Westword
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Tommy Chong, one of America’s most beloved cannabis consumers, is in Denver for the day…and could be hanging out near you. The eighty-year-old comedian, actor and pot entrepreneur is launching a new CBD product, and will be visiting Denver dispensaries as part of the promotional push for hemp-derived CBD tinctures from his recreational cannabis company, Chong’s Choice.
On September 12, Chong’s day started at Bonfire Cannabis Company in north Denver, but he left at noon to check out other pot shops around town, according to his business manager.
The pot pioneer’s first film, Up in Smoke, debuted forty years ago, in 1978 – long before CBD was extracted from cannabis or used as a medical product, as it is today. But even then, Chong says, he knew about the plant’s health benefits. “I always had this feeling it had good qualities,” he remembers. “You know, the Chinese – my ancestors – used it for medical purposes 5,000 years ago.”
And Chong is pretty spot-on: There are reports of Chinese emperor Shen-Nug using the plant for its healing properties in 2,700 B.C.
Chong will be sharing his ganja gospel and signing autographs as he visits dispensaries, promoting the Chong’s Choice tincture line. Chong partnered with local hemp grower and CBD provider Conquest CBD on the product. According to Conquest CBD founder Brent LaGrange, Chong’s representatives reached out to him after he won first place for most potent CBD tincture at last year’s Blazer’s Cup, a cannabis competition that Chong hosts annually in California.
“We want to surround ourselves with influential and great people in this business,” LaGrange says. “This is exactly what we were looking for when we got into this.”
