Case Study: How Cova Software Helped Set Highlife Health Up for Success in New York’s Competitive Cannabis Retail Landscape

Behind every cannabis success story is a system, a strategy, and a partner who helped make it happen. In our Case Study series, we read from the operational playbooks of cannabis leaders, learning about the tools and expertise they have implemented to grow their business. From technology, to equipment, to consulting, these are real stories from real operators who are building the future of cannabis.

If you’ve been paying attention to cannabis industry news the past few years, you know that launching a licensed cannabis dispensary in New York’s early adult-use market has been anything but simple for those who took the plunge. 

Regulations have shifted rapidly, technology expectations have evolved on the fly, and newly licensed operators often find themselves navigating an avalanche of vendors, platforms, and promises. For Highlife Health, a woman-owned, family-run dispensary founded by entrepreneur Jennifer Gierum, selecting the right retail technology stack was one of the most important early decisions the company would make.

Highlife Health opened with a mission grounded in personal experience: after her teenage son suffered a severe back injury, Gierum watched cannabis become a core part of his recovery and long-term wellbeing. It shaped her understanding of the plant’s medical benefits and inspired her to create a business that would advocate for cannabis as a legitimate, compassionate form of care. She wanted to build a retail environment that was educational, accessible, and capable of serving a wide range of consumers.

When she received her license, however, the flood of technology vendors that reached out made it clear how difficult those goals would be to achieve.

As soon as Highlife’s license was awarded, Gierum was inundated with high-pressure sales pitches from cannabis technology companies pushing their platforms. Many assumed she already understood their systems, jargon, and hardware requirements. Few took time to understand her actual needs as a new operator entering a challenging, rapidly evolving market.

What she needed, she says, was something basic: clarity. A foundation. A partner willing to explain what mattered and why.

Instead, most of the industry treated her like a prospect to close—not an operator to support. That changed when she reached out to Cova Software.

Gierum noted that from the first interaction, Cova took a different approach. Instead of delivering a scripted pitch, they began by listening. They asked about her operational goals, the customer experience she wanted to build, the systems she already had in place, and the partners she planned to work with. They made an effort to understand Highlife Health’s unique position and tailor their recommendations accordingly.

One of her most urgent needs was finding a POS system that would integrate seamlessly with a custom website experience. Gierum had hired her own developer to design a front-end menu that matched her branding and vision. Most cannabis POS platforms resisted integration or insisted she use their standard templates.

Cova did the opposite. They coordinated directly with her developer, worked through the technical requirements collaboratively, and helped build a fully custom product menu that synced live with Highlife’s inventory without forcing her into a predetermined design.

The result: Highlife Health’s website looks nothing like the cookie-cutter menus used by the vast majority of their competitors in the region, giving them an edge when it comes to brand affinity and memorability.

As the New York market continued to evolve, regulations shifted, workflows changed, and new compliance requirements emerged. Cova approached the uncertainty with purpose, working alongside Highlife Health to co-develop features tailored to the state’s needs.

Gierum emphasized that this level of attention was unmatched by other providers she evaluated. Cova treated New York not as an inconvenience, but as a collaborative opportunity. When she and her team identified pain points, Cova incorporated that feedback into real product development.

This partnership model became essential as Highlife Health moved through its first months of operation.

One of the most defining aspects of Highlife’s experience with Cova has been reliability. In retail (especially cannabis retail), downtime is costly. Every minute a POS system is offline leads to lost sales, frustrated customers, and operational chaos.

Gierum says that in her entire time using Cova, she has never experienced a single day of downtime. For a business operating in a competitive, high-volume environment, that stability has real financial impact.

Technical confidence also helped support Highlife’s community-centered brand. With a dependable system in place, staff could stay focused on client care, product education, and creating a welcoming environment rather than troubleshooting system failures.

Highlife Health’s experience with Cova has been shaped not only by the software but by the people supporting it. Gierum says she has multiple points of contact, each responsive and informed. Coming from a corporate background, she is no stranger to unhelpful or inaccessible tech support teams. Cova’s accessibility—top to bottom—stood out immediately.

Whether she needed technical assistance, product guidance, or help with an integration, the support team responded quickly and with practical solutions. She contrasted this with providers who pushed “one-stop shop” systems and tried to lock her into vendor ecosystems. Cova, she said, never tried to box her in.

This collaborative mindset extends to how Cova handles product improvements. Through Cova’s Beta/Staging environment, Highlife is able to preview fixes and enhancements and even test updates using her own company data before they go live. It gives her confidence that improvements are real, tested, and aligned with operator needs.

Her team has embraced the system as well. Staff are excited about updates, comfortable with the interface, and grateful for the reliability.

Highlife Health is more than a dispensary: it’s an advocacy-driven business trying to reframe how society views cannabis. Gierum has worked to highlight real patient stories, including her own family’s experiences. She also developed a reality-based television pilot showing the day-to-day complexities of running a dispensary and the human side of cannabis retail. It wasn’t a comedy or “stoner” stereotype—it was an honest look at the industry.

This mission is one reason choosing the right technology partner mattered so much. To run a business built on compassion, transparency, and community, she needed systems that supported those values—not systems that added friction.

Highlife Health’s journey reflects a reality shared by many cannabis retailers entering complex, fast-changing markets: your technology partner can determine how smooth (or chaotic) your launch and daily operations will be. For Jennifer Gierum and her team, Cova became the backbone of a reliable, customizable retail ecosystem that has supported both their mission and their growth.

Want to explore how Cova could unlock new potential for your dispensary?

➔ Visit the Cova Software website

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