According to Michael Dundas, president and CEO of Sira Naturals, making cannabis-infused products is not as simple as adding cannabis oil to cookies. “It turns out it’s more complicated than that,” he says, pointing to regulatory requirements that involve food processing and sanitation practices while scaling up.

“They were essentially brand new to regulated cannabis but what really stood out to me from these guys is they had a very specific focused plan, a very detailed business plan they laid out for us,” Dundas said of Hothouse Holyoke.

Park and Wiggins met at a teaching program in Texas, but they wanted to smoke marijuana freely in a state where it’s legal. She likes to bake, while he enjoys cultivating.
During their summer vacation in 2016, the same year Massachusetts voters broadly legalized recreational marijuana, the pair landed in Quincy, a city south of Boston.

After marijuana legalization passed and the state structure for regulatory oversight got underway, they headed to Holyoke, where marijuana businesses have been welcomed by Mayor Alex Morse.