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Susan Chicovsky, owner of Green Mountain Harvest, runs a team of over 50 trimmers who help trim for Colorado growers. Many thanks to House of Dankness for hosting my visit, allowing me to see the GMH team in action.
Green Mountain Harvest, which has been in operation since 2010, employs workers ranging in age from 21 to 79 and many of Susan’s workers are Baby Boomers. She takes good care of them, making sure that they are all covered by worker’s compensation insurance as employees. Colorado law mandates that trimming workers must be W2 employees rather than contractor labor. However, there are several illegal trim operations in Colorado that don’t follow the rules and treat their trimmers as though they were 1099 contractors.
GMH also takes care to only work with growers who produce high-quality products. Early on, GMH took a trimming job where the buds were covered in powdery mildew. Three of Susan’s workers had to go to the emergency room from exposure to the mildew. Needless to say, that grow operation is no longer a client. Susan doesn’t want to expose her workers to contaminated flower ever again.
I met Susan on a sunny day outside of House of Dankness. After signing in and getting a visitor badge, we went back to the trimming area to meet the team.
A dozen trimmers were set up in a dedicated trimming room that was kept isolated from contamination. All the workers wore gloves, aprons, hair/beard nets, and/or hats to avoid getting any hair or other contaminants into the product. The crew works at only one location per day in order to avoid cross-contamination between different grow operations.
Business is booming for GMH, and they are booked at least two months in advance. Susan is hiring new workers as fast as she can vet them. She hired nine new folks in the past week and is looking for more experienced trimmers to join the team. If you are looking for work or know anyone who is, drop her a private message.
After visiting the trimmers, we took a tour of the dispensary, which was elegantly designed. One wall is dedicated to shelves containing the numerous awards that House of Dankness has won since they started in 2010. Adjacent to the awards wall is a section featuring some stunning glasswork available for sale. Several of the pieces cost thousands of dollars with the most expensive one clocking in at $20,000. The pipes and bongs alone were works of art, worth a visit just to see them in person. I asked Austin, the budtender, for a recommendation of what to purchase and he sent me home with an eighth of their Star Killer OG, which comes packed in nitrogen cans to preserve freshness.
The final part of the visit gave me an opportunity to see a rosin press from Sesh-Technologies Manufacturing(stm). Susan recently partnered with stm to offer rosin-pressing services to her clients, and stm brought their stm 4.0 Rosin Press to House of Dankness to show it to the staff and answer their questions. Jessica from stm showed the ins and outs of the press. The press weighs in at a hefty 500 lbs. and requires a dolly to move around. It can process up to 30lbs of plant per day and is fully automated, meaning that you can program in parameters and then let it work. No more accidentally pressing for too long and ruining your product. The press is also fully OSHA compliant; the pressing area is shielded on three sides by polycarbonate and the front section has an infrared light sensor that shuts off the press if anything enters the pressing area. Unfortunately we didn’t have a 220V outlet available to see the press in action, but I did make plans with Jessica to visit their facility and get a view of the full process.
Thanks again to House of Dankness, GMH, and stm for being generous with their time. If you’re ever in Denver, make sure to stop by House of Dankness and enjoy their expertly trimmed flower.
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