Andrew Heckman on Building OGGO Growth Systems and the Future of Cannabis Innovation
- Ishqa Hillman
- Jul 20
- 4 min read
Babes, I am so excited about this one. I recorded this episode at the My Bud Vase offices, surrounded by some of the most beautiful bongs I've ever seen, sitting down with Andrew Heckman from OGGO Growth Systems up in Ontario, Canada. We'd actually already recorded together the week before, when I was a guest on his show, and that conversation was so good I knew I needed him on mine too.
Andrew is yet another reason why I say men are babes too. He's a carpenter turned grower turned inventor turned business owner, and every single one of those chapters ended up feeding the next.
This episode is proof that your "detour" is usually just the long way to your actual path.
Who Is Andrew Heckman?
Andrew Heckman is the owner of OGGO Growth Systems Incorporated (OGGO GSI), a family-run hydroponic, aeroponic, and water culture grow equipment company based in Southwestern Ontario. He co-owns the business with his wife, his sister Jax, and business partners Pete and Shannon, a husband-and-wife team. Andrew is also a third-generation carpenter and owner of Heckman Renovations, and he hosts the podcast Growing Pains with Andrew Heckman.
Andrew started growing as a teenager back in 2008, got licensed to grow medical cannabis in Canada in 2011, and taught himself to build his own aeroponic cloning machines from scratch, because he couldn't afford to buy one. That decision, made out of necessity in his early twenties, became the foundation for everything OGGO makes today.
From Guerrilla Grower to OGGO Growth Systems
Before it was a company, OGGO stood for the Ontario Guerrilla Growers Organization, a nod to the guys who taught Andrew how to grow back when cannabis wasn't accepted anywhere near mainstream society. The "GG" still stands for Gorilla Grower, and that gorilla mascot protecting the plant is baked into everything OGGO builds.
Andrew's path there wasn't a straight line. He worked professional grow facilities, learned water culture, and got so burned out on growing for an hourly wage that he temporarily lost his taste for the plant altogether. He stepped away, went back to building trailers at a manufacturing facility, and that's where he met Pete, his now business partner. One night Pete came out to see Andrew's home grow, watched his Gorilla Ponics system in action, and said, "Dude, we gotta start a business." Both families said yes, and OGGO Growth Systems Incorporated officially launched in January of last year, though the brand had been years in the making.
Inside the OGGO Growth Systems Product Lineup
Everything OGGO builds comes out of Andrew's own trial and error. He estimates he built 100 to 200 iterations of his first cloning machine before he ever sold one.
The Mothership — OGGO's flagship and most accessible aeroponic system. It houses one mother plant and up to 18 clones in the exact same environment she lives in, same feed, same light, same temperature, so the clones never have to adjust to a new "room." Andrew calls it his growing gift to the world.
Gorilla Ponics — Andrew's original invention, an outdoor grow system that takes indoor aeroponic technology and scales it up under natural sunlight. OGGO's slogan for it says it best: indoor quality, outdoor quantity.
The Gorilla Strength Trainer System — A low-stress training tool used the moment a clone is cut, designed to shift the plant's stress response instead of overwhelming it, cutting down that typical 12 to 24 hour wilt.
A 136-site industrial cloner — Still unreleased, currently in testing, and built for growers who need to fill large orders fast.
Building Community Beyond the Grow Room
Andrew didn't stop at hardware. OGGO now runs four YouTube channels: OGGO GSI for product content, Growing Pains for the podcast, a Saturday morning live session that gets pulled from YouTube and archived exclusively for members, and OGGO Charizard, a Pokémon collector's channel that has nothing to do with growing and everything to do with reminding people he's a human being with hobbies, not just a cannabis brand.
That instinct to diversify came from getting burned. OGGO got monetized on YouTube, then demonetized and three-striked before their first payout ever came through. Instead of folding, they moved their content to their own website's subscription platform, which is now the backbone of OGGO's membership program.
Members get two tiers, Gorilla Gardener and Apex, both of which include access to a private Discord where Andrew and his co-owners are reachable directly, no hold music required, plus store discounts, free shipping, and monthly giveaways. There's also Sunday Service, Andrew's non-religious ritual of reading from a book called Back to Basics with the community and setting intentions for the week ahead.
Behind the scenes, Andrew's sister Jax produces and edits the show, his wife runs inventory and online content alongside Shannon, and Pete handles manufacturing right beside him.
The Bottom Line
Andrew's story is a reminder that your skills don't disappear when you change industries, they just wait for the right project to reassemble around. Every job he was disenfranchised by, every facility that hired him for carpentry instead of cultivation, was quietly building the exact resume he needed to found OGGO Growth Systems.
If you're a grower, a collector, or just someone who wants fresher food on your table, go check out OGGO Growth Systems, and go listen to my episode on Growing Pains with Andrew Heckman too. This is what it looks like when guerrilla roots grow into a real brand.
Watch the full interview on YouTube:
Connect with Andrew Heckman:
Website: https://www.oggogrown.com/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/oggo.grown/
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