We were lucky to catch up with Robert Hoban recently and have shared our conversation below.
Robert, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. We’d love to hear about the early days of establishing your own firm. What can you share?
I was a successful commercial litigation attorney. My Mother was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. I began to explore the Colorado medical marijuana program because the prescribed opiate regime was deleterious. I began to meet various business owners and very knowledgeable medicinal cannabis professionals. There was a demonstrated need for quality experience (non-criminal-law) legal services, and there was an opportunity in Colorado build a law firm — the first of its kind — that focused solely on the commercial regulated cannabis industry. But the opportunity was even greater than that because numerous states were, at the very same time, enacting forms of lawful medical marijuana businesses. This happened at a time when the Nation was in/entering into a recession and entrepreneurs were looking for opportunities — hence the Great Green Gold Rush! All of these opportunities across the country were happening at the same time. The cannabis conference circuit was in its early stages, but proved to be very fruitful in attracting clients, but more importantly, I began to meet (at these national cannabis events) a variety of attorneys, who were interested in servicing the cannabis industry — really really great people too! Then, on the way back from one of these events I was at the airport and I picked up a magazine at the newsstand — I don’t recall which one, but the cover story/images involved coverage of live music festivals (my favorite). As it turned out, the magazine contained an article that discussed building a national business, and it addressed building a national law firm. This article had citations to an American Lawyer article that discussed the trend of law firm ‘of counsel’ models and effectively how to build a firm upon such a model – a national law firm. And so I did! Over the next three months, I spent a great deal of time with these lawyers from the cannabis events and began to gather interest and feedback. I then out the plan in motion and began to get these lawyers – one-by-one to sign on to my law firm, Hoban & Feola (precursor to the lauded Hoban Law Group). It was challenging to persuade lawyers — let alone lawyers who were generally accustomed to working solo or with one other person — to join a firm with (now) dozens of lawyers, but the allure of being the first cannabis lawyers, was too exciting to pass up. And within 3 months I was able to build out a roster, and a structure. One Monday, I cam back to Colorado from a conference and placed a stack of contracts and attorney bios on the desk of my firm’s COO, Kate. I said “we now have 35 attorneys and offices across the country,” as we were initially/mostly able to leverage the existing offices of these lawyers. “Would you please update our website, and begin to meet these people, one-by-one,” I said. Kate looked at me like I was crazy (maybe just a little bit crazy, haha), and just like that, she began to execute. Within 6 weeks, we had a web presence and became known as the first national, commercial cannabis law firm. Once the “Nation’s Premier Cannabusiness Law Firm” became established and known, the rest is history. Over time the initial firm structure required tinkering (and capital!). But its success ensured that it would — the “Hobanites,” as the attorneys dubbed themselves, were part of the first full time, full service commercial national cannabis law firm. So, to anyone who ever has any hesitation about going for it – Just Do It! Our firm was not only the best at what we did, but it was the only firm that did what we did!
Robert, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?
Due to my personal story regarding my Mother and her journey with pancreatic cancer, I began to understand people’s journey with/through terminal cancer. I firmly believed that I can help by assisting as many cannabis businesses as possible get going so that people in these circumstances would have a wide array of options to ensure a high quality of life. And along the way, I became the leader of an extraordinary group of people — attorneys and staff across the country. I had good instincts, and it was key that I trusted those instincts. But I studied being an entrepreneur and business tactics online most days; I went to breakfast and lunch with a large number of professionals from who I learned a great deal. And most importantly, I steered away from a traditional law firm model (which are often stagnant and uninventive). I decided to run the law firm like a business, and not like a law firm. This entailed making very hard decisions regarding structure, organization and leadership. To that end, I decided to focus on business development, marketing, and customer satisfaction by using technology; digital technology was extremely impactful in its infancy. I put non-lawyers in places of leadership (very controversial for a law firm); I elevated younger people into positions that were a bit premature for them, but based on instinct and ambition. We learned together; we grew together. I decided that I was not only going to ensure that we provided a wide array of high level legal services (which required constantly adding attorneys in specific areas of expertise and/or regions of the country, and ultimately the world), but we were also going to label ourselves as industry experts! After all, it was a brand new industry and we were actually building it on behalf of ourselves and our clients. This model was unique for lawyers, as lawyers tended to stay in their lane in narrow areas of legal expertise and were not generally comfortable serving as industry experts as well. It was a challenge, but we were dedicated to internal education, and outward facing content creation to both improve and demonstrate our skills to the nation’s cannabis industry. It was this decision – to project expertise outside of being just lawyers only, and the accompanying digital marketing/content strategies — that I am most proud of and is what caused the firm to rise to the top.
How about pivoting – can you share the story of a time you’ve had to pivot?
The cannabis industry was in its infancy and growing leaps and bounds. The firm was the proverbial cream of the crop, and was recognized across the country as such. But as new state markets opened up, we had to add attorneys licensed in those jurisdictions, and growth soon became unwieldy and internally unenforceable. We had to restructure various aspects of the firm, including the fact that we had to convert many of our attorneys from Of Counsel (independent contractor) attorneys to direct W-2 employees, partners, and the like. This required time, patience, countless face-to-face meetings, and financial commitments that went behind my comfort level initially. I had to take a major pay cut for a lengthy period of time to ensure the firm’s sustainability and viability.
After working to open and establish the regulations and business operations of these dispensaries in numerous states, we began to coast. But then, the new state-based cannabis markets, came with plenty of work, but low-paying and slow-to-pay clients in the state-regulated marijuana sector (i.e., dispensaries). And so, I had to diversify our practice given the bloated payroll and financial commitments. I took a chance on the developing the so-called hemp sector in order to diversify our industry service offerings. After all, hemp is cannabis; and marijuana is cannabis; and so, we were still servicing the newly created cannabis industry. It was a major additional/pivot, and it could not have worked out more beautifully. As a result, we were able to effectively usher in the proliferation of hemp-derived CBD (and beyond). After building the marijuana dispensary system, we literally built out the CBD/hemp sector with our innovative legal and business strategies.
We then focused on ancillary companies, who serviced the hemp and marijuana sector. They needed a guide to the industry; someone who knew everyone, and who could provide high quality legal services in a brand-new context. We were very successful in this pivot.
But then, the hemp sector began to slow. I was teaching a variety of cannabis business/policy classes at the University of Denver. And one day, DU got a call asking about whether or not it had any cannabis policy experts. I was immediately connected to officials in the Uruguayan government. And likewise regarding Costa Rica. This notion of a global cannabis industry came at a time when the firm needed to add industry service offerings. And so in the very same way that I built the national aw firm, I built out HLG Global, a subsection of the Hoban Law Group, that serviced the burgeoning global cannabis supply chain. We focused on policy, import/export, legal opinions, cross-border business structures, and the like. It was a major pivot for the firm, and it worked out beautifully, once again. Sometimes you would rather be luck than good, but we were both!
What do you think helped you build your reputation within your market?
Over time, I became the most recognized cannabis attorney in the world. After all, we were the first so-called ‘cannabis attorneys’ that there ever was; people began to go to law school to become a cannabis attorney; that was humbling. My firm serviced hundreds of clients across the country and across the globe on a daily basis. And a large part of how I and the firm became so widely know was due to the attorneys. These folks were extraordinary lawyers, inventive and thoughtful. But they were also truly great and affable people. We would send our attorneys to nearly every event that took place across the country, and to various select events around the world. Our attorneys became our firm’s ambassadors — my ambassadors. This had a massive impact n my ability to build a reputation in this industry. I was, after all, the leader of the Hobanites. We fostered this through annual firm retreats, which were like family reunions, but in a good way!
Also, our dedicated marketing budget and content creation strategy reached a massive audience on a daily basis. The industry as we viewed it was robust (Cannabis Industry: Hemp, Marijuana, Ancillary, and International) and had grown to be worth billions upon billions of dollars. My name and the firm’s name were out in front of everyone who wanted to look at the industry for the first time, and was well known for those already in the industry. Our professional, dedicated, consistent digital content production and promotion cemented my place in cannabis industry lore.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.bobhoban.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/bob_hoban/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/bobhoban
- Linkedin: https://linkedin.com/in/rhoban
- Twitter: @Robert_Hoban
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=robert+hoban
Image Credits
I own all photos