Starting a cannabis business is exciting. It’s also a little intimidating.
You can spend months working through licensing, finding a location, building a team, planning your store, and figuring out how you’re going to pay for everything. Then you finally get close to opening and realize there are dozens of decisions that can affect whether the business actually works once the doors open.
Minnesota’s adult-use cannabis market creates a lot of opportunity, but opportunity doesn’t remove the challenges of operating a regulated business.
In fact, one of the most important lessons for Minnesota entrepreneurs is this: a new market doesn’t mean you have to learn everything the hard way.
Minnesota may be establishing its adult-use market, but regulated cannabis businesses have been operating in other states for years. There are operators, vendors, consultants, technology providers, cultivators, retailers, and service companies that have already experienced many of the problems Minnesota businesses are about to encounter.
Learn from them.
That was one of the central themes of a recent episode of The Canna Connect Show, recorded live at CannaCon Midwest 2026 in Saint Paul. The panel brought together four people with firsthand experience across different parts of the cannabis industry:
- Brytany Melville, Forte Ops
- Jonathan Hunt, Leech Lake Cannabis Company
- Jacob Affeldt, Frostbite Dispensary
- Munir Haque, Cure8
The conversation covered cultivation, retail, operations, technology, compliance, infrastructure, staffing, margins, and what it takes to build a cannabis business that can survive beyond opening day.
Here are some of the biggest do’s and don’ts from the discussion.
Do: Vet the People You Work With
If there’s one piece of advice worth taking seriously before spending a dollar, it’s this: vet your partners and vendors.
Cannabis has attracted a lot of people who want to sell services to the industry. That doesn’t mean all of them have meaningful cannabis experience.
Ask questions.
Have they actually done this before? Can they provide references? Do those references come from businesses similar to yours? Can they explain exactly what they’re providing? Do they understand the regulatory environment you’re operating in?
Don’t be afraid to ask for proof.
Minnesota entrepreneurs have an advantage that earlier markets didn’t always have: you can learn from what happened elsewhere.
Talk to operators in mature cannabis markets. Ask what worked, what didn’t, and what they’d do differently.
A vendor’s sales presentation isn’t enough.
You want to understand what happens after you sign the contract.
Don’t: Assume Everyone Selling Cannabis Services Understands Cannabis
This sounds obvious, but it’s an easy mistake to make.
Someone can have an impressive website, a long list of services, and plenty of industry terminology without having meaningful operational experience.
That matters because cannabis isn’t ordinary retail.
Compliance requirements, seed-to-sale tracking, security, inventory controls, payments, employee procedures, and technology all create additional layers of complexity.
Before choosing a partner, ask about their actual cannabis work.
Who have they worked with? What problems have they solved? What happens when something goes wrong?
The answers can tell you much more than a polished pitch deck.
Do: Learn From Mature Cannabis Markets
Minnesota operators don’t have to reinvent the wheel.
Other states have already experienced many of the growing pains that come with building a regulated cannabis market. They’ve dealt with changing regulations, price compression, inventory issues, employee turnover, payment challenges, technology problems, and the realities of competing in both regulated and legacy markets.
Study those experiences.
That doesn’t mean copying another state’s business model. Minnesota has its own regulations, customers, economics, and market dynamics.
But the underlying business lessons can still be incredibly useful.
The question shouldn’t be, “What did another state do?”
It should be, “What can we learn from what happened there?”
Do: Understand What It Really Takes to Run Cultivation
For businesses entering cultivation, the excitement of producing cannabis can sometimes overshadow the operational complexity behind it.
Jonathan Hunt’s perspective from Leech Lake Cannabis Company highlights just how much goes into commercial cultivation.
Seed-to-sale compliance is only one piece.
Operators also need to think about genetics, quality, production planning, scaling, inventory, staffing, environmental controls, and the realities of building a consistent supply.
Growing more doesn’t automatically mean making more money.
As production scales, so do the operational demands.
Minnesota’s developing supply will create opportunities, but cultivators need systems capable of maintaining quality and consistency as the business grows.
Don’t: Treat Compliance as Paperwork
Compliance needs to be built into the operation.
For cultivators, retailers, and other cannabis businesses, regulatory requirements affect everyday decisions. They influence how inventory is handled, how employees are trained, how transactions are processed, how information is recorded, and how businesses respond when something goes wrong.
The strongest operators don’t treat compliance as something they prepare for right before an inspection.
They build it into their procedures from the beginning.
That means documented SOPs, employee training, clear accountability, and systems that make the compliant process easier to follow.
Do: Know Your Local Customer
Jacob Affeldt’s experience building Frostbite Dispensary highlights another important lesson: you have to understand who you’re actually serving.
It’s easy to get distracted by the size of the overall cannabis market.
Your store doesn’t serve “the market.”
It serves the people who walk through your doors.
What do they value? What products are they looking for? How price-sensitive are they? What kind of experience do they expect? How much education do they need?
Understanding those questions should influence your product mix, store layout, staffing, marketing, and pricing strategy.
You can have a great dispensary and still struggle if the business isn’t aligned with the customers in your market.
Don’t: Underestimate Buildout Costs
A beautiful dispensary can become a very expensive dispensary.
Before committing to a design or construction plan, understand what the buildout will actually require.
Jacob’s experience also highlights the importance of controlling costs and making thoughtful decisions before construction gets too far along.
Every change made during construction can become expensive.
That’s why planning matters.
Think through your operational requirements before walls go up. Consider security, networking, cameras, electrical needs, POS equipment, inventory areas, employee spaces, customer flow, and future technology requirements.
Do: Plan Technology and Infrastructure Before Construction
This is an area where Munir Haque’s perspective from Cure8 is particularly relevant.
IT, cybersecurity, networking, surveillance, access control, electrical infrastructure, and construction shouldn’t be treated as completely separate projects.
They interact.
Where you put cameras affects wiring. Where you put networking equipment affects infrastructure. Access control needs to work with the physical layout. POS and other technology systems need reliable connectivity.
If these decisions are made after construction is nearly finished, you’re often left trying to retrofit systems into a space that wasn’t designed for them.
It’s much easier to plan infrastructure before the walls are closed.
Think about what the store needs today and what it might need two or three years from now.
Do: Build Strong SOPs and Train Your Employees
A dispensary doesn’t run on good intentions.
It runs on repeatable processes.
Brytany Melville’s operational perspective focuses on the systems behind the retail experience, including SOPs, employee training, technology, marketing, retention, and margins.
Your employees should know what to do, how to do it, and what to do when something doesn’t go according to plan.
That means documenting procedures for the important parts of the operation.
Opening and closing. Inventory. Customer interactions. Compliance. Security. Technology problems. Escalations. Incident reporting.
Then train people on those procedures.
And don’t stop training after orientation.
As your business changes, your training should change with it.
Don’t: Think Your Team Will Just Figure It Out
This is one of the most expensive assumptions a new operator can make.
Your employees aren’t mind readers.
If a process matters, document it. If something is complicated, train it. If a mistake could create a compliance problem, make the correct procedure clear.
Good employees still need good systems.
And when your team has those systems, managers can spend less time putting out avoidable fires and more time actually leading the business.
Do: Watch Your Margins Closely
Revenue can be exciting.
Profit is what keeps the business alive.
As Minnesota’s market develops, operators should be prepared for pricing pressure and changing consumer behavior. The economics of the market today won’t necessarily look the same a few years from now.
That means you need to understand your margins from the beginning.
Know your costs. Track labor. Understand inventory movement. Watch discounts. Monitor vendor expenses. Review product performance.
Growth isn’t automatically good if every additional dollar of revenue comes with an even larger expense.
Don’t: Expand Just Because You Can
There’s a natural temptation to think bigger once the first location starts working.
Another store. More employees. More products. More services.
But expansion should have a reason behind it.
Brytany’s operational perspective reinforces the importance of building a strong foundation before scaling.
If the first location has inconsistent SOPs, weak training, poor inventory controls, or thin margins, opening another location doesn’t solve those problems.
It multiplies them.
Get the operation working first.
Then determine whether the business is ready to grow.
Do: Prepare for the Market Five Years From Now
Opening day is important.
But it shouldn’t be the finish line.
Minnesota’s cannabis market will change. Regulations will evolve. More businesses will enter the market. Consumer expectations will change. Prices may move. Technology will improve. Consolidation could reshape the competitive landscape.
The operators who build flexible businesses will be better positioned to respond.
That means creating systems that can adapt.
Your technology should be scalable. Your SOPs should be updateable. Your training should be ongoing. Your financial model should account for changing margins.
Don’t build a business that only works under today’s conditions.
Build one that can adjust when tomorrow looks different.
Don’t: Forget the Legacy Market
Minnesota’s regulated adult-use market is developing, but cannabis consumers didn’t suddenly appear when legalization created new opportunities.
There’s already a customer base with existing purchasing habits and expectations.
That creates a competitive challenge for licensed businesses.
Legal operators need to give customers reasons to choose the regulated market. That can include product quality, consistency, safety, customer service, education, convenience, and trust.
The goal isn’t simply to open a legal store.
It’s to create a business customers want to return to.
The Bigger Lesson for Minnesota Cannabis Entrepreneurs
The panel discussion at CannaCon Midwest 2026 wasn’t really about getting a cannabis license.
It was about what happens afterward.
A license gets you permission to operate. It doesn’t guarantee that the business will be profitable, efficient, compliant, or resilient.
Those things have to be built.
That starts with choosing the right partners and learning from people who have already operated in regulated markets. It continues with careful planning around cultivation, retail, staffing, technology, security, compliance, infrastructure, and financial performance.
And it doesn’t end on opening day.
Minnesota has an opportunity to build a cannabis industry informed by the experiences of markets that came before it. Entrepreneurs don’t have to repeat every mistake those markets made.
Ask better questions.
Vet your partners.
Understand your customers.
Control your costs.
Train your team.
Build your infrastructure properly.
Protect your margins.
And give yourself enough operational flexibility to adapt as the market changes.
That’s how you move from simply opening a cannabis business to building one that can last.
Ready for What Comes Next?
Starting a cannabis business will always come with uncertainty. That’s part of building something new.
But you don’t have to approach every challenge as if you’re seeing it for the first time.
There are lessons, systems, and experiences available to you if you’re willing to learn from them.
At Forte Ops, we work with cannabis operators on the practical side of building and running their businesses from operational planning and SOPs to staffing, training, technology, and retail strategy.
If you’re preparing to enter Minnesota’s cannabis market, we’d be glad to help you think through the details before they become expensive problems.
Ready to Build Your Minnesota Cannabis Business?
Starting a cannabis business is only the first step. Building the systems, team, technology, SOPs, and operational foundation to support it is what comes next.
At Forte Ops, we help dispensary owners prepare for the realities of running a regulated business from operational planning and SOPs to staffing, training, technology, and retail strategy.
Preparing to enter Minnesota’s cannabis market? Connect with Forte Ops to build an operation that’s ready for opening day and everything that comes after it.
