The Growing Pot Economy
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http://www.freep.com/article/20091112/NEWS06/911120424/1008/The-growi...
The tailspin may be over, but no one's suggesting that bedrock industries of the Michigan economy like cars and real estate are headed for boom times again.The Michigan marijuana economy, on the other hand, appears to be going gangbusters.
Once largely underground, activity linked to the cultivation and use of pot is now in full public view thanks to voter approval in 2008 of marijuana use for medicinal purposes.
Equipment manufacturers, retailers, doctors, lawyers and publishers are suddenly advertising, hanging up shingles, opening storefronts and building growing equipment all over the state.
But suppliers of the newly defined medicine -- the certified caregivers who can grow up to 12 plants a year for as many as five clients -- are, so far, less visible in part because the distinction between legal commerce and criminal activity isn't always clear.
"There's a whole lot going on," said Matthew Abel, a Detroit attorney who has become a sort of medical marijuana specialist, "and it's going to keep growing."
Like a weed.
Medical pot opportunities flourish
Rick Ferris worked 25 years in construction until a debilitating leg condition took him off ladders. Then he got into landscaping and was doing OK until 2008, when "every laid-off guy with a truck" in southeast Michigan started mowing lawns.
But Ferris isn't complaining. In fact, things are looking up at Big Daddy's, site of his latest venture, an Oak Park facility to manufacture hydroponic growing systems. The kind used for growing marijuana.
Ferris, 46, is one of an increasing number of Michiganders looking to cash in on last year's voter-approved initiative that legalized the use of medical marijuana. In addition to his manufacturing operation (which shares space with the still-operating landscape business), Ferris is set to publish next month the first issue of the Michigan Medical Marijuana magazine.
So far, so good, he said in a recent interview.
Since getting under way in the spring, Ferris has hired five employees, three of them full-time. He has sold at least 140 hydroponic (soilless) growing systems and said without them, the landscaping business would have closed.
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http://www.freep.com/article/20091112/NEWS06/911120424/1008/The-growing-pot-econ...
