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Jugheadz Juice leads the Hemp Revolution in Manchester, TN
The Jugheadz Juice story begins ten years and 100 pounds ago. That is how much time has passed and how much weight has been lost since Justin Morrison started juicing. Not steroid juicing. Juicing juicing. Carrots, cucumbers, apples, spinach, oranges. That kind of thing. “I visited my grandfather at Vanderbilt Hospital and knew that I had to get healthier,” Justin, now 33, recently recalled. “I started by quittin’ cigarettes. I was on Youtube and saw this dude was standing’ in front of a skanky lookin’ RV, juicin’ with a ol’ blender on a cardboard table, and I thought, ‘hmm…okay.’”
So Justin bought a big bag of vegetables and a used blender of his own and made mostly messes. But he didn’t give up, and along with Brittany Chapman, his longtime girlfriend, Justin became an expert juicer. “Most people who get into juicin’ quit and become our customers,” Justin grinned, referring to Jugheadz Juice, the thriving, homegrown business in Manchester that he now operates with Brittany.
But it wasn’t always a thriving, homegrown business. In the beginning, it was much more an ad hoc kind of enterprise, a hey-let’s-meet-up-in-a-parking-lot-and-swap-cash-for-a-clear-mason jar-filled-with-some-kind-of-colorful-liquid-out-of-a-cooler operation. And, if that is all it had remained, then this juicy story of fruits-n-roots capitalism to make a little leafy green would end right here. But it doesn’t. Because, on or about February of 2014, the whole world changed. At least it did for Justin and Brittany. That’s when the Agricultural Act was signed, the law that created a framework for the legal cultivation by state of “industrial hemp.” Thanks, Obama.
Justin got in line, receiving the eighth permit in the state of Tennessee to grow hemp. Since 2010, he and Brittany had been making hemp milk from Canadian seeds. “I knew it was time to take a chance,” Justin recalled, “even though for the first two years we weren’t allowed to sell anything. It was all experimental. We had a half acre of hemp in year one and two acres in 2015. Then, in 2016, the Tennessee legislature passed a law that allowed people in the hemp program to start selling legally.”
So Justin and Brittany did just that, openly marketing the various hemp milks and juices that they had been perfecting over the preceding years. Local TV took an interest, interviewing Justin about Jugheadz Juice and Hemp, the first certified kitchen in Tennessee to serve edible hemp products. Local law enforcement took an interest as well. Two days after his TV appearance, four cops pounded on his front door just after dawn, demanding to see his operation.
“Half the story of the last four years is battling the ignorance,” Brittany says. However, the ignorance is understandable as the subject is a particularly murky one. For example, until Sept. of 2018, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration classified cannabidiol or CBD, a chemical compound found in cannabis, as a Schedule I drug, no different than heroin. CBD is also the very stuff that Justin and Brittany have been merrily mixing into their juices, honey sticks and other products and openly selling for the past two years. Still, the DEA’s recent ruling only applies to CBD with a THC content below 0.1%. THC, of course, is the psychoactive cannabis compound that creates the “high.” However, according to the 2014 Agricultural Act, industrial hemp is defined as cannabis having a THC content below 0.3% and legal as long as the grower has a DEA permit and is following state regulations in an authorized pilot project. However, because of contemporary politics -- or lack thereof -- the Agricultural Act of 2014 was not extended when it expired on September 30th of 2018, calling into question whether hemp, industrial or otherwise, was back to square one. Clear yet?
While the legal situation might be dazed and confused, Justin and Brittany most certainly are not. They are too busy, focusing on their unique products. “We’re the only ones in the hemp program juicing and focusing on the raw side” Justin says. “ All the others are focusing on oils, fibers and seeds.” Brittany agrees. Jugheadz Juice uses the whole plant to make their products. The seeds go to make the milks and “nice” creams and various edibles. The buds go into juices and soups. The leaves are turned into teas. Even the roots go into butters. Currently, Jugheadz Juice offers some twenty different flavors of hemp milks and juices, flavors like Starburst, combining raspberry, peach, pineapple and hemp milk with a splash of OJ
Business is booming, but it’s completely word-of-mouth. “We never advertise,” Justin says. You can find Jugheadz Juice at the Nasvhille Farmers’ Market and at their store in Manchester.
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