Angela Mustone likes pretty packaging.
That’s why she doesn’t offer her line of THC-infused sex oils and chocolate in her home country of Canada, where the packaging for cannabis products is as unappealing as a dry vagina.
“I saw what was out there on the marketplace, and everything was so ugly,” said Mustone, founder and president of Quebec-based HighOnLove. “The packaging has to be very bare, very basic. In making this beautiful brand, I wanted to keep it pretty. I want people to see HighOnLove and say, ‘What’s that? It’s so pretty and shiny.’”
HighOnLove is a line of personal lubricants, gels, bath and massage oils, and body paints. Products that are infused with hemp seed oil — not CBD or THC — are sold in Canada in the beautiful packaging Mustone created.
But the company’s products that are infused with THC — what Mustone says is the key to a stimulating sexual experience — are only available in Colorado because of Canada’s strict packaging rules.
Canada’s packaging regulations restrict the graphics, color, and other visual elements to make the products less appealing to young people. Embellishments such as glossing, embossing, coatings, foil, and cutouts are forbidden, as are metallic and fluorescent colors.
Manufacturers can have a marketing or branding element in addition to the brand name, but if they use a logo, it can’t be bigger than the standardized cannabis symbol Health Canada requires on cannabis packaging.
Mustone says HighOnLove’s Stimulating Oil and Gel are transformative for women experiencing vaginal dryness and that they intensify orgasms. For men, it can delay orgasm to ensure they don’t cum too fast.
“CBD is great as a lube or an anti-inflammatory, but to increase blood flow, you need THC,” Mustone said. “I love cannabis — I love what it does as a topical. What it does for me in terms of my sex life is A1 on my list.”
HighOnLove’s THC-infused lip balm is made for fellatio.
“In terms of sensation, it prolongs his orgasm,” said Mustone, who has worked in the beauty and sexual products industries for decades.
Before founding HighOnLove, Mustone worked for California Exotic Novelties, an adult sex toy company; California-based personal care company Dermalogica; and Canada-based Produits Amour & Beaute, a sensual cosmetics company.
HighOnLove’s research is conducted in Canada, where cannabis is federally legal, but the company’s THC-infused products are manufactured by Boulder-based WHT LBL, which sends the products out for testing.
“There’s nothing like waking up in the morning and feeling passionate about what you do,” Mustone said. “WHT LBL gets just as excited as I do.”
For now, Mustone is content with HighOnLove’s Colorado presence, but she hopes to expand the THC-infused product line into Oregon and Nevada as well as Europe, the United Arab Emirates, and Saudi Arabia.
“That’s where I want to be — it’s a new market and there are new opportunities,” she said. “The US is so flooded, so competitive.”
Mainstream companies like Sephora and Nordstrom are considering stocking different versions of sexual wellness products, so Mustone is confident it’s only a matter of time before HighOnLove becomes well-known as a luxury brand.
Numerous companies across the US are infusing lotions and oils with THC and CBD and marketing them as sexual aids–there’s New York-based Her Highness, California-based House of LDLR, and oOYes and Foria, both based in Denver. But Mustone isn’t doesn’t pay much attention to what other cannabis sexual wellness companies are doing. She just wants to make the best products she can.
“I want to be the Gucci of cannabis brands,” Mustone said. “Gucci doesn’t worry about what Hermes is doing. Gucci is Gucci.”
