Stewart: ‘I’m looking forward to our first collaboration together, which will offer sensible products for people’s beloved pets’

This article is more than 1 year old

This article is more than 1 year old

Canada’s huge marijuana producer Canopy Growth has recruited the lifestyle guru Martha Stewart as an adviser to help develop a line of new cannabis-based products for humans and animals, the company announced on Thursday.

Cannabis companies in Canada, including Ontario-based Canopy, have been pouring cash into their businesses to fend off competition and develop new products, especially after the country approved the use of recreational marijuana in 2017.

Canopy, the world’s largest pot producer, also has a deal with the Corona beer maker Constellation Brands for the alcohol company to invest more than $4bn in Canopy to develop various drinks.

Canopy announced Thursday’s agreement with Sequential Brands Group Inc, which owns the Martha Stewart brand of media and merchandising properties.

“I’m especially looking forward to our first collaboration together, which will offer sensible products for people’s beloved pets,” Stewart, made famous by her cooking shows in the 1990s and then infamous by her conviction for lying to federal investigators over a share trade, said in a statement on Thursday.

She currently hosts a show with the rapper Snoop Dogg, who made headlines last year for smoking a cannabis blunt in front of the White House. Stewart is also well known for championing animal rights.

Canopy has also announced plans to invest between $100 and $150m in a hemp industrial park in New York State.

Canopy’s chief executive, Bruce Linton, described Stewart’s as a “one of a kind” collaborator on Thursday, according to a Canadian news report.

The company will use Stewart’s expertise and experience in consumer products in conjunction with its aim to exploring hemp-derived CBD, a compound found in cannabis, and other cannabinoids for items for human and animals that tap into the beneficial properties other than getting high.