How Is CBD Oil Made? From Hemp Plant to Product

The thought “We can do that too, but better!” laid the foundation for MAGU in 2017, and the initial pop-up store grew into a steadily growing company with its own cultivation and its own production in Vienna. Our little plants are accompanied by our employees from the growth process all the way into your hands. If you have ever wondered: “How do you actually extract cannabinoids?” or “How is CBD oil actually made?”, then you have come to the right place. In this article, you can expect a little insight into how our plants become our CBD oil.

Breeding the hemp plant

In the beginning was the seed – or the cutting.

Normally, the hemp plant is an annual plant. This means that it spends the winter in seed form under the ground and then sprouts anew in spring. In our case it is different: we arrange the seasons, so to speak, just as it suits us – in our indoor hall. (If you would like to take a look inside our hall, you can go on a little tour here.) Thanks to the constantly adjusted light and temperature conditions, our plants can live for two or more years. These old-timers among hemp plants are called mother plants, as they are the origin of our seeds and cuttings. And this is exactly where our production cycle begins: with planting the cuttings.

Obtaining the cannabinoids

With the hemp plant, a distinction is made between female and male plants. The cuttings are female clones of the mother plant. When the female plant matures, it forms flowers that contain a particularly large number of trichomes. These trichomes, in turn, contain the pearl of the hemp plant: the cannabinoids, such as CBD and CBG, their precursors and various terpenes. The psychoactive THC can also be found in hemp plants, but in our plants it is at the minimum set by EU standards.

When the plants are ripe, the flowers are harvested. We do this by hand in order to provide the highest quality assurance. Before the flowers are processed further, they have to dry. The cannabinoids and terpenes can now be extracted from the dried flowers. There are many different processes for extraction. Suitable solvents include, for example, hexane, butane, alcohol and CO2. As cannabinoids are fat-soluble, oil can also be used to dissolve them out of the flower.

The carrier oil

The carrier oil of our CBD oil is so-called hemp seed oil, or hemp nut oil. We make most of our oils from outdoor flowers that we have grown on an organic farm. For this purpose, male and female plants are grown together in an outdoor field. As a result, a large proportion of the flowers contain seeds, which are then pressed and thus processed into oil.

This carrier oil is then enriched with cannabinoids and terpenes to achieve the desired percentage of CBD – in our case 5%, 10% or 20%. This can be done by producing extracts or directly from the plant. Because all the cannabinoids and terpenes are added, our organic CBD oil is a so-called full spectrum oil. The substances reinforce each other and therefore work better. This effect is called the entourage effect.

Now all that’s left is bottling (to make the whole packaging process sound “short” :‘-)) and, with the help of our logistics department, the oil then sets off from our production hall to our shops or to your home! And for us the cycle begins all over again – via mother plants, cuttings and extraction of the cannabinoids to CBD oil.