Today we’d like to introduce you to Shayda Torabi.
Hi Shayda, we’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
The story of RESTART CBD kicks off in November 2015, when I was in an auto-pedestrian accident where I was hit by a vehicle as a pedestrian, leaving me with two fractures in my pelvis. I was in my mid-twenties and confronted with chronic pain and navigating my recovery journey through traditional remedies, i.e. prescription medication, steroid injections, and physical therapy.
While I was utilizing those modalities, nothing seemed to give me relief without severe side effects. And eight months post-accident, I knew I couldn’t (and didn’t want to) sustain continued prescription medication, and with the pain lingering, my Doctor suggested surgery as an alternative. That was the impetus for my mother actually recommending I look into CBD.
Now in 2016, the CBD market was non-existent, it was not federally legal, there was no marketplace, and they’re certainly weren’t “experts” or shops I could go visit to inform me. So our family began an anecdotal approach. My mother started making me homemade CBD tinctures, topicals, and edibles, sourcing the CBD herself and creating what would go on to be the foundation of our formulas for later launching RESTART. Within weeks of using my mom’s homemade products, my chronic pain had subsided like no other remedy had at the time, and our family became believers of CBD.
Despite having found personal relief with CBD, again, there was no market for CBD and so while our family had become advocates, it wasn’t something we could take to market. I was working in corporate technology as a marketer, and my sister Sydney was a personal trainer. We maintained those jobs until August of 2018, when we decided to formally launch RESTART CBD in our hometown of Austin, Texas.
We originally opened up an e-commerce store, selling direct to consumers online through our website restartcbd.com. But with CBD being so new, we quickly saw an opportunity to merge into Retail and opened our first (and only) brick and mortar that we still operate today off Burnet Road. Not only did cannabis help me heal during my own journey navigating chronic pain, but we saw a huge opportunity in helping educate our community here in Central Texas by providing a safe space to educate our consumers, as well as provide high-quality CBD products.
Since launching in 2018, our product line has certainly expanded, but so has our business. We were recently name the #1 CBD shop thanks to the Austin Chronicle, and have happy customers from Austin and coast to coast.
Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
I think small business ownership is challenging enough. And running and operating a family business on top of that certainly has added difficulties to manage. But I would say the biggest struggle we face is the legality and status of cannabis. So unfortunately, that impacts us in a number of ways.
From payment merchant and processing issues to integrations with e-commerce <> our retail point of sale (POS), cannabis is still a highly stigmatized plant and its federal status, although Hemp (which all our products are derived from) is federally legal thanks to the 2018 farm bill, marijuana (a similar-looking plant, but with > .3% D9 THC) is a Schedule 1 drug, it makes banking to processing, and leveraging platforms that much more difficult. But thankfully, my background is in technology, so it’s not a deterrent; it is just an unfortunate reality of working in cannabis. Add on top of that Texas and even Austin’s specific cannabis laws, and it adds more complexity to our day-to-day operations.
Hemp was officially legalized in Texas in June of 2019, and our regulatory body, the Department of State Health Services (DSHS), in an effort to further regulate hemp, decided to put a ban on smokable hemp products, so farmers couldn’t grow hemp for smokables, processors and manufacturers couldn’t produce smokable products, and retailers (like myself) couldn’t sell smokables in the state of Texas. That includes anything from loose hemp flowers to pre-rolls to vape cartridges.
Fortunately, there was a lawsuit brought to the state when that rolled out, and the judge put a pause on the ban, so ever since that went into effect, we’ve been able to continue to sell smokables. But the lawsuit has gotten tied up, so there is still a chance that once it gets settled, smokables could be pulled from the shelves, etc. That’s just one example that as regulation settles out, we could see (and should expect) more movement of the cannabis marketplace.
Our opinion is that it is unfortunate for the consumer that as the industry matures, they’re on the short end of the stick while laws are changing. But it is what it is, and we aim to keep our customers informed of these laws changing, whether it’s at a city level, a state level, or even a federal level.
I’m personally very involved in the legislative process; I sit on the board of the Texas Hemp Coalition and do my best to keep a real-time pulse on what’s happening to not only keep our business informed but our customers so we can navigate these obstacles together as a community.
Great, so let’s talk business. Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
I am the CEO and Co-Founder of RESTART CBD, an education-first CBD wellness brand. I started the company with my middle sister Sydney in 2018, and in late 2019, our youngest sister Nika joined the family business. We are also born and raised Austinites, so extremely proud to be entrepreneurs and building our brand in our hometown!
Prior to founding RESTART, I worked in corporate technology as a marketer. Marketing and brand building is my passion. I also started to create content online on Instagram as @theshaydatorabi, which helped me build the foundation for my personal brand and platform. We are about to celebrate three years in business at RESTART, and over the last three years, we’ve accomplished some major wins. We set out to create RESTART as a safe space for our community to get educated about CBD. We originally launched as an online/e-commerce brand but quickly saw an opportunity to open a retail storefront which we still operate today.
Our product line is comprehensive, including tinctures and sublingual, to topicals, edibles, pet products, and a wide array of smokable cannabis options. We also feature lots of other cannabinoids, including Delta 8, CBN, CBG, and THCV. Everything in our store is hemp-derived (that’s what qualifies it to be legal in Texas/federally), which means our products will contain no more than .3% D9 THC. But as things have expanded, there are new cannabinoids and new products hitting the shelves all the time. We really aim to help understand our customer’s needs and guide them towards the right product, consumption method, and routine that will work best for them.
I love to public speak and have taken on the role of being very involved in our community from an event perspective, both here locally in Austin as well as nationally. I was recently voted Best Texas Hemp Educator, Influencer, and Advocate, thanks to the Texas Hemp Awards. I also started a podcast called To Be Blunt (tobeblunt.buzzsprout.com), which covers the intersection of cannabis business and marketing, interviewing industry-heavy hitters about how they’re navigating the industry. My podcast was recently featured in Austin Monthly, where I was named one of the top women podcasters in Austin.
And RESTART was also recently voted the #1 CBD purveyor thanks to the Austin Chronicle. These accolades help shine a light on the day-to-day work my team and I do to help establish ourselves as experts in this industry. I really am passionate about this plant, and my aim in life is to destigmatize, normalize, and professionalize cannabis.
The crisis has affected us all in different ways. How has it affected you and any important lessons or epiphanies you can share with us?
We were very fortunate that at a federal level, cannabis was considered essential. However, here in Austin, our retail was shut down for a few weeks, but because we had an e-commerce website already, it wasn’t a scramble for us to figure out how we were going to continue servicing our customers while our retail was closed.
Additionally, because we are a predominantly family-run business, my sisters and I were all able to put our heads together and get creative in how we were going to stay operating. One of the things we started to offer was curbside pick-up so we could still fulfill orders for our customers. And it is still a service we continue to offer today.
I think my observation was there were a lot of people who weren’t prepared to adapt or pivot to leveraging technology to help them stay informed with their customers and sell their products, so because we were already very tech-focused from launch, that was an added boost for us that we didn’t get held back by during covid. But covid is ultimately what prompted me to launch my podcast, To Be Blunt. I think while the circumstances were serious and unfortunate, it also gave me some time to step back and re-align with what my goals and journey forward were going to be. As someone who leverages her personal brand and network to market and sell her products, when in-person events were shut down, it was an opportunity for me to get creative on how to stay plugged in while isolated at home.
I’m a big believer in asking because the worst the answer could be is no. So I started asking to interview people, and some said no, but a lot said yes, and my other tip is consistency. You don’t have to be the best right away when you launch a new product, project, or menu item, etc. But being consistent in how you show up and chip away at progress on that new endeavor is the true sign.
I’m now a year + from launching my podcast, and I’ve produced over 55 episodes (1x a week every Monday!) and I’ve had incredible conversations, grown my network, and created another platform for me to leverage my authority in the industry which helps keep me informed and in the know too!
Contact Info:
- Email: theshaydatorabi@gmail.com
- Website: https://www.restartcbd.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/theshaydatorabi/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/RestartCBD/
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/restartcbd
- Yelp: https://www.yelp.com/biz/restart-cbd-austin
- Other: https://tobeblunt.buzzsprout.com/
Image Credits
Breezy Ritter Gaby Deimeke Romina Olson
