CustomGrow420: WeedTube’s First Superstar

How Joel “Jolie Olie” Hradecky turned giant hits, unforgettable catchphrases and raw one-take videos into one of cannabis YouTube’s first million-subscriber empires.

Washington Launch

Joel Hradecky, better known as Jolie Olie, launched CustomGrow420 as Washington’s legal cannabis era was beginning.

The channel dates to March 2013, only months after Washington voters approved recreational cannabis.

The exact first upload remains unclear, and it is possible an earlier channel or videos existed. Parts of the CustomGrow420 archive disappeared over time, making March 2013 the strongest documented starting point rather than a perfectly settled origin date.

The Character

CustomGrow420 was built as much around Jolie Olie’s personality as the cannabis itself.

His stretched-out “Yoyo you yeahyaaa YouTube, YouTuuuuuuube!” became instantly recognizable, usually followed by “Jolie Olie comin’ atcha for CustomGrow420.”

Before a hit came “cheers.” Afterward came phrases like “let’s get it,” “it’s major” and “oh God.”

The repetition turned simple catchphrases into part of the character.

The Iron-Lung Era

Despite the word “grow” in the channel name, enormous hits became some of CustomGrow420’s most recognizable content.

The 30-inch Lung Buster, Dabinator, timebomb bowls, hot knives, helium dabs and 1-gram challenges turned extreme smoking sessions into viral spectacle.

Coughing fits were not edited out. They became part of the entertainment.

When the channel reached 250,000 subscribers, Jolie marked the milestone with 25 rapid-fire dabs.

The Breakout

By late 2015, CustomGrow420 was approaching 600,000 subscribers and was reportedly adding close to 1,000 subscribers per day.

By March 2016, the channel had passed 800,000.

That same period brought mainstream attention. VICE profiled Jolie as a major figure in the emerging WeedTube world.

His videos often felt intentionally unpolished. Long takes, huge hits, coughing, jokes and direct conversation made viewers feel less like they were watching a produced show and more like they were sitting in the room.

The Million-Subscriber Club

By January 2017, CustomGrow420 had surpassed 1.2 million subscribers.

Cannabis creators existed on YouTube before Jolie, but his channel reached a scale that very few cannabis-native personalities had achieved.

He later leaned into titles such as “Don of Dabs,” “King of Pot” and “Social Media Giant.”

The character had become bigger than a review channel.

Building the Creator Blueprint

CustomGrow420 also showed that a cannabis personality could become a business.

The channel expanded beyond videos into product reviews, affiliate traffic, merchandise, branded glass, Hemper boxes, appearances and endorsements.

This was happening before “influencer” became the default term for creators monetizing large online audiences.

Jolie helped demonstrate that cannabis media could produce its own recognizable personalities, products and commercial ecosystems.

The 2018 Purge

That growth eventually collided with changing platform rules.

After YouTube’s broader 2018 advertising crackdown, cannabis creators faced increasing demonetization, restrictions, strikes and reduced visibility.

Multiple cannabis channels were removed or penalized during this period.

CustomGrow420, then sitting around 1.5 million subscribers, was deleted in 2018 before later being restored without a clear public explanation.

The incident showed how vulnerable cannabis creators were to platforms they did not control.

Legacy

CustomGrow420 did not invent WeedTube. It proved how large WeedTube could become.

Older cannabis creators laid groundwork before Jolie Olie arrived, but CustomGrow420 pushed cannabis-native YouTube into true mass-audience territory.

Videos disappeared, platforms changed and algorithms became less welcoming to cannabis content.

The personality survived all of it.

The intro, the Lung Buster, the coughing fits and the larger-than-life Jolie Olie character became part of cannabis internet history.

CustomGrow420 showed that a weed channel could become a million-subscriber entertainment brand before cannabis creators had a reliable blueprint for getting there.