Hobby to craft: First marijuana ‘microbusiness’ license awarded to Northern Michigan man

The first marijuana seeds were planted for his personal use in 2009. Back then, Ben Kolasa didn’t know what he was doing.

A little more than a decade later, through countless trials and errors, the 33-year-old is opening Sticky Bush Farms, his own recreational marijuana business in Presque Isle County’s Onaway, about 45 minutes from Mackinaw City. He said it’s an entirely new world.

Kosala didn’t initially expect his hobby to evolve into a career.

The Marijuana Regulatory Agency, the body that oversees the state’s medical and recreational marijuana markets, issued Kolasa the first ever recreational marijuana “microbusiness” license last week, and he hopes to open the doors to his tiny 500-square-foot storefront in an Onaway an industrial park this November.

“When I started growing, it was just for me, so I could provide myself with medicine,” Kosala said. “Then, I guess it started being decent medicine. People wanted help or just wanted to try it. And then I started helping some other people, epilepsy patients, some cancer patients, an MS (multiple sclerosis) patient.

“It kept blossoming into more. I just kept going as the road opened up.” [Read more at MLive.com]