( ENSPIRE Community Spotlight ) Through Outreach and Information, House of Wise Works to Inform about Cannabis and CBD While Firmly Supporting Criminal Justice Reform
ENSPIRE Contributor: Kaleigh Gabriel
House of Wise, a company out of North Carolina, provides customers with CBD and Cannabis products to provide calm and focus to those who feel they have tried everything. Founder and CEO, Amanda Goetz tells her own story of struggling as a working, single mother and how she began using cannabis and CBD products to help her deal with stress and calm her in times when going to therapy and staying physically active just wasn’t enough.
Despite all the good that a brand like House of Wise does, there is still much stigma surrounding the use of cannabis and CBD. Goetz and House of Wise feel that as a leading company of CBD and cannabis sales it is important that they work to inform people of the good that comes from cannabis and CBD while also working to support criminal justice reform surrounding the possession of such substances.
House of Wise was built on the mission statement to empower women, help them take charge of their life, their routines, and their finances by selling CBD products. House of Wise also maintains that it is important to take a stand and work towards restorative justice.
Through their partnership with the Last Prisoner Project (LPP), the House of Wise donates a portion of profits directly to an LPP grant fund for single mothers and children impacted by incarcerated cannabis prisoners. Grant recipients are then given the freedom to use funds however they need, be it for rent, utility bills, groceries, or school supplies.
What motivated your company to become involved with the Last Prisoner Project?
Even before we launched it was important to me to use my brand to become involved with criminal justice reform. The cannabis industry has a long history of inequality. Despite cannabis usage rates between whites and non-whites being similar, Black Americans are arrested for cannabis offenses at a rate of nearly 4:1, compared to people who are white.
House of Wise’s mission statement includes the goal of “dismantling stigmas around CBD and Cannabis.” How has your company worked to affect this change besides working with LPP?
Part of dismantling stigmas around CBD and cannabis bringing its use out of the shadows, sharing the stories of how successful women, mothers, daughters, neighbors are using it daily and how it has impacted their lives. I am one of those women, and my affiliate partners—Wise Women—are those women.
I started House of Wise after realizing the potential of CBD in my own life. And it was important that House of Wise had a friendly face to help more millennial women see someone like them—focused on working to “having it all” like career and family—but needing help, and finding it in CBD products. We don’t see enough female executives and moms speaking openly about their cannabis use. It’s important for me to share my story about how cannabis helped me navigate a divorce with three kids under the age of four while at the height of my career leading brand marketing for a global company. House of Wise is dismantling stigmas around CBD and cannabis through our content, earned media including profiles about who I am and why I started the brand, speaking engagements, Clubhouse sessions, conversations on our private House of Wise Slack channel, and through social media. We’re telling real stories from real users. The more we share about our experiences, the more we can normalize them and destigmatize CBD and cannabis as drugs that lead to an unproductive life, because it’s really quite the opposite. CBD can help users destress, as well as focus, and get the most out of every moment.
Given your experience, what steps can businesses take to help support reform in the criminal justice system? How can others start to become involved?
It will be imperative that we use brand platforms to share the stories of inequality. As brands build communities, those communities have power. We saw the power of the people in 2020 and it will be a brand’s responsibility to use their channels to shed light on all that is happening and take steps towards equality and justice.
Another facet of House of Wise’s business objective is to empower women and help them take charge of their own lives. The namesake of the company, Brownie Wise, serves as an inspiration to the abilities women have to work and make a name for themselves through marketing and sales. Founder and CEO Amanda Goetz explains her inspiration for naming the company after Brownie Wise stating, “Brownie Wise saw an opportunity to bring women together, empower them, provide opportunities for them to make money, and support their families after the war.”
Goetz said, “Brownie Wise was a single mom and marketing innovator who wanted to build a better life for her and her son. When she asked for more pay and a seat at the executive table, Earl Tupper fired her. He sold the company only a few short months later and Brownie got nothing. Throughout the course of history and still today, there are patriarchal societal structures that put women behind men. House of Wise is focused on helping women grow their wealth, both through the sales of our products and through ongoing education series around personal finance and the future of finance and investing.”
With a mission to inform the public of cannabis and CBD use and empower women to take charge of their lives, House of Wise is becoming a leading force in the cannabis and CBD industry. For more information on House of Wise and a listing of their products for sale, visit their website where a portion of proceeds will be donated to the Last Prisoner Project to continue on their mission of supporting criminal justice reform and reducing the stigma around substances like CBD and cannabis.
