Co-owners Tiffany Hightower, left, and Victoria Williams smile at a ribbon cutting for Star Buds, the first craft cannabis grower in Illinois, in Rockford on Oct. 3, 2022.
As a craft grower, the business is severely limited in size compared with existing growers. But its launch also served as inspiration for hundreds of other cannabis business owners in Illinois, still trying to get off the ground.“It required persistence,” CEO Victoria Williams said. “I’m so proud to show people that it can be done.”
Unlike dispensary licenses, which may not be sold until they open for business, some craft growers are looking to sell their licenses.Chicago Tribune editors' top story picks, delivered to your inbox each afternoon.The licensing process in Illinois got delayed repeatedly in Illinois due to complications from the COVID pandemic, claims of unfairness in scoring the applications, and lawsuits.
The warehouse remains mostly empty except for one room where 600 six-inch plant cuttings, or clones, grow. After five weeks they’ll be transferred to a bigger room to mature or “vegetate” for five more weeks, followed by eight weeks under alternating 12 hours of light and darkness. That will simulate day and night to trigger the growth of flowering buds containing THC, the main psychoactive component that gets users high.
Sad...after locking black people up for decades, there should be more...
Wow, what a reason to celebrate, not.
I’m waiting for the first Caucasian pot store to open in Rockford and then I’ll buy.
Twisted American way, who needs a job, who needs responsibility, when you can get all the pot you want.... Pot should be recreational not the way of life it's in the United States
Why so much racial reporting?