At a glance
Native Roots is a Colorado cannabis retailer and producer whose modern identity grew out of the state's early medical market. Its story spans caregiver-era cultivation, a large vertically integrated network, a three-founder ownership dispute, and a major 2026 restructuring that separated most of its retail stores from its cultivation operations.
From caregiver grow to dispensary network
The company dates its beginning to 2010, when a small Denver cultivation and extraction facility made medical products under Colorado's original caregiver model. It later opened a medical dispensary on Denver's 16th Street Mall and merged with The Dandelion in Boulder in 2013. Those are the brand's own documented milestones; the 2009 date sometimes associated with Native Roots belongs to Garden Club loyalty imagery, not the company history.
Three founders formed the business
Independent reporting identifies Josh Ginsberg, Rhett Jordan and real-estate developer Peter Knobel as the three people who formed the business in 2013. By 2017, Knobel's Brightstar entity held 70 percent, Ginsberg held 16 percent and Jordan held 14 percent. Native Roots' official history uses the broader phrase “founded by caregivers,” so the named-founder account comes from reporting and court records rather than current brand copy.
A large Colorado operating platform
Native Roots built The Mothership, a cultivation and manufacturing facility of more than 173,000 square feet, and historically described two grows and more than 20 Colorado locations. It also says it became the first Colorado dispensary to implement an off-premise storage-facility license for centralized distribution. These historical scale claims should not be mistaken for the post-transaction footprint described below.
Retail assortment and house production
The chain carries flower, concentrates, vapes, edibles, beverages, tinctures, topicals, accessories and CBD products from its own operations and outside manufacturers. Native Roots has used Green Label for flower and Spectra and Plant Power lines for extracts and vapes. In the 2022 710 Showdown, Spectra's East Coast Alien live-resin disposable placed first, while Jack Flash wax and a Training Day CO2 cartridge earned second-place finishes.
Medical, adult-use and delivery access
Locations have served both registered patients and adult-use shoppers, although license type varies by store. The company currently advertises recreational and medical access at four Colorado Springs stores and same-day Denver delivery through its Speer location. Store ownership, inventory and service area can change, so the location page and the Colorado license record are better authorities than an old location count.
Recognition and community work
The company's published honors include a 2022 Colorado Civic 50 designation for community involvement, workplace recognition and multiple product awards. Native Roots also publishes an impact report and says it partners with local nonprofits. Those companywide honors are distinct from blind product competitions such as the 710 Showdown and should be labeled by awarding body and year.
The founders' ownership litigation
A dispute over a proposed sale of Brightstar's interest produced an arbitration award of roughly $53 million to Ginsberg and $47 million to Jordan. In April 2024, the Colorado Court of Appeals reversed much of a trial court order that had vacated the award and remanded the case. Later reporting described further collection litigation and an appeal, so the dispute should be presented as an evolving court matter rather than a simple founder biography.
Most stores changed hands in 2026
Verdant Capital Partners completed its acquisition of 15 Native Roots dispensaries on July 31, 2026, after regulatory approvals. The stores continued under the Native Roots name. The transaction reunited the retail brand with co-founder Josh Ginsberg, now a Verdant principal, but it did not include the cultivation and manufacturing assets retained by NR ParentCo.
The cultivation model is now changing. In August 2026, NR ParentCo filed a WARN notice for the planned closure of its Denver cultivation facility at 4990 Dahlia Street and 141 layoffs effective October 2. Because that date had not yet arrived at this research cutoff, the closure is a filed plan, not a completed event. The most accurate current reading is a brand in transition: 15 stores under Verdant, separate retained operations facing a major shutdown, and older “vertically integrated” copy that no longer describes the whole network cleanly. Explore other operators in the High Rise brand directory.