This summer, Higher Origins is teaming up with Mendo Mystic to pilot new ways for legacy growers to connect directly with consumers at Reggae on the River. It's one of California’s most iconic cannabis-friendly music festivals, running since the 1980s. For many legacy farmers, it was a place where cannabis culture, community, and music came together long before legalization, and Mendo Mystic was one of them.
We sat down with Cindy Browning, who co-owns Mendo Mystic with her husband Tony.
Hi Cindy! Thanks for joining us! We can’t wait to work with you at Reggae this year. We’d love to hear how you got started in the cannabis industry!
We are super excited to bring our brand full circle. We grew up together at Reggae- raising our family on the ideals of unity, community, love, and of course - the herb. It was where we first heard the words Legalize it and Never Give In.
Tony and I started dating in 1990 in January- he took me to my first Reggae later that year in August. I immediately felt at home at the festival - the people, vibes, and music- everything coming together in great unity.
Cindy and Tony at Reggae
From that day forward we treated Reggae as if it were a vacation. We always planned at least two weeks at the river, and each year it was a different experience. In the early years we camped in the parking lot, and then later on we stayed at the Benbow RV camp ground. If you haven’t taken the shuttle from Benbow to Reggae, you’ve missed out on a wild journey! As the years went by we got much better at planning for the festival and would book weeks in advance to get a spot at the Oak Flat camp ground or Richardson Grove. You just never knew who you’re going to meet at Reggae. That was the greatest thing about the festival- the friends we made and continued to meet at the river. Other great memories are of floating the river, as well as the food and the bonfires.
One year we were camping at Benbow and this huge bus came pulling in. They quickly parked and set up their camp. I recall us dreaming about how someday we would roll up like that. Then the bus came alive with music and it was rockin! You could hear all the partying going on! When the folks finally popped out with their hands full of mojitos, they immediately offered us a drink and invited us over. It was Danny Glover and his friends and family! I remember at Reggae’s that followed, we were able to drive right backstage with them.
Cindy and friends meeting Reggae legend Paton Banton
My daughter Crystal was I believe 3 or 4 when we took her for the first time. She always found friends there. Her favorite thing was to run around with her water guns, cooling folks off as they passed by our canopy, and the glow sticks of course! My son Matt was 2 months old for his first Reggae. We would just set him up in a camping chair and he was happy to be along for the ride. Back then you could just motion to the folks to the side of you (that literally you have only known for a day) and say “Hey can you watch him for a minute, I will be right back!” The festival community was always supportive like that.
The vibe of Reggae was different back then. One time we rolled up to camp in the parking lot and, well, we had already started enjoying ourselves, if you know what I mean. We got out of the truck and started into the festival, and about an hour went by when all the sudden we were like, “Hey did we even close the truck doors?” We went back and yep! Sure enough we had left them wide open: cameras, pounds of cannabis, mushrooms, and even our cash still sitting in the seat. Nobody had stolen it!
I remember that at the beginning of the trailhead there were always people set up selling or giving away all kinds of stuff: you could find everything from homemade brownies to handmade jewelry, and a whole lot of colorful characters in between.
Are there any specific artists from Reggae that you really enjoy, or you think that really captured the feeling of the event for you? (Author’s note- for me, seeing Jimmy Cliff was unforgettable, also one year there was this guy called Gentleman who delivered an incredible mood).
Songs like Helicopters by Rod Deal and the I-deals really captured the feeling of the time, when people were really living in fear of losing their homes for growing the herb. Pato Banton’s songs Legalize It and Never Give In are still in our hearts today as we trudge forward with growing our legal brand. We spent year after year dancing all night to big names like Third World, Steel Pulse, Michael Franti, Alborosie, the Marley’s, and Natalie Rise. The DJ’s would always keep the party going at the South Stage until the early morning.
What is your background, and how did that evolve into where you are today growing under the Mendo Mystic brand?
I was born in Willits, California. My father was the head sawyer at the local mill and we lead a pretty simple country life. I tried cannabis for the first time in my early teens and I’ve been smoking ever since. Tony and I met in the late 1980’s and we first started dating in 1990. I was always immersed in cannabis. My friends and their parents all grew- it was just a thing that everyone did in the area.
Tony was born in Hollywood and his father was a movie producer and his mother is a glass artist. Tony is a carpenter and artist, he makes beautiful woodturned bowls and saggar fired pottery.
Tony started growing and using cannabis when he was pretty young and living with his mother in Sunland. It was very illegal at the time and so it was underground and you had to know where to get it. Tony remembers getting pot from the Hot Dog stand on Zuma beach. Tony moved to Willits in the 70’s and bought the farm in 1986.
I remember when Tony brought me up to his property (our current farm), and after showing me around he asked, “Well, do you see my plants?” I said “No, you have plants?” Although I knew he smoked because we had already smoked together. Well, he points up- and there they were, hanging hidden in the tree tops!
I remember the first time that I heard the helicopters. Tony had taken me up the the property and I quickly turned it from a bachelor pad into a home. One day he went to work, and I stayed at home. He had some plants he was sexing out in the yard where the helicopter could see them. Talk about freaking out! I was running around trying to hide the plants out of sight. Later on I learned to not worry as much about the sound of helicopters when I realized that we are located right in a flight path.
At one point back then Tony went from growing in the trees to growing in remote areas deep in the woods, far from prying eyes. We just couldn’t risk losing our property back then- and it was commonplace for the authorities to take your land away if they raided you. Tony would throw on the backpack, load it with plants and poly pipe, and be gone all day out in the woods.
Yeah, the fear of raids was real back in the guerilla days, we’ve heard the same from friends, neighbors, and other farmers. Did you ever have any near misses with the helicopter raids?
I remember once we had a major shake down. I was out in the yard, it was a beautiful day. I had a worker up helping me out, and Tony was at work. You could hear the helicopters echoing through the canyon. I quickly went back to the house, and the roadways were loaded. People and farmers in a panic to get to their patches before the feds. I looked out from my house and I could see the main road being blocked with many white trucks, and a helicopter was parked on the road. It was really going down!
My worker took off, they wanted nothing to do with it. I was left in a total panic. I called Tony, and he said “Cut them down! I’m headed home!” It was all a blur. I just remember being saturated in sweat, sitting in my living room with a pile of plants, and I mean a pile. Back then the plants were so big it was like we grew trees, because you needed to get that 100 pounds or more out of your crop. I had the doors locked and was sitting in panic. I didn’t want to go to jail. What about the kids? We didn’t get busted that year. I thank the Lord for that one.
A CAMP helicopter in the Emerald Triangle (Image via CLMP / Humboldtareaarchive)
Wow! That’s so sketchy, we’re also very glad you didn’t get busted! It seems like it was always pretty random who they chose to target for raids. So after that pre-legalization period, how did you adapt as the industry slowly started to legalize?
When Prop 215 came into play, we finally started developing a site to hold 25 plants, which is what you could easily get a recommendation for. For a mere $100, all you had to do is go in and say it helped you sleep, or calmed your anxiety, and BAM, it was legal to grow 25 plants! I remember at the time prices per pound were still good- not as good as the guerilla grow days. I remember getting $4,500-$5,000 a pound. We’d send it out and the return always helped keep things going at home. It afforded us a lifestyle where we could support our family, give them the best opportunities, and increase the amount of time we spent with them.
From there our farm seemed to grow and grow. Under the Mendocino County Sheriff’s program in 2016 we had permission to grow 100 plants. That was a hard year, but we dug in deep and did more development to make the grow sites bigger. Some years we would harvest and I wouldn’t get done trimming the crop until the next season. One year I think I had 2 weeks total without the tray in my lap. I was blessed to have my daughters help! When we say family owned and operated we mean it. Our kids grew up immersed in the industry. My son Matt has been a big part of the process, helping with branding, harvesting, compliance, at times just holding our hand. We are super proud of him. With his Higher Origins website he is a big supporter of small farms. We started doing light deps right before and during the sheriff’s program. By that time it seemed like prices were around $2,500-$3,000 a pound if you had something really premium.
Prior to legalization our flower always seemed to find fans far beyond California. We sold out quickly. We grew strains like Sweet Tooth, Bubba pre-98, Stinky Pinky, Kosher Dawg, Blue Cheese, and AK-47. Man, those turkey bag days were the best of times!
We have grown non stop every year since 1986!
Currently we grow about 150 plants on a 5,000 square foot permit. We are OCal certified, meaning our inputs meet standards comparable to organic food production. We also use sustainable packaging, with jar tops and tubes that are 90-day compostable. Our flower has been testing clean since 2015. Our best-selling strains this season are Jack Mormon and Mystic Lights. Mystic Lights is a sativa-dominant strain we first bred on our farm about 17 years ago, and Jack Mormon is a newer addition, both cultivated under the Mendocino sun using organic methods.
Some of the beautiful flowers at Mendo Mystic
Thank you for telling us your story! We’ve got a few more quick questions for you! What do you think is more important- genetics or growing skills?
Genetics and appellation play a big role in the plant produced, but it’s up to the grower to be able to cultivate different genetics consistently.
What are the most important skills a grower should have?
Patience. There are a lot of unknowns in cannabis, you have to be tough enough to take the punches, and be as prepared for sudden events as much as you can. If you can’t handle a bad year, or a few, you might be in the wrong industry.
The legal market was advertised as safer for growers- have you found that to be true?
It’s been safer in some ways than others. It’s less violent and sketchy, but the days of fighting against over-regulation haven’t left us, so now our fear is no longer death by violence, but bankruptcy due to some obscure paperwork deadline that nobody bothered to tell us about.
If you had the cash to expand your farm, would you? Why or why not?
We’d like to keep it small, as we’re getting on in years, so we need to focus on making the farm we have more manageable and reducing the energy required to run it. We’d prefer to use the cash to increase the efficiency of our current space over expanding it. Scaling up would just make it harder to focus on the plants, and even if we had the cash, the headache of getting an expansion approved with all the regulations would be too stressful.
What’s the most unique or brag-worthy thing about your farm ?
Once upon a time our farm used to be part of Seabiscuit Ranch, home of the legendary racehorse. We’ve been cultivating at this site since the beginning, and our process has been pretty finely tuned to work right in this environment, we’re very adapted to our appellation. We’re positioned on top of a ridge overlooking both Willits & Redwood valley so we get great sun, and we get coastal air influence as the fog rolls in from Fort Bragg.
Tony up in the trees!
If you could snap your fingers and make one change to cannabis law, what would it be?
Allow farms to ship directly to consumers, it’d allow us to have a more sizable audience so we’re not competing with our fellow legacy farms. There’s clearly demand for everything being grown in our area but it has to be filtered through distributors which make it hard to actually sell.
Because farms can’t sell directly to consumers, we often lose both income and connection to the people who love our flower. Most of the margin goes to middlemen, and many small farms don’t survive long enough to build their brand.
Is there a celebrity involved in cannabis who you respect?
I’ve always thought Matthew McConaughey was pretty cool, he should start a dispensary!
What would you describe your farm's target market to be?
Anyone who enjoys premium small-batch craft flower, because our genetics are so strong they don’t need to be distilled.
If you could bring back one element of the industry from when you started, what would it be?
$3,500/lbs!
Despite all the obstacles to success in this industry, what keeps you moving forward?
We’ve always wanted to make something of this industry, after doing it for 4 decades what else are you supposed to do? We’ve made this far as a small family farm, and chances are we'll still be around and flourishing in the future. It’s who we are.
Tony and Cindy with another successful crop!
Want to try Mendo Mystic flower or meet the team in person? Visit us at Reggae on the River this summer (Aug 1st-3rd) or follow along on Higher Origins to learn more.
