"The multimillion-dollar 'Forget Stoner' push featured a diverse cast of models posing in photos with the label 'Stoner' crossed out at the bottom."

"Other identities, like 'Grandmother,' 'Queen,' and 'Entrepreneur' were scrawled in instead. One image featured a uniformed police officer. Because of weed’s legal status, internet platforms like Google and Facebook, as well as most television stations, generally reject ads for it. So MedMen’s campaigns, which earned national recognition, relied heavily on billboards and radio spots... [In one ad, directed by Spike Jonze, an] interracial couple walks up their suburban driveway, carrying reusable canvas totes filled with groceries and a red MedMen shopping bag. The narrator toasts the blissful scene with the slogan, 'Here’s to the new normal.' The makers of Comedy Central’s 'South Park' [made] a parody version of the ad for an episode of the show about the arrival of recreational weed in Colorado. In Trey Parker’s and Matt Stone’s reimagining, a police officer shoots an old woman in the head, a man violates a pig in a corporate boardroom, and unmistakable cartoon depictions of Modlin and Bierman appear on-screen while the narrator intones, 'Fuck those guys.'"

From "Lavish Parties, Greedy Pols and Panic Rooms: How the ‘Apple of Pot’ Collapsed/MedMen was the country’s hottest pot startup—until it flamed out. Its fall has exposed the gap between 'green rush' hype and the realities of a troubled industry" (Politico).