Josh Kesselman, founder of HBI Innovations, featured in The Cap Times article on Madison Meet and Greet

New York, New York–(Newsfile Corp. – September 30, 2025) – Josh Kesselman, founder of HBI Innovations, was featured in an article for The Cap Times covering a recent meet and greet at Knuckleheads Madison. Journalist Ashley Rodriguez described the event as a “homecoming” for Kesselman, who opened the first Knuckleheads in Madison in 1995. Kesselman’s HBI Innovations is the independent distributor of the RAW® brand of rolling papers and smoking accessories which Kesselman himself launched in 2005.

Josh Kesselman is an icon of the smoking and cannabis industry. He estimates that he’s taught “millions and millions of people around the world how to roll” joints. (Josh Kesselman is the founder of HBI Innovations)

Speaking with Rodriguez, Kesselman said, “I had always dreamed of opening a smoke shop”; he noted that he took inspiration from the head shops he saw in the East Village in New York, “because you’d go into these places … and the people behind the counter, they were free.”

LJ Nelson made a rug woven into the likeness of Josh Kesselman. Nelson gave Kesselman the rug during at meet-and-greet at Knuckleheads. (Josh Kesselman is the founder of HBI Innovations)

Hundreds of fans lined up to meet Kesselman at the State Street outpost of Knuckleheads, a smoke shop with three locations in Madison and Milwaukee. The article mentions LJ Nelson, a fan who attended the meet and greet and gifted Kesselman a custom-made carpet he had woven into his likeness, demonstrating the icon status his decades of work in the industry have brought him. Rodriguez goes on to write that many of the event’s attendees “credit Kesselman for legitimizing a culture that kept to the shadows due to legal restrictions and societal norms.”

In the article, Kesselman reflected on the changing attitudes towards smoking and cannabis culture in the decades since he opened the first Knuckleheads shop in Madison. “People are much more OK with smoking,” Kesselman said. “They understand that it’s not the devil’s lettuce. Society has changed so much for the better. And I love seeing it this way.”

At a meet-and-greet at Knuckleheads, the shop he founded on State Street, Josh Kesselman put a joint into a custom-made RAW ring with a hole on the side. (Josh Kesselman is the founder of HBI Innovations)

Kesselman describes his role in the cannabis community as a “keeper of the culture.” In June, it was announced that he had purchased High Times, a cannabis culture publication started in 1974. The magazine featured essays by writers such as Hunter S. Thompson and Charles Bukowski. High Times ceased publication in 2024, but Kesselman – along with High Times co-founder Matt Stang – has been working to bring it back to glory.

The article makes Kesselman’s reverence for those in the community clear, “So when I see somebody come to a store like this – to come say hi to me – I already know they’re one of my people.” he says.

The full article can be read here.

Source: Grasslands

To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/268527