Originally posted on Cannabis & Tech Today.
Before Vantage Hemp Co. formed in December of 2018, the leadership team debated about where they would open their facilities.
After looking at options across Canada and the United States, they decided on Colorado.
“Colorado is well known for the cannabis and hemp industry,” says Harvinder Johal, Vantage Hemp Co. Partner. “That’s where the resources, suppliers, and customers already are. It really kind of became a natural fit.”
From their base of operations in Greeley, Colorado, Vantage Hemp Co. — a scientifically-driven CBD extractor — works with large institutional clients such as pharmaceutical companies and retailers around the country and internationally.
For the Vantage Hemp Co. team, Greeley’s biggest draw was its rich agricultural history and opportunity for the growing hemp industry.
“The Greeley City Council has a keen interest in attracting processors like ourselves to build
out the value-added side of the hemp industry,” Johal says. “Having processors like Vantage Hemp Co. located in the area creates high-skilled jobs and attracts other companies to service the hemp industry.”
Additionally, being located near academic institutions like Aims Community College enhances Vantage Hemp Co.’s commitment to researching improved agronomic practices and future extraction methods.
Today, Vantage Hemp Co. operates a 35,000-square-foot, high-volume CO2 extraction facility.
The company also recently opened a 26,000-square-foot facility with state-of-the-art technology to meet a demand for GMP compliant, high-quality, pharmaceutical-grade hemp-derived CBD extractions using hydrocarbon extraction.
The facilities support large scale winterization, in-house testing capabilities, and crystallization equipment designed to produce CBD extracts.
With these two facilities, Vantage Hemp Co. is able to process four tons of biomass per day using hydrocarbon extraction.
What’s more, the company can process one ton of biomass per day via CO2 extraction.
This is one thing that sets Vantage Hemp Co. apart.
Since many companies choose just one form of extraction, the capability to do both helps provide greater flexibility and better outcomes when processing different types of harvested biomass.
“When you look at something like full-spectrum oil or distillate, there’s going to be variety in that based on the characteristics of that hemp plant that year,” Johal says. “Depending on what our customers are looking for, we make sure we hit those requirements.”
Vantage Hemp Co. aims to be a scientifically-driven CBD extraction company that takes the unique characteristics of the hemp plant into consideration in order to produce high-quality product not only to satisfy its customers, but to bring new opportunities to its agricultural partners.
“For farmers looking to diversify from corn and soybeans, hemp is a growing opportunity,” Johal says. “We’re focused on CBD, but others may be interested in food or fiber. There’s a lot of opportunity within hemp and the industry has a strong future.”
More and more, Johal and the Vantage team see companies in the healthcare, cosmetic, or food space looking at how they can utilize CBD products.
“We want to be at the front of the line of that opportunity by providing world-class production right here in Colorado,” he says.