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Another top exec has departed buzzy cannabis company MedMen

MedMen
MedMen store employees serve customers buying marijuana in West Hollywood, California. REUTERS/Lucy Nicholson
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David Dancer, MedMen's chief marketing officer, has left the company in June after less than a year, Business Insider has learned.

Dancer, whose career has spanned companies including Teleflora, Charles Schwab, Visa and American Express, was hired by MedMen in July 2018 as it sought to expand its North American retail footprint.

MedMen did not immediately respond for a request for comment.

MedMen has been at the forefront of trying to make pot mainstream with its sleek stores in high-profile locations. It also enlisted Spike Jonze to make a two-minute film, narrating the evolution of weed over time.

Read More: 'It gets tiring': Cannabis retailer MedMen's CMO talks about the challenges of marketing marijuana and why education is a key pillar of its strategy

At MedMen, Dancer built the company's marketing and insights practice, heading a 40-person team, according to his LinkedIn, which doesn't reflect his departure. He also led MedMen's in-house ad agency.

His departure comes amid other exits and concerns at the marijuana retailer that were raised by ex-CFO James Parker. Parker in February filed a wrongful dismissal suit against the company, raising concerns of overspending and an unhealthy work environment, the Los Angeles Times reported. MedMen denied the allegations.

In April, chief operating officer Ben Cook, general counsel Lisa Sergi Trager, and SVP of corporate communications Daniel Yi quit amid a broader shakeup at the company, according to CNBC. 

MedMen is traded on the Canadian Securities Exchange. It went public last May through a reverse takeover, when it bought an existing Canadian public company called Ladera Ventures. In its latest quarterly earnings, MedMen reported a loss of $63.1 million on revenue of $36.6 million.

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Tanya was a senior reporter at Business Insider, covering all things advertising, media and marketing.  She specifically focused on brands (both big brands and DTC upstarts) and ad agencies, and how their businesses are being shaped by technology and culture, as the analog world reckons with digital. She also wrote about Amazon, Facebook, Google, and other tech companies' impact on the ad industry as well as the blurring lines between retail and advertising. Here's a small sample of some of her work: Gap's earnings are skyrocketing. Here's how the retailer brought itself back from the brink by revamping its marketing and products. Snap is on a growth tear. We talked to 22 insiders about how the once-flailing company got advertisers to fall in love with it and reversed its sales slump. Inside Barbie's comeback: How Mattel repositioned the 60-year-old doll as a woke role model and reversed its sales slump The rise and fall of Crispin Porter Bogusky: How the hottest ad agency lost its mojo Inside the biggest independent ad agency, The Richards Group, where some say an old-school culture that included all-male retreats fueled racism and sexism Inside the rise of Netflix's new 'badass' CMO, who rubs elbows with Anna Wintour and the Obamas and handled crises at Uber and Papa John's 15 Quibi insiders detail Jeffrey Katzenberg's tight control of the startup's content and intense leadership as he tries to avoid disaster after raising $1.8 billion Glossier employees just sent an open letter alleging mistreatment and discrimination at the company — but staffers have long complained of issues of mistreatment and discrimination at the trendy beauty brand's stores $1 billion startup Rent the Runway has furloughed 35% of its employees. Its future is now in question as coronavirus ravages retail. Juul just laid off 650 workers after federal investigations rocked the company. Workers who were affected describe how it was handled and what they saw leading up to it. How a high-flying media executive with a $1 million annual paycheck and big plans to revamp the LA Times found himself out of a job after 5 months At Vice Media's once high-flying ad agency Carrot, a founder is out and insiders describe a hostile culture toward women Before joining BI, Tanya was a reporter at Digiday. She holds a Master of Science in Journalism from Columbia University.