PART 1 “Hopland Calling”
When you ask people about the cannabis competition scene, a cast of usual suspects always makes the top of the lists, but none have established a worldwide presence quite like Ego Clash. The epic one-day gathering is the brainchild of Brandon Parker, a third-generation Mendocino cannabis farmer well-known for the awards he and his family have collected, such as Third Gen Family Farms, Dying Breed Seeds, and Moonshine Melts.
The rules are simple: bring a jar of your finest and compete against the biggest names in your field. Divisions award first and second place for Full Melt, Rosin, and Flower, along with a Connoisseurs Choice Award. Ego asks for nothing except that a person leads with their best foot forward and respects the competition. Every contestant is also a judge. Scores are watched in real-time for inconsistencies, and whatever is left over is returned to the maker/grower at the night’s end. If that doesn’t sell you, they also collect toys from attendees to give to local and international charities.
Just like some kind of hash-inspired Hogwarts, you’ve got to have your wizard skills on point to get into Ego Clash. Guests receive their invitations after being scouted and vetted by Brandon himself. Everyone there seems to feel the opportunity they’ve been given to get together and uphold this special tradition. Since starting in 2017, Ego Clash has evolved into a highly respected invitational and international duel that starts in the foothills of the Emerald Triangle and ends in a Spanish chapel from the 1700s.
Because our story spans both time and space, to tell it properly, we’ll have to jump back a full six years. It’s 2017, and at a house party in Santa Rosa, Brandon is hosting the first version of the Ego Clash. He described the scene as “an industry house party that started a winner-takes-all session of BHO vs. Hash. People had been complaining that money and clout were the real reasons they didn’t have any awards, so I thought, why not make a day where none of that shit matters?” The party, which included people like Berner, Wookerson, Dougie Dracup, and
Jigga was intended to be a parliamentary debate, with Brandon acting as leader of the House of Commons.
“I sat in the middle. Each person brought a five-gram jar; it didn’t matter if it was branded, and we’d line them all up. Then I would turn around, the crowd would dab up, and when I turned back around, five jars would have to be cut.” When they had debated the choices down to three from each category, the final six battled again for the crown. The night was a huge success, and it wasn’t long before everyone asked about next year. Focused on his business, Brandon had borrowed a large sum using his land as collateral in the hopes of increasing efforts, but new changes in the California Cannabis market, along with a whole host of new regulations, meant he could not have their usual presence at Emerald Cup.
Needing to make something happen, he began planning a larger, more organized version of the house party. Despite outside pressures, he found the perfect location just outside of Hopland, and when December 2018 came around, he was ready to host The Ego Clash at its new official home. That first year on the property was a Hail Mary, funded almost completely by that loan he’d taken out. The prospect was scary, but he couldn’t help but see this as an opportunity to take a piece of everything he’d ever loved about the competition scene and stitch together his amazing event about fun, fellowship, and bragging rights.
The Clash represented a sort of anti-hero, top-dog energy mixed with a healthy dose of swagger. A Fight Club for brands and artisans suddenly divided by these new rules to battle without restrictions. Brandon’s not known for being quiet or timid. It’s this outspoken, sometimes off-putting energy, along with his work in the industry, that’s helped him to hold the torch and rally the community around the idea that Ego Clash is THE put up or shut up moment for anyone out there who thinks they’ve got what it takes.
Over the next few years, things would shift into focus, adding a scorecard in year three, eventually dropping the BHO battle aspect in favor of separate Full Melt and Rosin divisions, and creating a flower category. The scoring system was turned into an electronic spreadsheet where judges can enter answers, and everything can be tracked in real-time (shoutout, Kimo). But the legend of what each entry is can still only be found in a tiny notebook kept in Brandon’s back pocket.
By 2021, Ego Clash had become the premiere Hash competition in the country and was seeing a greater demand from talented new personalities who wanted to join in. For anyone curious about how to make it in, the invitation process has stayed the same for years. Months before, @3rd_gen_familyfarms will ask Instagram users to suggest who they believe would be a great addition to the party. Each suggestion is reviewed and looked at to help compile a list of potential hitters. Brandon whittles this list down into the core group invited to battle, often including a few names you’ve never heard of before.
That’s become a big part of Ego Clash, bringing the community together from across the country. In 2022, Ego Clash had around 500 attendees that came from as far as Maine. The event now stretches over the property like a Candyland game board, with locations to stop at like The Cave, Glass House, Weed Lodge, and the Hash Barn. Each location has a specific vibe and rhythm, and while there’s a fair amount of walking, one of the most treasured parts of Ego Clash are the golf carts that take you around like a game of Mendocino Mario Kart. As the event grew, they added more amenities like food, coffee, and fresh-squeezed sugar cane juice.
But the rough and rugged spirit of the North Coast also gives Ego Clash a sort of rustic charm. For many, it gives them a first taste of what it’s like to feel that NorCal cold seep into your boots. The surrounding hills remind us all how robust and fragile this important section of the Cannabis Industry is. In that magic environment, you understand how important it is that we protect small-label farmers and hash makers.
For competitors, EC is as much a challenge to their entry as it is for their lungs since entering also requires you, or a chosen champion, to sit down and judge over 30 different entries back-to-back. You see the look of dedication on everyone’s faces. The glaze on their half-opened eyes tells you that they understand, at the end of the day, this is about more than just naming a winner. And that’s what’s allowed this competition to spread from a little spot in California all the way to the Catalonia region of Spain.
PART 2 “Hashanista”
For the next part of the story, we have to jump a bit from the town of Hopland to the vibrant city of Barcelona. It’s 2018, and for the last three years, Giuliana Roldán has been working alongside different high-profile groups on the yearly Spannabis expo. For the last three years, she’s been watching a growing crowd of Americans coming over from California. Brandon and the crew from Third Gen. Family Farm were among this group, who had made their splash onto the European market when they released high-priced seed packs with Cookies. Along with this, the word had reached Spain about the Ego Clash and how it bucked the convention of how a cannabis contest was run at that time.
Being so tied in with so many different elements of the cannabis communities in South America, Europe, and the US, Roldán saw Ego Clash’s potential to reach a larger stage. In an interview, she told us, “I’ve traveled all over Europe and South America, and I just felt like this was the kind of event that could be worldwide. Most of the people I know who grow or smoke have a passion for Hash, and this model represented the most even opportunity for a community to determine whose stuff was the best.
That year, she went to Ego Clash in California and made her pitch to Brandon about holding a second competition overseas and how she believed there was just as high a level of competitors in Europe as in the US. Since production in Europe is still mostly illegal, she felt the gathering of so many private and small-batch producers mirrored their own scene. “I wanted to lift up all the people I knew in the space, especially all the women hash makers I knew that were doing such incredible things but didn’t feel like they had a place to compete.”
Giuliana’s dream was to bring everyone together to create a second Clash in Spain that wouldn’t impede any other events surrounding Spannabis but also bring the spirit and structure of this friendly battle to a worldwide stage. After coming to a tentative agreement, she returned home in December, ready to put her plan to full speed. By February, she invited Brandon out to see what the event would look like and what kind of final adaptations they’d wanted to make for the European Clash. Brandon mentions this would be the final sign that he knew her plan would work since, just like Mister T’s character in the A-Team, he hates to fly, and this would mean an additional trip to Spain right before Spannabis.
March 11th, the Third Gen. crew returned to help Roldán kick off the first Ego Clash Barcelona. “The first one was little,” she admits, “nobody expected this to go global, and some people weren’t sure what it would even look like.” Brandon talks about how they were there to show support and keep the competition true to form but that Giuliana was responsible for making the whole thing happen. She had secured a historic and lavish Masia just outside of the city (Americans can picture it as something between a large farmhouse and a small castle), complete with an attached chapel for the awards ceremony. She had even convinced the owners of the spot to let everyone smoke by showing them how a Puffco Peak works.
Combustion is one of the key differences between EC and ECB. Surrounded by a structure built in the 1700s, safety is paramount. So, instead, judging is encouraged through the use of Puffco’s flagship e-rig, the Peak Pro. Flower is judged out on the patio alongside dry sift and a DJ who keeps music running throughout the day. Another difference is the prize, with the custom glass rigs and bubblers awarded in the US switched out for championship wrestling belts (which honestly still feels very on-brand for The Clash). Just like the original event embodies the spirit of the land around it, the feeling at ECB carries that laidback, chic Catalonian vibe. For one thing, judges are allowed to talk about the various entries, a practice frowned upon in California. Giuliana expressed that, in a smaller setting, there’s more time to talk about the entries and less need for speed. “The growers and the hash makers love it. You go there and put what you have in front of the community. If you have something to say, it’s face to face; you have to say it with love, but we encourage people to share it.”
She also talked about how food is just as much a part of the show for them as the golf carts are for Cali. A large part of the budget for Spain’s Clash is in the three meals they feed everyone. “I truly love food. I’m a Columbian who grew up in Spain, but after 15 years around Italians, I consider myself at least 35% Italian.” There are vegetarian options and even real Neapolitan pizza. One last notable difference is the Dry Sift category, which is a nod to the rich tradition of Hashish production within Europe.
In creating ECB, she says the easiest thing to transfer over was the competition. Surprisingly, the difficult task is keeping things low-key in a country where all of this is still frowned upon. Brandon and Giuliana told Skunk that in previous years, Americans made up around 10% of the entries at the European Clash, but now that number has risen closer to half. On the day of ECB, attendees meet at a private club in Barcelona. Once there, they are picked up by bus for the forty-five-minute trip to the Macia. Once you’re on the street, you’re no longer in private and are subject to having your bag searched, resulting in a fine or even jail. “Sometimes, in the fun and excitement of what we’re all gathered together for, people forget that we still have to keep things under wraps when we’re outside.” As one of those people who’s been known to hit his vape pen in a Target, I can see where she’s coming from.
Setting this up across multiple continents and making sure everyone knows what they need to do is a humongous task of organization. It takes someone with impressive skills to tame the chaos, and Roldán has proven herself a powerhouse of planning. Last year, 200 people showed up, and there were around 91 entries. This year had so many competitors that an unbelievable 16 entries for rosin were disqualified before the competition even got underway. Like the US Clash, this is all created by the community and funded by the goodwill of sponsors. It’s this combination of trust that has kept things from having to go the route of chasing corporate endorsements or opening attendance to the public, but the duo is realizing that the interest in the event is even bigger than they imagined.
Both individually expressed the same sentiment that Ego clash just keeps growing, and they’ve had to do some uncomfortable growing along with it. This year, Roldán was able to secure a small staff to support the organizing, but the event is still mainly her efforts until the Third Gen crew arrives right before the show. With California now at 500 people and Barcelona hitting closer to 300 this year, plus the sudden addition of the DQ round, both America and Spain will be navigating some new territory next time.
Competitions are popping up in Germany, Thailand, and the Canary Islands. With so many hash makers coming over from Chile, Argentina, and Mexico, the question is, where will Ego Clash go next? With so much global interest, there’s no telling where this battle of the Titans will land next, but knowing these two, there’s no doubt lightning will strike a third time.
All photos credit: Matt Jackson
Follow on Instagram: @actionmattjackson @fahi_skunk @3rdgen_family_farm @egoclashinvitational
