Dark Hawk Genetics : Black Market Sister Brand to Big Chief
One rule of thumb to go by in the cannabis vaping community is that, if you’re having trouble tracking down a brand, it’s probably black market. Such is the case with Dark Hawk Genetics, sometimes known only as “Darkhawk.” You will find many leads for this company, all of them dead ends.
Before we get started, “Darkhawk” is not to be confused with the comic book character.
All the “official” sources for DarkHawk are dead ends
First there’s the packaging, which lists “darkhawkgenetics.com” right on the box! That should be straightforward enough… but it’s a parked domain at GoDaddy.com. Note, this box shot comes from a Reddit post only 24 days old as of this writing.
How about that Instagram? Sure, here is @darkhawkgenetics on Instagram. It’s an account with zero posts set to “private.” However, it does list a separate domain, “darkhawk.co.” Could this be the actual home page of this brand? Maybe, but that domain is also nothing but a big logo on a page. Here’s a screenshot of the source code for that page, which actually contains the most information we’ve seen for it so far:
We see the claims “the next generation in cannabis brands,” and “one of Southern California’s fastest growing Cannabis brands,” and a name for the author, “Taha Khan.” We should view source code more often! Sadly this doesn’t narrow things down; there’s a lot of “Taka Khan”s out there including some high profile people in academics, and the name was probably used as an alias here.
Long story short: No company, no license, no source. Conventional wisdom in the vape community claims that Big Chief “owns” the Dark Hawk brand. For a recap, Big Chief was a black market brand for so long that their packaging saturated the black market supply sites, long before they ever thought of a license. They finally did acquire one, as an afterthought, and that license has blinked in and out of existence ever since.
Regardless of Big Chief’s license status, the damage is already done. Black market vape carts are now such a toxic epidemic, they’ve stretched well beyond synthetic cannabinoids to even avenues for fentanyl. That’s beyond the initial vape-related lung injury epidemic that predated COVID. Even if they extract the cannabis and make it right in front of you, every time you buy a Big Chief cart, you are supporting a company financed by blood money. As is the case with any brand which is counterfeit to the ends of the Earth and back.
The deadly reputation of Big Chief is their own doing from cruising without due regulation for so long, and they’re apparently doing it all over again with DarkHawk.
DarkHawks flood the market with no license in sight
Your most common search for Dark Hawk’s owners will simply uncover other consumers asking each other the same thing. Obligatory Reddit list:
- 10 days ago
- 24 days ago
- 1 month ago
- 1 month ago
- 2 months ago
- 5 months ago – note completely different packaging
This brand has also been on the streets since at least December 2019, going by this IMGUR video.
Speaking of video, Dark Hawk Genetics is prominently reviewed on YouTube. Dozens of hits there, it seems several reviewers have an interest in them.
Dark Hawk Genetics are not single-sourced
You will find no legit dispensaries carry DarkHawk, but every black market website and corner plug does!
We see a lot of Dark Hawk packaging with “delta 8” on it too. This might simply be a case of black market packagers in China getting whiff of the popularity of delta 8 and printing it on the box, with no connection to anything inside the cart.
We find a number of DarkHawk plugs on social media too…
So we can blow away any comforting delusions we might have had about the oil within these cartridges being “single source” or “centrally distributed.” They are concentrated in southern California (OC, LA, IE) but we’ve seen them as far east as Illinois.
Just treat every DarkHawk as fake
Between all the sketchy distributors, we’re going to say for safety’s sake to just steer clear of them now. Regardless of future developments, it’s far too late for the brand to save face with a token license now. It’s been 2 years, they have a blank domain. Take a hint: any company that insults you this way could care less about anybody’s health.
Readers, when the inevitable hospitalization reports come in regarding DarkHawks, file them here in the comments or detour to our forum.
