing more nothing less, but a few months later I got an email from this cannabis leader named Justin at Fat Nugs Magazine where he said to me, "Where you at with this show? I want to be on it." And that was all the validation I needed to create a proof of concept and the pilot episode and then to create Sizzl Deck. So, what I like to say to others in consideration is that, you know, we have the ways to means of dope hopes and dreams content, authentic content vision creation on a silver platter. The ways being, you know, the deck to sizzle the real, the means being the streamers, you know, looking for content, recognizing everything from the space of it only is what it is and content is king to support that statement.
You know, food media has kind of like a proven playbook from, you know, Food Network to YouTube cooking channels. Which parts of that playbook you know, transfer to your category and which parts break?
Well, the ideation actually started from following along Chopped where there was a mystery basket and chefs had to create in the space of cooking competition, you know, with without knowing without a knowingness of what they're cooking and they had to create. So, that was really the inception ideation from cooking normal shows or whatnot and we just insert chefs and get them baked in that space. But then it expanded a lot further into a variety show of cannabis advocacy. And when I realized the that cannabis was the most sustainable and versatile plant on the planet, and here we are in a climate crisis, as a climate activist, you know, I recognized that I was the common denominator in all three of these visions of changemakers on the cusp of a B2B SaaS model, social impact as a service, the rock and roll anthem of champs, and the cannabis show. So, they all aligned with trying to be the change reflectively seek in life, you know.
So, cannabis brands are largely locked out of mainstream advertising. does that make a media brand in this space more valuable or just like harder to grow?
I think it's all there for the taking in terms of the wide openness of collaborative cannabis marketing. Everything is available to collaborate with brands. So, for example, in every episode, we have to get the chefs baked, and therefore there's the product placement showcasing the brand, the method, and whatnot. But in terms of the media for Baked, you know, we're not plant touching. So, we can go anywhere and again, you know, this is just fun and funny content. It's got nothing to do with anything that isn't such.
That's super interesting. I guess where does like revenue realistically come from for a cannabis media company? Is it like sponsors or licensing, events, subscriptions? I mean like what's the mixture kind of betting on?
Well, that's a good question. I'm still trying to figure that one out. So, we're trying to form a business entity that embodies the equation of ESG plus DEI plus THC plus NYC for durable balance. The overarching long-term goal is the streamers with balls, the Netflix, HBO, whatnot, which would offer a production, development, and revenue share in such. Along the way, we know that that's a giant leap from ways to means and we can create a model that embodies you know, the framework I just mentioned, ESG plus DEI, showcasing cannabis vision in development in action for short-form social media evolution to create bandwidth, a following community to eventually monetize with sponsorships and or events and or branding. But, that is a bit of a unknown. I believe that the whole vision is there for the taking with round table subject matter complimentary skill sets and whatnot. I'm trying to bring that to a round table. And that's what I'm looking for as allies and partners to go after this wide-open opportunity.
That's interesting. And you guys's 90-day focus is consistent social content to build a brand, right? So, what does consistent mean in numbers and like which platforms, what cadence, like what formats?
Well, again, Sunny, that remains to be seen. But, we have the availability to plug and play people into New York City and use the set in the settings for consistent cannabis advocacy in short form, you know, social media, what not. So, it It's relatively easy to come up with some ideas. It's me trying to find support of the back end is really what what's required for me to begin this evolution. And you know, like I said, it's tiger by the tail vision. I have a lot of folks that are interested, but I've yet to find lock-in partners that are ready to go after this. However, you know, I am in touch with industry leaders. That keeps me confident. And I have lunch with the director of partnerships for High Times this week. And I speak to New York City Cannabis. And that's the possibility of partnering with New York City itself, cannabis. And showcasing, you know, high road activations of nothing but fun, positive cannabis content.
And like I guess like how would you know like the content is working? Like what what's like the one number you'll watch kind of every week or whatever?
Oh, I know it's working with consistent growth, you know, we just started a LinkedIn page profile, which was absent for, you know, the first start. And you know, we we're consistently finding people that are interested in, you know, evolution. And there's, there's a lot of interest. It's just a matter of, you know, trying to get to that next step. The this is actual succinct next steps to get people out of their, you know, curious curiosity into partnership consideration to join forces and to co-create. That's the what we're trying to do is to create a big tent movement for the short-form social media to create community engagement, partnerships, and showcasing the colorful characters of cannabis. Because that's what seems to be overlooked for mainstream media, where we can find collaborative supports in the whole spectrum of humanity that partake in cannabis, whether business or personal, and to collaborate with them to expand on up the high road.
And then soft launch events are the site's first ask, right? So, I guess what role do live events play in launching, you know, a media brand in this category?
Well, one of the people I'm trying to partner with that was very interested and wants to do a live event, actually a live baked cooking event where we bring on some chefs and we sell some tickets. And that remains to be seen. Another possibility is somebody I met through LinkedIn here that was actually looking for support for his orphanage in Uganda. And over the course of a few years developing a relationship with this kind soul of saintly characteristic of kindness and gratitude, where he actually turned out to be born on 4/20. When I asked him, "What if cannabis was able to bring you to New York City to get you baked for your birthday?" He was over the top excited. But then the optics got in front of him and kind of turned him away from leaning into cannabis. That was a year ago. And now we re-approached that scenario and he's very much interested in taking part. So, that's something that we can create storyline, sideline projects to showcase, you know, getting baked in your city via kindness and gratitude and whatnot to help shine a light on the project and the high road that we're trying to embody and emulate.
And if someone watching this runs a brand in the space, like what's the one way to work with you guys?
Just to reach out and have a conversation about, "Hey, this is the collaborative possibilities of you know, getting baked whether the method, you know, the products, brand or the flower brand or the any ancillary brand. You know, it's relatively easy to plug and play and come up with a short-form concept and to develop partnerships with openness. That's all it is. It just requires openness to have a conversation and consider, you know, what the possibilities are. And at this moment or at this stage, it's relatively easy because of the inception and you know, lack of structure. You know, we can bend, we can move and accommodate and be very flexible and nimble and jump over that candlestick or get to it, you know.
How do you keep the project fun and like cannabis forward while making kind of the social impact piece feel real, you know, rather than just marketing?
Well, the social impact, you know, peace, you know, comes much later. You know, what we designed to do in the process is to create an NFT of the winning recipe in any show, which we can then auction off with our nonprofit social impact partners. The business modeling, you know, is the movement which we look to create sharing ownership, equity for skill set and we look to lean into the DEI and folks that have been harmed by the war on drugs. So, it's business modeling and advocacy of cannabis in the segmentation once we get picked up in the this cannabis variety show. That's all predicated upon chefs getting baked and creating from that lens of green sativa in action and fun.
Where do people learn more about project, the company, and yourself? yeah, and then well, I guess bring this one to an end.
Well, yeah. my LinkedIn profile is Jay Frank. you know, I have to maybe link that up digitally. The social media Instagram, which is on pause but shortly to relaunch is AKA Baked. And we have those social media handles locked down for YouTube, which we will eventually get, but AKA Baked kind of flows under the radar and is that's our handle.
Awesome. Thank you, Jay. thank you all for tuning in live. We got a bunch of people listening as well. Thank you. And yeah, with that said, Jay, hang up for 1 minute. I'm going to bring this stream to an end.
Thank you very much, Sonny. It was a pleasure to be on the show and hopefully you know, this is the start of further evolution for Baked Up the High Road. Let's get it.
Let's go.
