Cannabis Accounting, Taxes, and What Operators Still Don’t Understand | Mark Waller & Betsy Morem

There’s a moment where every cannabis business has to get serious.

Not about branding.
 Not about product.

About the numbers.

Live from Lucky Leaf in Minneapolis, we sat down with Mark Waller and Betsy Mooreham of SAX Advisory Group to talk about what it really takes to build a sustainable cannabis business from a financial perspective.

This conversation starts with their transition from Moore & Waller CPAs into SAX, a national firm with a growing cannabis practice. But what it turns into is something bigger.

A conversation about scale, support, and what operators actually need as this industry matures.

We get into:

• Why joining a larger firm unlocks better tax strategy and support 
 • How stronger financial infrastructure leads to better decision making
 • The reality of tax planning in cannabis and why it’s still evolving
 • What rescheduling could mean for cash flow and compliance
 • Why the most successful operators think like business owners first

One of the biggest takeaways?

The operators who succeed in cannabis aren’t just passionate about the plant.

They understand the business.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:01

The thoughts, views, and opinions expressed on the CannaConnect Show belong solely to the individuals and do not reflect those of CannaConnect and its affiliates, sponsors, or partners. Canticonnect does not promote or facilitate any activity that violates state or federal regulations. Everything you hear here is strictly for educational and entertainment purposes. It is not legal advice. It is not financial guidance, and it's definitely not medical direction. Seriously, don't take our word for it. Even if someone on the mic sounds like they know what they're talking about, and they're probably crazy smart too. Regardless of how legit our guests may be, you should always do your own homework, consult with your attorney, and understand the risk you're taking before you do anything when it comes to cannabis. Our intention is to keep it real. If you've got a problem with anything we've said, take us to court.

SPEAKER_03 0:49

Oh, SACS. SAX. This is where Moram and Waller has now moved their clients. So Betsy Morham, Mark Waller, CPA firm, local cannabis accounting firm. Yeah, they are now under the SACS accounting tax and advisory uh umbrella. So their clients now have been moved to SACS. So they have kind of like Corey Lake, they have now more at their fingertips. Sure. So they're able to serve their clients better, worry less about the hiring, the firing, but they can still uh handle all of your cannabis accounting needs.

SPEAKER_01 1:24

Is it and do they go beyond just cannabis accounting and tax? I think so. Yeah. And now kind of like more broad, like we talk about with Corey Lake. Right.

SPEAKER_03 1:31

Yeah. I believe uh tax advisory for more than just cannabis, but yeah, sure. Mark and Betsy are stick are focused on cannabis. Welcome back to the Canada Connect Show, live from Lucky Leaf. We are here with some of the newest members of SACS Accounting Tax and Advisory. We're sitting with Mark Waller and Betsy Moram, Moram and Waller CPAs. You have some news to share.

SPEAKER_04 1:55

Yes.

SPEAKER_03 1:56

Tell us a little bit about you and how you frame the announcement.

SPEAKER_02 2:02

I'll kick it off. Yeah. So uh Betsy and I, we started Moram and Waller CPAs five years ago. And what we found is uh we we love working with clients in the cannabis space. We love working with uh the cannabis industry and in Minnesota. And we got the opportunity to join SACS, uh SACS advisory group that has that is uh a top 75-ranked firm in the country, has a uh a very large cannabis practice already. And uh we just jumped up the opportunity to join a team that has a full cannabis practice. Um when we started talking to Allison, who uh Alison Kirschhoffer, who's our cannabis uh practice leader.

SPEAKER_04 2:50

Shout out to Allison.

SPEAKER_02 2:50

Shout out to Allison, uh, a friend of ours for many years who's also been um a cannabis accountant in the industry. Uh, we actually met her at locally at um uh legacy cuff industry night. So we ran into her again. The seeds of this um uh uh integration, I'll call it, uh, really started actually at that night because we started talking to Allison. Allison was somebody we we've wanted to work with for a long time. Wow. And so it was a very natural conversation. Betsy actually, you can you can tell what your conversation was like with Allison.

SPEAKER_04 3:22

Yeah, she was just um talking about how they're growing so much, and she was she was uh had just joined SACS, and I kind of jokingly said, Well, I mean, maybe you guys should take us on. And she said, If you're serious about that, I've got someone here that would want to talk to you about that. And I was like, Yes, I would love to.

SPEAKER_03 3:41

And this was September of 2025, right? Okay, cool.

SPEAKER_04 3:44

So many conversations happened over the course of several months, and we just felt like it was a really great fit. Um, it's kind of like in dating where you when you know, you know, sort of sort of that's that's how I thought was sound.

SPEAKER_03 3:56

Oh, that's good. I remember seeing Allison that week. She came to a Candle Connect event, and we walked from the wilderness, which is, you know, yeah, uh we have an affinity for. And then we walked to Rectangle on the and picked up some pizzas because I was like, hey, I I kind of know who you are. Let's let's walk, let's walk for five minutes and get to know each other a little bit better. And and very easy to get to very friendly, outgoing. She seems like a great person. She is for sure.

SPEAKER_02 4:25

And Sax Sax came from Minnesota to to look at the Minnesota industry, and it was a really natural connection because we're here already. Yep. So the whole the whole idea of us coming on board, it was just a very natural fit, which goes along with everything that we did when we built Moram and Weller, is partnerships are the most important thing to us. And so it was just a very natural um wow evolution of that same concept, really.

SPEAKER_03 4:50

Has it felt better from a work-life balance standpoint? Like, what are some of the benefits that you're already noticing?

SPEAKER_04 4:58

Yeah, I'll say from my perspective, um, there's a lot of additional pressure that comes along with running your own business, any business running your own firm. And so um just sort of having that stress go away feels feels really great. Um, but at the same time, all the things that I love about having your own business, which is the entrepreneurship aspect of it, yeah, um, we've been able to maintain. So they're a very entrepreneurial uh focused firm. So they kind of you know let us uh I don't want to say do what we want because that's not the case, but um they give us a lot of autonomy. And so it's just enough autonomy where you feel like you you haven't lost all the things that people love about business ownership.

SPEAKER_03 5:43

Right, which is good because you're re-engaging clients uh through SACS. You're not uh you didn't sell Mormon Waller, you're not there's all there's different ways to look to misaddress it, but you you've pivoted in a way where it's one step back, two step forward, or how would you how would you argue it, Mark?

SPEAKER_02 6:05

Yeah, I mean I I think that the thing that we we wanted to make sure uh what before we moved over is we wanted to make sure that our clients would feel comfortable with the move. Yeah, every single client we talked to was very excited about it. They were excited about the opportunity to have a bigger team, more, more resources that we could reach to reach out to. Um, in reality, um having that bigger team means we can scale more. So it didn't change our clients' prices all that much. Right. It also provided other advantages to them, like better tax planning, because as a as a smaller firm, it's very difficult to take on more liability when you need to be a little bit more aggressive, and especially in this industry, to help clients save money. With a bigger team, with a with a dedicated tax practice that we can we can be inputting to, but we're not necessarily the final decision makers on. We have that team. So we can talk about how to best approach tax planning. And and as a result, we're we're literally able to do a lot more tax savings for our clients with Sax, which which we're really excited about. That's amazing because that's so important and you feel supported.

SPEAKER_03 7:14

Yes, right, absolutely.

SPEAKER_04 7:16

Yeah, and I um I was telling some of our clients, and like the my new colleagues at SACS, I I'm just so elated to be in a room with so many intelligent people. And um, so I I'm excited for my clients that they get wow, they get the advantage of all their excellent minds. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 7:37

It's not just Mark in Minneapolis and Betsy in Austin anymore. They're along in your support.

SPEAKER_04 7:44

Uh-huh.

SPEAKER_03 7:44

Wow. The only change is inspiring to you guys, I'm shit too.

SPEAKER_02 7:47

I mean, you know, the big the change for us is we moved from Slack to Microsoft Teams. So at first of the interview. Yeah. At first it was a little, yeah. But uh, but you know, the one of the first things I did when we joined is like I told the teams, like, you know, Betsy and I, like when we started the firm, we kind of like gassed each other up on Slack of like when things happen good, we send each other gifts. So as soon as our colleagues started doing that back to us, we're like, okay, we're in the right place.

SPEAKER_04 8:14

Yes, we're trying to break.

SPEAKER_03 8:15

Good. Hey, the your the Mormon watercolor culture needs to also flow into sex. Yeah, it's a two-way stream. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 8:22

Well, it's it's fun too because it they're new it's Aceco space firm. So there is, there can be, you can notice some cultural differences, right? Yeah. So I think we could all we could both sort of um uh bring positive things to the table in terms of our our the cultures that we come from.

SPEAKER_03 8:40

You know, since we're at Lucky Leaf, and we've this is year three, and you've been to Lucky Leafs in other markets as well. Yeah. Um the national trade show circuit for cannabis, they in the since we've known each other, they've often peaked in Minnesota, right? Oh, really? Well, like in the sense of like last year, Lucky Leaf's best show was Minnesota. Uh probably not the year before.

SPEAKER_04 9:11

Yeah. There wasn't a whole lot happening.

SPEAKER_03 9:13

But uh Kenakon, same thing. The interest from an outside group, from a from a New York uh based accounting tax advisory firm, it makes sense because Minnesota is a bright spot in the cannabis industry at large compared to how the national market is overall going. Absolutely. Yeah. And and it's it's fun to be a part of. It really is fun to be a part of a growing market. Uh I love the hemp turned cannabis-turned adult use aspect of this industry. I feel like we're very knowledgeable around the plant because we've had a lot of different product iterations and and things that we can try. And you know, um, so I just want to highlight Minnesota as as you, you know, as your world starts to get bigger, like we have a lot of eyes on us because of of the way this industry has been set up. Yeah, that's cool. And we hear a lot about it, yeah. Yeah, what what are you hearing? Uh, I mean, we could talk schedule three, we could talk safer banking. I mean, schedule will schedule three affecting we're not there yet.

SPEAKER_02 10:23

Well, we're not there. And what happened in December when the president signed an executive order, yeah, didn't actually change anything. So we're honestly, we're we're in the same place we've been. Yep. It's uh you know, it's unfortunate, but we're we have to continue to navigate uncertainty the same way we have been. Right. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 10:42

And it's yeah, I and I will say I I think the the announcement in December created more confusion than anything else in the industry because um there are some people that think it has been rescheduled when it hasn't. So and also just people wondering, well, if it is it is going to be rescheduled, can I act now as if it has already been rescheduled? You know what I'm saying? Right.

SPEAKER_03 11:08

Um and the answer is no.

SPEAKER_04 11:09

Correct. The answer is no. But from a service provider's perspective, it I I'm thinking account accountants and attorneys mainly questions surrounding rescheduling. Um, I'm sure they're I'm sure they've been having a lot just because of the news that that came out, um, and sort of having to debunk some of the Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 11:30

Which happens a lot in this administration. Yes. A lot of a lot of debunking.

SPEAKER_04 11:35

Correct.

SPEAKER_03 11:36

Um But man, wouldn't it be nice if we could get X and Y and Z and the whole industry could be transformed and there could be a level playing field across nationwide. Maybe we'll see it in our day. You know, we're in Isle Law apparently.

SPEAKER_04 11:52

Well, and we could go down the rabbit hole of like whether or not rescheduling is really what is best.

SPEAKER_03 11:57

I know, yeah, that's it. But that's 11 years past where you've had a you've you've shared about that. Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 12:03

I mean, uh I I'm of the mind that, you know, full decriminal full de-scheduling would be much better for most people. Yeah, there's always a danger of rescheduling, shifting the the landscape of regulation just to a different entity versus completely descheduling would certainly change things a lot more and sort of like from the perspective of the war on drugs, and the war on being much more effective, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 12:33

Absolutely. I mean, we've seen how when you move it from run one regulatory agency to another or to a new regulatory agency, how slow and how uh convoluted that can be at times and disappointing for for the operators. So that's a great call out, Mark, because yeah, the DA doesn't want to touch it. No. And and and they're the drug enforcement truth. Yeah. Yeah, exactly.

SPEAKER_04 12:55

From a tax perspective, um, the idea is if rescheduling happens, that would be a positive change from a from a tax perspective, which would free up cash flow for businesses, right? So that would be a positive. I think the thing that um our our colleague Stacey brought up during our panel that we just asked before we came over here was we don't know because rescheduling applies to the medical side, right? How rescheduling would affect adult use and whether or not um the 280 impact would go away or perhaps a different tax would take its place. There's just so much that we don't know at this point. Um and so we're just sort of continuing on as usual, of course, until something final comes up.

SPEAKER_03 13:45

Sure. Yeah. Um just to kind of think about the success that you've seen from your clients, what are some skills, traits that stand out from operators that you've seen do well in this industry? There are a lot of hurdles, there's a lot of hoops, but what are what are some of your most athletic customers? What do they look like?

SPEAKER_04 14:06

Well, I would say that um it really is just like running any other business. And so I find that our clients who are most successful um have a lot of uh uh they come to it to the table called business acumen.

SPEAKER_01 14:21

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 14:22

Um they've run maybe other businesses before or at the same time as their cannabis business.

SPEAKER_01 14:28

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 14:29

Um, and then they they don't look to take any shortcuts as well. I would say so that. Yeah. And they also don't like to take shortcuts. They they value compliance, they value, of course, I'm biased, but um good financials, that sort of thing. And so they they they understand where their limit is as a person, okay, and then when they need to bring in a professional.

SPEAKER_03 14:54

Okay. Yes, that's great, right? Because if you hold on to too much, eventually something slips out.

SPEAKER_04 14:59

And that's how it is with any industry.

SPEAKER_03 15:01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 15:01

Um a business owner across all industries has to learn when it's better to delegate certain tasks versus try and take it all in by themselves.

SPEAKER_03 15:11

Absolutely. Absolutely. That's great. Anything to add?

SPEAKER_02 15:14

Yeah, I think adding uh a strong tone at the top is really important, similar to a lot, a lot of different industries. But the clients we work with that are, to me, kind of the most successful ones in many ways, they have strong leadership that is respected amongst uh its employees, but uh leadership that knows what it's what it wants to do and what it wants to accomplish. Uh, because it's a this is a very difficult industry to to work in, and there's a lot to think about. And so um having that uh that tone at the top where people who work on work with you as an organization can believe in the vision of the organization goes a long way because you can't do it alone. You really can. Right.

SPEAKER_03 15:58

Right, absolutely. So in this new day and age, what's the best way to get in touch? How should folks reach out to you if now they're interested in working with Betsy Morum and Mark Wallet?

SPEAKER_02 16:08

Yeah, uh, they can go to uh saxadvisorygroup.com, uh click on the cannabis um tab on the top, and uh you'll find all of our contact information there. Um you can sign up for a newsletter and um reach out to us via email, reach out, you know, LinkedIn. LinkedIn's a great spot. Yeah. Congratulations around in Minnesota. Thank you so much.

SPEAKER_04 16:32

And I'm uh I'm very um proud of all the work that you've done with Canon Connect. And uh, it's so wonderful to see the evolution of everything you're doing. And I'm I'm happy that um, you know, we we've both we've all grown together over the years.

SPEAKER_03 16:47

Yeah, so it's been amazing. The last year has been a lot of work, but I mean it's paying off.

SPEAKER_04 16:52

Yes, it is.

SPEAKER_03 16:53

I can tell.

SPEAKER_04 16:53

Yeah, thanks for having us.

SPEAKER_03 16:55

Amazing, good to see you. Good to see you. Thank you so much. Yeah, thanks, Steve. That's Betsy Moram, excuse me, Betsy Morham and Mark Waller. This is the Lucky Leaf Expo, day one, in a wrap. We are wrapped! That's a wrap for day one. Yes, thank you so much.