Kiva Confections co-founder Kristi Knoblich Palmer on reforming cannabis's image

Even in states that have legalized marijuana, opening a business that sells it can be hard.

Some of it, according to Kristi Knoblich Palmer, the co-founder of Kiva Confections, which makes edible THC products, is just down to people not wanting cannabis retail in their backyards.

For a time, even Instagram was skeptical of letting Kiva's products -- mints, gummies, and chocolates -- show up on their platform. "Our account kept getting shut down," said Knoblich Palmer, even though they were "keeping it informative, all about education -- and then you'd look at other pages that weren't getting shut down and weren't getting flagged, and they were racy and inappropriate."

Still, her company's answer was to keep graduating marijuana's image. "We really have to act professionally and go above and beyond to make ourselves look professional, to act professionally, and to help overturn that stigma," said Knoblich Palmer, who launched Kiva in 2010.

That starts with the packaging, where 95% of Kiva's brand image happens. "Having a beautiful package was the front door for the consumer," said Knoblich Palmer. "It had to step up the edibles category as a whole and really let edibles finally sit in a different part of the mind for consumers." Beyond that, down-to-the-milligram precision in THC dosage ("everybody had those college experiences" of having a bit too much) goes a long way in building trust with consumers.

On this week’s episode of Making Marketing, Knoblich Palmer talked about the responsibility she feels when marketing a product that some people still oppose, how the company started in her kitchen, and what her vision for the company in five years is.