VERMILION RESERVATION- After the first Native-owned cannabis dispensary in Minnesota opened in Red Lake in August 2023, the Bois Forte band set the wheels in motion to one day do the same. And while the process has taken longer than many had hoped, the band is now on the verge of opening a new dispensary on the Fortune Bay grounds, possibly before the end of the year.
The dispensary will be located on the old frontage road just north of the Fortune Bay RV Park. To expedite the business, the band purchased a prefabricated 2,000-square-foot building from a Mississippi company for $318,000. The band plans to sell its cannabis products under the brand name “Ishkode,” an Ojibwe word which means fire. The dispensary will offer real cannabis flower, pre-rolls, gummies, drinks, legal mushroom options, and more. For the time being, the band will source its cannabis from other tribes, while continuing to explore and develop its own growing operation in the future.
Bois Forte Development Corporation Executive Director Drew Ebert told the Bois Forte News in August that it had taken a lot of behind-the-scenes work to move the project forward, and that consultations with a company called Minnesota Roots had been instrumental to the endeavor.
“Minnesota Roots has been critical in helping us establish policy and operations, introductions to vendors for all of our needs. They assist in negotiations for all things related to the dispensary, grow, and product,” Ebert said.
Minnesota Roots officials estimated that Bois Forte could be looking at monthly gross revenues of $90,000 to $100,000 at the Fortune Bay site.
“Minnesota Roots has many success stories,” said Ebert. “Fortune Bay is already a destination location for winter or summer activities, plus the casino. Now people coming up (will) have access to real weed because of this new amenity that we have.”
But the extra traffic to Fortune Bay is no guarantee of success, as the band discovered with a smoke shop in the resort selling hemp-derived edibles and beverages that failed less than a year after opening.
But the band may have longer than originally anticipated to establish a customer base free from local competition as the state’s effort to establish its system of licensing cannabis vendors has also lagged behind its original timeline. Minnesota is reportedly on pace to be the fifth slowest of 23 states to go from legalization to legal sales. Officials in the state Office of Cannabis Management (OCM) have stated that cannabis sales will begin in 2025, but several prospective vendors in October told FOX9 News in St. Paul that they are growing increasingly skeptical that they’ll be in operation before 2026 given the delays in implementation of the state regulatory system. OCM has said it expects a second lottery for the current group of social-equity applicants to take place by March 2025.
With the new dispensary, the Bois Forte band hopes to reverse its fortunes from prior attempted business forays into purchasing hardware stores and building a convenience store in Eveleth that did not come to fruition. Band leaders have consistently expressed the need to expand business revenues produced by Fortune Bay and the band’s convenience stores for the benefit of band members and tribal services.
The band had hoped to open the new dispensary by the end of September and create a second one at the C-Store in Nett Lake, but the C-Store project has been put on hold for the time being as efforts have been focused on the final pieces needed to get the Fortune Bay location up and running, hopefully by mid-December. Ebert is confident that the dispensary will be a solid addition to the band’s business portfolio.
“I’m excited about the real potential our dispensary will have,” he said. “I understand the concerns that have been raised, but given the expertise Minnesota Roots brings to the table, and growing market demands I am confident the dispensary will be a win for us and the future grow operation will be an even bigger win for us.”
The Bois Forte News contributed to this article.