The federal hemp rules change on November 12, and the founder whose products already clear the new limit is not treating it as a win.
Mark Gillilan started Kyoto Botanicals in 2020 as a THC-free hemp brand after a decade in hemp wellness, including time at Charlotte’s Web. On Unscripted Cannabis with host Just J, he walked through what the new total-THC standard actually does to the category. His products fit it. He still called the situation a bummer.
Why he went THC-free in the first place, and it was not the law
It was a bad afternoon in his own kitchen. He was developing flavoured full-spectrum tinctures, spent half a day mixing extract with flavour oils, and eventually noticed something:
“Part way through, I started to realize that I was really high. Because even that, you know, even below that 0.3% THC level, that can still end up with a significant amount of milligrams of THC, which is what really matters, right? The percentage doesn’t matter… It’s the milligrams, right?”
— Mark Gillilan, Kyoto Botanicals
That distinction is the whole regulatory story in one sentence. A percentage cap scales with the size of the bottle. A milligram cap does not. Under 0.3 percent, a high-potency tincture can carry several milligrams of THC per serving and still be compliant hemp.
What actually changes
Host Just J framed the change on the episode: a law signed in late 2025 redefining hemp federally, effective November 12, 2026, moving to a total THC standard. Mark’s reading of where the line lands:
“this applies to finished products, right? So it’s a consumable product. So that’s 0.4 milligrams per container plus to what you would buy off the shelf, buy online, that sort of thing.”
— Mark Gillilan
He is careful about the limits of his own expertise, and says so more than once: “I’m not a policy expert, so don’t quote me on this.” He also does not know where the number came from. “I don’t know where they got point four milligrams per container. I don’t I don’t know where that number came from, but that’s the number we’re that’s you know, that’s the number we have to abide by now.”
His estimate of the damage, offered as an estimate
“so it’s gonna be it’s gonna be massive. even ahead of November it’s already started to ripple through the states”
— Mark Gillilan
On scale, he is explicitly citing something he has read rather than measured: “Numbers I’ve seen are like 95% of the CBD industry will now be outside of… the laws.” Treat that as a figure in circulation, not a verified one. What he can speak to first-hand is his own shelf: “pretty much every C B D brand that’s out there now has leaned heavily into THC over the last couple of years. All of them, all your big brands in the space.”
And the balance sheet consequence nobody is putting in a press release:
“They’re gonna have Manufacturing lines that aren’t being used anymore… there’s gonna be a lot of capital investment out there that’s now sitting idle. I don’t know what’s gonna happen to all that.”
— Mark Gillilan
He blames the industry, not the regulator
This is the part that separates his answer from most compliance commentary. He thinks the rule is a response to something real:
“it’s unfortunate that we got here. It’s unfortunate that we couldn’t regulate ourselves as an industry… it’s like water, it’s gonna find the weak spots. People are gonna find the weak spots in regulation.”
— Mark Gillilan
He is careful not to tar everyone: “there’s a lot of really good actors. There’s a lot of people that are in it for the right reasons that wanna help people.” But his verdict on the Delta-8 era is one word repeated — it had to be addressed.
The people he is worried about are two groups who did not cause any of it:
- Customers who relied on ethically made full-spectrum products for the entourage effect. Outside states with legal marijuana industries, he does not expect those to survive the cutover.
- Farmers. “it’s been awesome for farmers to be able to transition crops specifically. You know, Kentucky’s a big one. Lots of tobacco has been tobacco farms have been converted into hemp farms”
What is still unresolved upstream
The finished-product limit is the clear part. The extraction chain is not. Raw hemp extract is concentrated by definition — Mark describes it as “a really viscous, almost like a molasses product” before it is diluted into a tincture — and nobody has told the raw material market how the new standard treats it.
“So there’s uncertainty in the raw material market on exactly how this is going to affect that. that everybody’s gotta figure out”
— Mark Gillilan
The advice that has not changed
Whatever happens on November 12, his consumer guidance is the same as it was before any of this: find out who is behind the brand, and find the lab results. On the show he was direct about people whose job depends on a clean test — if drug testing is part of your livelihood, he recommends avoiding cannabis products entirely, no-detect included, because “it’s not worth your livelihood.”
Quotes are verbatim from the raw Riverside transcript of the episode, trimmed only for false starts and filler. Nothing here is legal, regulatory or medical advice. Listen to the full conversation at Unscripted Cannabis.