Inside the first Health Canada licensed and Indigenous-owned cannabis company operating on a First Nation Territory.

Seven is a prominent number in Kanien’keha:ka (Mohawk) culture, says Dianna Tarbell. (Image by Seven Leaf, Instagram)

Tarbell is the general manager of Seven Leaf, the first Health Canada licensed and Indigenous-owned and operated cannabis company operating on a First Nation Territory.

“We’re responsible to consider in our decision making the experience and wisdom of the generations that came before us, and to have the responsibility to prepare for the futures of the generations to come.”

Seven Leaf was built with the future in mind, she says. The young workforce is made up almost entirely of members of the community of Akwesasne and promotion comes from within. Three per cent of Seven Leaf’s proceeds are also used to support youth and elders in the community through the Strong Roots North Charitable Foundation.

In January, Seven Leaf offered The GrowthOp a virtual tour of its 84,000 square foot home that was previously a water bottling plant and is now a state-of-the-art cannabis facility.

Local ironworkers and construction crews completed the work, retrofitting the entire building and turning it into a commercial growing space. Founded in 2013, Seven Leaf’s first products were listed by the Ontario Cannabis Store last year, under the brand SEV7N. A second brand line, SOVE7EIGN, will be launching later this year.

Mike Maresca, Seven Leaf’s director of operations, says there’s a gap in the Canadian market for consumers who are looking for something other than “heavy hitting indicas.”

“We feel like it’s a good opportunity for us to get into the market and give the consumer something they want,” he says.

Dianna Tarbell, the general manager of Seven Leaf. PHOTO BY SEVEN LEAF

In 2018, Seven Leaf began seeking out and growing unique cultivars, including wholesaling to other licensed producers. The company even sacrificed one of its grow rooms to store genetics and phenotypes that it plans to release in the future.

“With sativas, yields typically aren’t as high, they are harder to grow, or it’s just a lot more maintenance,” he says. “But we took on the challenge to provide the end consumer with something different.”

As he steps into a flower room, industrial fans humming overhead, Maresca says Seven Leaf is particularly excited about the upcoming release of its Strawberry Diesel x C99 cultivar.

“We’re one of the only people growing it,” he says. “It’s our baby and we’re thinking it’s going to really be a favourite when it kicks off in our SOVE7EIGN brand.”

“We have a really low turnover rate. Everyone that started here, really, we don’t have any people that leave,” he says. Pre-COVID-19, the company employed about 90 people but now it’s around 50. The majority of the company’s employees are under 40.

Kori Jackson started as a part-time team member in 2019, working in a variety of production-related roles before becoming Seven Leaf’s production materials coordinator. She laughs when asked if she thought she’d end up working in the cannabis industry.

“Not at all. I went to school for criminal justice,” she says. “But I found myself here and I’ve been here for about three years now.”

Kanienʼkehá꞉ka territory straddles both international (U.S. and Canada) and provincial (Ontario and Quebec) borders. For Jacobs, each morning she leaves the District of Tsi Snaihne (Snye) Que. , travels into New York State and then back into Canada to reach the facility on Cornwall Island, before doing the reverse trip in the evenings. In all, it takes about 45 minutes.

“That’s the majority of our employees’ daily lives,” Jacobs says. “We have to cross through customs to get to work and then go through U.S. Customs to go home.”

The trimming machine, for example, was a demo that’s been refurbished and modified to meet the company’s needs. Members of the trim team also built Seven Leaf’s bud sorter.

That hands-on work has left the team with “a really deep mechanical understanding” of the equipment they rely on, Maresca says.

“I think it’s a function of being a smaller operation and also the people that work here are extremely self-sufficient and motivated, with a huge array of different backgrounds, right from legacy growers to auto mechanics, chemistry majors and biology majors,” he says. “If something goes wrong here, someone can help fix it.”

“We have a number of people here with engineering and biology degrees that never thought they were going to be able to work at home. So this is a really important factor for us because it keeps our community whole,” she says. “If they don’t have jobs available here in Akwesasne then they are going to leave the community and go to other places.”

Before the pandemic began, Seven Leaf was routinely fielding calls and hosting tours at the facility for other First Nations who wanted to learn about their experiences and, in particular, their ability to maneuver through multiple jurisdictions.

“What we really hope is that we’re showing a path to other First Nations,” Tarbell says. “Just because we’re the first, we must not be the only. We have to make sure that other First Nations have the opportunity to have this economic development create prosperity on their territory. So we are hoping that the path that we chose will be able to show other First Nations that there is a way to do it.”

Tarbell says the company is an “open book” for other communities interested in entering the industry.

“We share with everybody because we really believe that First Nations have a role in this industry,” she says. “Legalization has taken place for three years. And you can see that cultural diversity does not just miraculously appear. People have to fight for their place and that’s where we think Seven Leaf comes in. We think the market can stand to have a different perspective.”