There’s a small team busy crafting liquid sunshine in Hamilton, just down the road from Pure Blossom. The only exception is on Friday afternoons, which are reserved for family lunch…
Meet SUN, a family-owned extraction company bringing Northern California live resin expertise, vanilla extraction wizardry and a whole lot of love to the Garden State.
We caught up with co-founder Nate Green and head extractor Noel Liese to talk about their passion for live resin and what goes into creating next-level extracts that just dropped at PB.
Meet the Extract Dream Team 🌟
Nate Green, co-founder: Driven by his experience treating his grandfather’s cancer with Rick Simpson oils, Nate’s quest for quality cannabis led him through Canada’s cannabis industry where he discovered his future head extractor and business partner, Noel Liese.
Noel Liese, head extractor: Meet one of the inventors of live resin! Noel has been perfecting his craft in the Northern California hills since 1998, bringing decades of cannabis expertise to the East Coast.
Steve Lovis, founder: With his background in vanilla extraction, Steve’s bringing a new level of innovation and efficiency to cannabis extraction. Get smoother, cleaner and more consistent hits.
Bringing SUN to NJ
“Our goal is to create extracts that embody the warmth of the sun.” shares Nate. “We are creating whole plant extracts with nothing added…
and to show what the str@in really was at the moment it was harvested.”
For them, live resin is their bread and butter. Nate explains, “We started with live resin because that’s what we know best, and we can show there’s a whole other level to extractions.” This approach means letting the plants guide the way. He also points out, “A lot of live resin on the market is mass-produced and follows a simple formula where everything is treated the same way.”
SUN prides itself on giving individualized care. “One thing that we try not to do is force an extraction to go into a product that it doesn’t necessarily want to be,” says Nate.
…and the proof is in their terps. “When we do our extractions, we create a side product called Terp Juice. (A high-terpene extract that Noel trademarked over ten years ago.) This extract is anywhere between 20 and 40% terpenes (7-8% is normal) and 50 to 60% THCA,” Noel explains.
Fresh Frozen Friends
“Fire in, fire out” isn’t just a motto at SUN—it’s their guiding principle for sourcing top-tier cannabis flower. As they put it, “only fire makes sunshine,” meaning only the best flower. Nothing enters their facility without their team going to the cultivation and passing their examination.
Thanks to Noel’s West Coast roots, SUN found kindred spirits in Garden Greens. “We love their flower, we love their facility, and I love their team. Everything about them,” Nate shares.
…and local connections led them to North Lake Supply. Nate recalls, “North Lake’s material—that mint jelly—was the first thing to ever go in our extractor, and it came out beautifully.”
With Brighterside, SUN found their craft cannabis soulmates. “What they (Lindsay and Frank) do is the epitome of craft and small batch, and what we do with it is the epitome of craft batch,” says Noel.
GH1 carts and a Velvet Mac blend (Velvet OG x Free Mac) just dropped at PB. Don’t sit on this. This is a very limited release!
The Art of Blending
Extract blending is born from SUN’s own experiments mixing dabs at home. Unlike typical single-strain extracts, SUN combines multiple extracts to create one cohesive blend. “If you breed two strains together, the extract won’t be the same as if we take two extracts and blend it.” Nate explains.
Take Discodelic, for example—a blend of North Lake’s Pound Town and Chunkadelic strains. With one leaning Sativa and the other Indica-dominant, both bring earthy, fuel-like notes and a high myrcene profile, resulting in a beautifully blended extract that hits over 3.5% myrcene.
Ahead of the Curve in Cleanliness
While full certification in cGMP (drug regulations enforced by the FDA) and ISO 9000 (international standards on quality management and assurance) might be years away, the SUN team isn’t waiting around. They already built out their procedures with those methodologies in mind.
3,2,1…Blastoff!
SUN Extraction’s flavor-focused brand, Space Ranger, is touching down this November! Get ready for liquid diamonds and saucy extracts infused with terpenes and bold flavors—think watermelon, tropical and more.
Next year, they’ll be rolling out live rosin and infused pre-rolls.
Why SUN Picked PB
We were honored to be the second dispensary to carry SUN extracts. When choosing who to partner with, SUN “prioritize those (dispensaries) that we believe really care about the plant and the products of their zone.” They also emphasized, “You are the group of people that touch the clients. We don’t always see or get to meet them.”
Community Note 💚
“The first people that I would shout out are our cultivators (Garden Greens, Brighterside Farms and Northlake Supply) because we can’t grow our own. Having those key cultivation partners is the cornerstone of every single thing that we do here…We also would shout out our lawyers who got us here, which would be Shapiro Prolin And specifically Eric Rieser. He has helped us as we don’t have an in-house lawyer. We’re doing so many contracts and agreements, and needing that guidance is critical. So without him and without the other lawyers on our side to get the facility here, we wouldn’t be able to do what we’re doing. So it’s with the help of so many unique people across the state that we truly got to this point.”
