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US (MN): Trying to expand a cannabis business while surrounded by stigma

In a former cellphone store at the Canna Corners operation on Main Street, customers came in and out on a summer afternoon — a young man in sandals and backpack, a retiree in a veteran's cap.


"My wife takes half a gummy every day before bedtime. It helps her sleep," said Mike Lafrance, noting his wife suffers from autoimmune complications. "For me? I drink Miller."
For longtime radio DJ John Reitmeier and his associate Casey Hammer, it's been a rocky road in getting their enterprise, Canna Corners, accepted in northwestern Minnesota.

"The council here [in Crookston] now is favorable to neutral," Reitmeier said, seated behind a laptop at his Crookston shop."But there were people accusing me of being Satan incarnate."

Reitmeier, whose rapid-fire voice has been heard over northland airwaves for decades,can be prone to colorful speech. In late July, he sat under dueling posters, of a Hiroshige print of crashing waves and a Minnesota cannabis company, Moonlight, recalling that there was nothing cute about those early days just two summers ago, when he opened his store down the block from a bustling business district and a stone's throw from the winding Red Lake River.

Read the full article on The Minnesota Star Tribune.

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