Editor’s note: Think Local is sponsored content written by Collegian staff members. Additionally, we have corrected where Top Shelf CBD is located in Manhattan. We apologize to Top Shelf CBD and to our readers for this incorrect information.
Located on the northwest side of Manhattan is the city’s newest CBD shop, Top Shelf. The store opened its doors in April and is locally owned and operated by Ray Hanning and Jeremy Meek.
The two went from friends sitting on the bus together in middle school to business partners. Meek developed an interest in CBD after writing a paper while he was a student at Kansas State.
“I wrote the paper a long time ago,” Meek said. “I was going to write about cannabis, sativa and the medical values it has, and I ran across the CBD looking up articles. So I decided to write it about that and I have always been interested in it.”
Meek said after visiting Holland and stopping into European coffee shops, he decided to start a similar coffee shop back in Kansas. European coffee shops sell CBD products, Meek said, and he had to wait for CBD legalization in America. He also needed to wait for the public’s reaction to CBD to turn positive before pursuing his dream of starting the shop.
“I have worked in social service my whole career till about 2018 when it passed,” Meek said. “I was waiting and watching to see how it was going to go or if it was going to be terrible or not. And it’s not, and it was the right time in our lives, and we talked, and I was like, ‘Do you want to do this?’ and he was like, ‘Sure, all right.’ So we decided to take the plunge.”
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One day, when Hanning called Meek after a tough week of work and told him it was time to “figure something out,” the pair committed to starting Top Shelf.
“We don’t consider it medicine — it’s just CBD,” Hanning said. “So we are big on the educational side, beyond people coming in saying they want anything … we have a lot of customers that come in that are for just the wellness side,” Hanning said.
Hanning and Meek want their customers to be aware of the different benefits and aspects of the strains and products they offer.
“[CBD is] non-psychoactive, so it can’t get you high or anything like that, but it has to have endocannabinoids in our system that humans have and so it’s really great for the body,” Meek said. “It’s an anti-inflammatory, it’s an anti-cancer, it just does a lot to help us sleep.”
Top Shelf offers a variety of deals for the Manhattan community.
“We have discounts we give daily if you are a first responder, fire, police, military, teacher, etc.,” Hanning said. “Every Thursday is K-State day, so if you are a student, faculty or staff, you get a 15% discount. First Friday of every month, the first 25 customers get 25% of their entire purchase. Other weekly sales are what we decide to put on sale for the week.”
