For James Keyes, The Classic didn’t start as a golf event, a networking opportunity, or a luxury experience.
It started after surviving a brain tumor — a moment that fundamentally reshaped how he thought about health, community, and what it means to bring people together with intention.
During MJBizCon week, I spoke with James Keyes at the Las Vegas Classic. Keyes shared that he grew his first cannabis plant on a golf course — an early overlap of his career, sport, and the plant that now feels almost inevitable in hindsight. What began as personal experience eventually became the foundation for a charity-driven event designed to hold celebration and giving back in the same space.
A Charity Event, Built as an Experience
From the outside, The Classic reads as a traditional golf outing. On the ground, it unfolds as something far more immersive.
While the course anchors the day, the experience is intentionally built to appeal to both golfers and those drawn to elevated, wellness forward environments. Attendees move fluidly between play, connection, and restoration, with space for both focused competition and intentional pause.
Beyond the Fairway
Each Classic is designed as a layered experience that extends well beyond the fairway.
Attendees move through wellness-focused activations including sound baths, meditation, and spa services provided by CannaLuxxe Wellness Spa. Curated snacks, infused teas, and vendor booths create natural points of engagement, while live rosin pressing, DJs, and creative competitions add energy throughout the day.
Design-forward details show up in the competition itself. For the putting contest, Figueroa Design Co created a diamond-encrusted ball marker as the prize — a small but telling example of how craftsmanship and intention carry through even the most familiar elements of the game.
Participating brands such as Tea’s Tea, Besos Wellness, Green Elevator, CharCharterie, Flower Powered LLC, along with community driven activations like Joint Wars, photo booths, and The Classic Gals, help shape an environment that feels considered and intentional.
Consumption is present at The Classic, with cannabis brands featured throughout the day in ways that align with the event’s broader wellness and luxury focus. These moments are integrated alongside food, drink, and experiential offerings, rather than isolated as a standalone attraction.
Reading the Course
Each Classic reflects the region it lands in.
Ohio brings a different energy than California’s more established landscape, or Vegas’s spa-centered experience. Rather than flattening those distinctions, Keyes allows each event to adapt to its setting while maintaining a consistent throughline: generosity, legitimacy, and thoughtful celebration.
There are currently three Classics — California, Las Vegas, and Ohio — with future markets, including New York, already on the horizon. Expansion, however, isn’t the point. Longevity is.
The Long Game
The Classic doesn’t rely on spectacle to communicate its purpose. The structure of the day does that work on its own — through collaborations with brands like Nothing But Fire, and through organic networking within a golf- and cannabis-centered community that values luxury, connection, and charity.
What’s unfolding at The Classic feels less like a trend and more like a community signal. In the way James Keyes has built the experience — intentionally, generously, and with an eye toward wellness — the event shows how charity, golf, and luxury coexist. Together, they create something that feels both meaningful and enjoyable, proving that when purpose and experience are aligned, everyone involved walks away with a win.
Victoria Burkard is a cannabis strategist and content consultant who helps brands grow authentically while navigating the ever-changing landscape of shadowbans and platform restrictions. She writes from the intersection of creativity and compliance—because in this industry, you need both.
