Understanding Terpenes: The Unsung Heroes of Cannabis

Different plants, different voices, and different ways of having conversations.

It's time to get personal with plant medicine. Welcome to Getting Personal with Plant Medicine. I'm your host, Diana, and today I am joined by Eric Mercado from Turpley. How are you doing today, Eric? I'm doing wonderful, Diana. Thank you so much for having me. Thank you for being here. And like I said, offline for being so patient and flexible. It took a long time to get here, but we're here.

So today we're going to talk about terpenes. And even though they're in a lot of different plants and they're a very big part of plant medicine, something that I just learned a few years ago myself, today we're going to focus on how they impact cannabis and people's personal use of cannabis. So could you give a quick explainer of terpenes for our listeners?

Absolutely. And to give you some insight into my background, I also just learned about terpenes a few years ago, and it's sort of the genesis of our entire business. So you don't have to feel alone in not knowing what they are. The super high level is that they're unsaturated hydrocarbons in organic matter. That is a long-winded way of saying something similar to an essential oil.

I think you drink your chamomile tea or when you were in high school and you were going to go take your SAT and they told you to chew peppermint gum during your SAT. Smelling lemons for nausea. Smelling lemons for nausea or I love I happen to love lavender. I drink lavender lattes because they curb the level of anxiety that that much caffeine can give me. Those are really the essential components of what a terpene is.

And when found in cannabis, they're found more prevalent than most organic matter. So terpenes end up being a driving component to the effects that individuals feel when they do consume.

Perfect. I love that. That was a great explanation. I should say I've always known about them in some type of a way, but I think we're all collectively learning more and more as we learn more about plant medicine as a whole.

I'm saying we, I'm broad stroking here, but I think that terpenes are really interesting because there's so much that we still don't know, you know, but also things that we do know in everyday life that we don't even realize about them. So can different terpene profiles help tailor cannabis treatment for specific medical conditions? Anxiety or pain like you just mentioned with lavender? Yeah, definitely.

And lavender has been, or linalool, as it's known as a terpene, has been a very important component for my own medical benefits. What I've found is that there are very particular terpene profiles that can help certain types of people. It also depends on what other underlying medical conditions you might have. And all of that is driven by what's called your endocannabinoid system. It's your body's reaction to particular terpene and cannabinoid profiles.

A really good example is when I was consuming back at my old job before I started TerpLate, I was consuming most commonly for pain relief, stress relief, and anti-anxiety. That was really the core components for why I was using cannabis on a regular basis. I was working 100-hour weeks. I had a nerve condition down the back of my neck, mostly because I was working in an audit room as a gremlin with terrible posture for way too long.

So what I was really focused on is how can I relieve this stress? How can I help myself sleep at the end of the night? There was an astronomical shift in the chemical makeup of products during that timeline. Mostly what was happening is all of that product, granted, I was consuming in Texas, which means I was sort of subject to whatever products came to us on the illicit market. And most of it was truthfully coming out of California.

And there was a shift in the way that producers were producing products. It was a focus more so on high THC and hybrid products. Most of the products that exist on the market right now are not traditional Indicas or traditional Sativas. Everything's a hybrid. Not only that, the naming conventions are essentially made up across the supply chain. It's very, very difficult to get quality control to the umpteenth level to where you actually trust the products that you're consuming.

So that's what makes those chemical compounds even more important for your consumption, especially on the medical side. What I found is that products became higher and higher in THC, which also were higher and higher in a... Terpene called limonene, which is predominantly found in like 11 games. For you, your favorite. For me, high THC, high limonene means anxiety for some reason.

I don't know what it is about my endocannabinoid system, my biochemistry, but whenever I consume a high limonene product, I tense up, I get overstimulated and actually become anxious and it counteracts all the positive benefits that I was seeking.

That's just depending on my particular body. And what was happening is all the products that were coming over the border, those were super high and limiting because they were trying to achieve a higher THC level because that's what people were shopping for. It wasn't until after I understood more about terpenes, more about minor cannabinoids and actually trapped that consumption in what's called a COA. A COA is a certificate of analysis.

That is the chemistry reporting that's supposed to be required for all cannabis products. Some folks test for terpenes and cannabinoids in those. Some do not. There's certain markets where it's regulatorily required. Others, it's too expensive, like a Colorado, unfortunately, where I am. Not a lot of people actually test for terpenes because it's very expensive. They do here in Maryland, I should note.

Maryland, one of my favorite markets. Not only is it required to test for terpenes, you actually have to have the top three terpenes posted on every single product. Yes. That's why we love Maryland. Maryland and Nevada are our two favorites because it's so readily available and customers actually care about it. So... All that to be said, to circle back to your question, when it comes to treating particular ailments, medical conditions, it's very difficult for us as a retail service, right?

Because that's really what Terpleat does is the ability to recommend products online based off of that terpene and cannabinoid profiles.

It's difficult for us to say this is going to be good for anxiety. It's good for post-cancer treatment nausea because it opens that door to liability. And what if it's wrong? What if your body is different? Now those retailers are subject to a little bit different risk. What we are able to do is empower customers to track on their own by providing the information.

It wasn't until after I started paying attention to terpenes and those COAs that I discovered linalool was that driving force for me to actually be able to sleep, be able to relax. And it's a terpene that I almost exclusively search for. Wow. It also depends on your underlying medical conditions. My co-founder, Peter, is very openly very ADHD here. What he's found is a terpene-like pinene, which is normally associated with things like focus, energy, and the ability for other folks to work.

I consume something high in pinene, I'm stabbed in the heart with an adrenaline needle. I'm cleaning the house. I'm doing everything that I want to do, which is awesome. For him, because he's ADHD, that effect is actually reversed. So he smokes something heavy and pinene. He's nice. He's relaxed. He can actually sleep. So it very much depends on your individual biochemistry.

Yes, that is really interesting. For me, for a long time, I thought that limonene was something I had to use later in the day or at night. And for me, it was actually waking me up. So... Or I shouldn't say it was waking me up. It was doing the opposite. I'm flipping it and reversing it because you said the pinene. The sativas, like sometimes I'll get a sativa because it's high in limonene, but only because of that. And I can use it later in the day and be okay.

But if I use pinene too late in the day, then I'm up really late pretty much. And I also realize that for different things, like you said, And for migraine relief, for me, limonene works really well. But also linolue. Linolue. I'm not saying that correctly. All of them are hard. There's humilene. There's osamine. Linolue. Myrcene. Yes, I love myrcene. They didn't choose great names. Myrcene, that's in mango, found in mango. You know, that's an interesting fact that a lot of people don't realize.

I mean, that's a good place to start when you're talking about terpenes and cannabis and how that intersects because the terpenes and mango can enhance your mercine cannabis experience or cannabis that has high mercine in it, I should say. And a good a good starting point for many folks if they do. Like the idea of essential oils. Some people submit to this helps or doesn't help. Some people are skeptical. Some people love them.

If you look at the back of your shampoo bottle, I can almost guarantee that there's caryophylline in it or Myrstein or almost 90% I've seen linalool in there because it is that essential oil. It's why when you're in the shower and you're lathering up your hair, you feel amazing. You feel clean. You feel relaxed. Mostly that's because these have been used for a long, long time. Essential oils, candles, anything that has a scent or aroma, your house smelling good.

These are all things that we've discovered decades, centuries ago that have been leveraged for the betterment of the human experience, for pain relief, for relief from things like headaches and other things medically that are just now being discovered in cannabis products, mostly because the medical research has been limited until now.

Still very limited across the country, but it's starting to open up and we're realizing that not only do terpenes have a massive effect, but minor cannabinoids also have a massive effect. Absolutely. I mean, I'm even seeing on social media a lot that people are lighting candles that smell like lemon or, you know, lighting incense that might smell a little bit more like pine. They're really making it a multisensory experience with the terpenes.

And so to that point, could you expand a little bit more on how the aromas and flavors associated with terpenes play a role in the person's response to cannabis? Yeah, I think it is a multi-sensory experience, as you mentioned, where if I can... Just like I'm lathering up my hair in the shower, I love smoking and then showering. I think that's a really good example where you smoke a J, you go take a shower, and all of a sudden you're a completely new person.

So the multisensory nature of it is one component. The focus on the terpenes themselves is that it is beyond just an aroma. Your endocannabinoid system does have a chemical reaction to the introduction of those terpenes into your body it can be via aroma but when you smoke a terpene all of a sudden it has a very much exacerbated effect so it is a much stronger effect than just the inhalation through or i'm than just the smelling of a terpene profile.

Very interestingly, that changes drastically for things like edibles. Many people believe that terpene content does have a lasting effect for edibles. However, the way that your body digests, it actually burns off the vast majority of the terpene profile that's present. So distillate edibles in theory should react similarly to a rosin or resin edible.

For myself, and I don't know if this is a placebo effect or if it is the ideology of a full spectrum entourage effect with trace amounts of cannabinoids in edibles, which do stay in your system even when it's consumed through your stomach. They have a much greater impact for myself. I get very anxious when I consume distillate edibles, no matter what strength it is, I get very anxious.

So it really does matter that it is through your olfactory that you smell it, that you've inhaled it and you've digested and it's been processed in your lungs and or that it's processed in your stomach as well. More topically, not to cut you off, but coincidentally, I have a flyer on my desk right here from a brand called Cancestra, which we've spoken about before. And the founder is going to be on a future episode or past episode, depending on when you're listening to this.

Anyway, their topicals are formulated so intentionally. They include terpenes. And it says right here, naturally found in plants, these powerful compounds activate the entourage effect, which we're going to talk about in a second, and allow CBD and other botanicals to synergize, playing a key role in unlocking many health benefits. So even topically, you know, or transdermally, however you're using it.

Terpenes really do play an effect. For the entourage, entourage effect. So let's talk about the entourage effect, because every time I try to talk about it with someone who doesn't know, I have a hard time keeping their attention because I don't know, as you said, the whole high THC component can be a little bit of a challenge because sometimes consumers are only focusing on that instead of the entourage effect.

So can you talk about why it's so important to have a customized wellness plan that includes your own personalized terpene profile and how that plays into the entourage effect? Yeah, absolutely. So to give some high level on what the entourage effect is, it's the ideology that it is beyond just THC or even CBD, which are the two most common components that people are extracting out of these products and utilizing for medical or recreational benefit.

What the entourage effect says is that it is the full spectrum of all of the terpenes, major cannabinoids, and minor cannabinoids that come together to produce a particular effect. That is because of your body's reaction based off of your endocannabinoid system. I think a good comparable, just to make it a little bit more of approachable of an idea, is actually alcohol.

Not that we'd love to be compared to alcohol in cannabis, but I think it is a valuable comparable that many people are able to really, really share at least an experience with. When I'm consuming wine, I'm not taking a shot of a hunt. I'm not taking Everclear shots because Everclear shots, one, way too strong. Two, there's a certain component of the type of effects that you are looking for, even within alcohol.

Wine is a much more relaxing experience. Even the categorization of tannins within wine is a different experience, different taste profile, different flavor profile, does have terpenes in it as well. So there are drastic differences to the types of alcohol that you consume, the way that you consume that alcohol, and the strength level of that alcohol. So many, many people are really looking for a much more moderate and approachable experience to cannabis consumption.

When you have solely a distillate, that's 90% THC. It's way too strong, it's overwhelming, and it reduces a lot of the medical benefits that you can get from cannabis products. That entourage effect is all of these different components coming in holistically. If we want to talk about holistic health, extraction isn't necessarily the best way of having holistic health. So that entourage effect is all of these chemical compounds coming into play.

Being interpreted and understood and then digested based on your system and your body and eliciting that effect.

I want to just cut in really quickly and just kind of piggyback on what you said, because when you brought up wine, I just started envisioning how, you know, I don't really drink anymore, but back when I did go to vineyards and things like that for festivals and whatnot, there is a local one in particular that really does give you like a multi-sensory experience they make chili with their wine and they have you know pieces of chocolate for you to eat for certain ones before

you eat it or fruit before you eat drink you know before you drink a certain type of sangria or what have you whatever they're you know they're matching it with or like this is what we used for this and then they have music so you're relaxed and it is really when you think about it something like that is kind of a good illustration of the entourage effect.

Even if you don't drink, you can kind of envision how tasting the chocolate before you take a sip of the wine to bring out the certain flavors and also the benefits to your system because certain people have preferences, right? And then you've got kind of the atmosphere taken care of in a way, which kind of like helps your brain relax a little bit. I don't know. I just think that's kind of a good way to kind of explain what the entourage effect is for me in my head just now.

I just wanted to throw that out there. And usually it's complementary benefits as well. They say red wine is good for your heart. Right. So is dark chocolate. Yes. Go figure. And your brain. Those are something that are paired very often in order to draw out. And those are things that have been paired together for a thousand years.

Yes. This isn't new. And I think that's an important component is that none of this is actually new, even though it's something we're finally starting to understand a little bit better. Absolutely. It's really nothing new. But trying to explain it to people who've even been using cannabis for decades upon decades, probably some of them even longer than I've been alive, just look at me like, why should I care about this?

So I think that it is a little bit of an uphill battle trying to explain this in a way that is accessible, but you did a great job of doing that. So I appreciate that. So talk a little bit about how Terpley can help people create their own wellness plan.

Absolutely. So the general idea of what Terpley is, is that we are a AI bud tender. When we refer to ourselves as an AI bud tender, what that means is that we sit on top of a cannabis retail experience, primarily online, but whether it's online or in the store. And we provide effect-based recommendations for shoppers.

The genesis of that recommendation is focused on those COAs, the underlying certificate of analyses, more specifically, the terpenes and cannabinoids that are present in those products. As I mentioned before, an important component is that there is very little benchmarking in cannabis products right now for naming conventions, as well as Indica-Sativa hybrid designations.

Not to disparage producers or retailers, but there's many times a lack of quality control in what products are being produced. Not to say that they're unsafe, but they may be drastically different than what I named them. For wine, I can't call a Bordeaux a Bordeaux unless it's from Bordeaux. Same with champagne. There's benchmarks for what types of grapes are present and whether I'm actually allowed to call it that product or not.

And there's actually a governing body that tells you whether you can call it a new name or not within the wine community. That doesn't exist yet in cannabis. We can call products whatever we want. It's kind of like the point system. And have you ever seen whose line is it anyways, Diana? Where it's all made up and the points don't matter. That is essentially the way that we've approach cannabis naming conventions. There's changes along the supply chain of what a product is called.

I can basically go in at the end of the day, and if it's not selling well, smell it, call it a different name, change the name, and hopefully sell it now. It happens all the time within the ecosystem. So what we're trying to do is create a level of transparency for the end consumer that they actually trust what is in their product.

So what we've done is we've not only analyzed all of the COAs, we actually know what the terpid and cannabinoid content is for all of the products that are on the shelf right now, regardless of naming convention. We know what the chemistry is. And what we've done is we've matched that chemistry with user reviews, both public and private user reviews.

So you've got public reviews like a Leafly, for instance, not to disparage the company, but fairly low quality in terms of the review criteria that's being leveraged. It's aggregated at the strain name level. It's aggregated nationally. Sometimes it's not time-gated. So according to Leafly, the blue dreams being consumed by me here in Colorado right now is the same exact blue dreams from Humboldt County, California, a decade ago.

It can't be true. No conditions are different. Phenotypes have changed. Yeah. And truthfully, those products, since there is no convention for naming, I can call it whatever I want. So customers are getting a very inconsistent experience, and we're breaking that consumer trust, especially in areas where there's a lot of canicurious. Yes. They're skeptical. Well, and also, again, sorry not to cut you off,

but just what you touched upon a point about the names. And I think focusing on the profile is so much more important because some people really have an issue with these names. I mean, I don't really pay that much attention, to be honest. I pay attention to what the effects are. So, you know, I try to keep track myself. And, you know, Terpley is a great tool. So definitely check that out if you haven't. But the names can really throw

people off. Like they don't want to go in and say like, oh, I want OG Kush face or whatever. They don't like to say these words. And it's like, well, don't. What is don't focus on that? Right. What is Cheetah Pit? Right. I mean, OG name. Yeah. People in the industry for a long time know what that is. But if I am a 55 year old mother of three shopping in Arkansas medically right now, I'm not going to buy green crack. I saw one the other day called Two Unicorns, One Poop. What does that mean?

What is that going to do for me as a person? So many times we're actually shooting ourselves in the foot by creating naming conventions that are more confusing than they are helpful. Absolutely. So what we've done is we've augmented that public review set with private reviews baked directly into the process of our tool that allow customers to keep their own journal within Terpley.

So it pulls their purchase history from the point of sale so they can only leave reviews on products that they've actually purchased. We leverage amazing partnerships with the likes of an Alpine IQ or a Spring Big to reward customers with rewards points for leaving those reviews. And now I have a firm understanding of Diana's endocannabinoid system, how she's reacted to products previously, and I'm able to hyper-personalize her future recommendations.

That's so amazing. I love that. I can see. Diana loved this linalool product. She's rated five different linalool products highly for sleep. Even if you didn't know, we have indicators within our recommendation flow of what is in these products, but you don't actually have to pay that much attention. It's great if you do. So it is able to bridge the gap between a novice consumer and a can of sore. If they want to pay a whole lot of attention, they can. If they don't, it will do this for them.

I know that Diana responds positively to lindaloo products for relaxation and sleep. So now you come in, that product that you love, that you just bought, had that chemical profile, but now it's out of stock. That happens all the time, no matter how mature or immature the market is. Instead of giving you a random indica, it's going to match you to a product that is chemically the same or similar as a previous experience you've already rated highly.

So the tool learns and adapts with each end consumer, modifying future recommendations based off of previous positive or negative experiences. That learning component, that really makes it your personal butt tender. That's awesome. I love that. But so before we end, how can people support Terpley and you and where can they find you? They can find us in 20 different states, which is very, very exciting.

We're a small team. So 20 states is a huge, huge advancement for us and accomplishment for our team. Um, so ask your local dispensary if they've heard about Turpley is the best way that you can support us. Use Turpley if you find a dispensary that is nearby. If you go to our website, which is turpley.io, you can see a banner of all of the different dispensaries that we operate in.

We are working on the ability for customers to navigate if they want to, not to say that we're trying to take away that customer, but being able to, Hey, where can I go find a tool like this is an amazing way to empower customers on that journey. So ask your local dispensary, start shopping for terpenes. That's a big one.

Pay attention to what your body reacts to positively, and then seek out tools that are able to empower you through that journey. Absolutely. Because honestly, sometimes when people say they have a bad experience with cannabis, it really comes down to the terpenes. And I really think that the more we focus on that, the more we're going to all be having great experiences, hopefully.

That's the goal. That's the goal is to give each individual the level of experience and the trust in their product that they're consuming for this to be positive. There's so many negative experiences on the medical side of things, especially with pharmaceuticals, sometimes with alcohol. We want this to be a positive and healing experience for each individual. But every person is different. So their recommendations should follow suit. Absolutely.

And once again, we'll just say that terpenes are not just specific to cannabis. So, you know, just try to find out a little bit about how that impacts your plant medicine wellness plan. And I think that it'll benefit you in the long run, right? So thank you again so much for spending time with me today. And I learned a lot and I hope to have you back sometime. Wonderful. Thank you, Diane. I appreciate you having me on. This podcast has been a product of Your Highness Media.

Each episode is written, produced, and edited by Your Highness Media. Music.