Troubled cannabis retailer Green Growth Brands announces CEO’s departure

Green Growth Brands, an embattled cannabis retailer in the process of selling off its line of mall-based CBD kiosks, said its CEO has stepped down, effective immediately.

The outgoing CEO, Peter Horvath, came to the Columbus, Ohio, company after leading company strategy for retail giants such as Victoria’s Secret, American Eagle Outfitters, DSW and Limited Brands.

Horvath’s departure comes after a tumultuous few months for the company, which owns the nation’s largest chain of CBD retail kiosks.

After a disappointing holiday sales period, Green Growth Brands announced in February that it is selling most of that business to focus on running marijuana dispensaries.

This week, the company said it has temporarily closed all its CBD kiosks because of the coronavirus pandemic while also suspending CBD e-commerce sales for its Seventh Sense line of CBD topical products.

In September, the company laid off about 50 employees to rein in costs.

Horvath told investors that “overhead costs” and unidentified “constraints on liquidity” required shedding the CBD side of its business.

Green Growth Brands said that former Chief Operating Officer Randy Whitaker would take over as interim CEO.

The company owns The Source marijuana dispensaries in Nevada and also has dispensaries in Florida and Massachusetts.

Green Growth Brands trades on the Canadian Securities Exchange as GGB and on the U.S. over-the-counter markets as GGBXF.