Ron Buel and two partners launch Dank Bros., an indoor grow operation in Milwaukie.
The startup has raised $1.4 million from 46 investors, said Buel, a local entrepreneur and former business and strategic planning director at Nike.
Buel founded Willamette Week in 1974.
Dank Bros.’ two other managing members are Gary Gatewood and Mike Powers. The company brought its first plants last month.
Buel expressed concern about market oversaturation but said the problem would likely resolve itself in a couple of years.
Asked if he smoked marijuana, the seventy-six year-old said he had taken a couple of puffs once.
But he didn’t inhale? “No,” Buel said.
He did eat a piece of candy at a cannabis conference, and it made him so “whirly” that he had to pull off the road on the way home.
“Never eat candy and drive,” he said.
Click here to subscribe to Oregon Business.
