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From growing weed in the basement to becoming one of the most sought-after premium cultivators in Michigan’s cannabis market, Growing Pains has clawed its way to the top.
Tom Farrell, co-founder of the Paw Paw brand, started growing as a caregiver in his west Michigan basement. He used the name Growing Pains because it was a pun and summed up the challenges of growing well. The name stuck and became an apt way to describe the learning curve of producing high-quality flower in a market flooded with flower.
He and co-founder Seth Miller built Growing Pains “by our hands,” Farrell explains, from installing the plumbing and irrigation system themselves to traveling across the country to track down unique new strains. The duo and their team worked long hours, learned from their mistakes, and committed to growing top-tier weed. Without deep-pocketed investors that have tried to dominate the market, the small crew turned their passion and commitment into their currency.
“I was always strict on quality and growing high-quality flower,” Farrell tells me. “When I get involved in something, I get really obsessed. I don’t sleep or eat. I just want to work on it. It spilled over into everything — the details and nuances.”
The DIY approach allowed the crew to grow incrementally. They started in a modest 5,000-square-foot building and saved money until they could afford to expand. They eventually scaled up, tripling their footprint to about 20,000 square feet.
Going from 84 flower lights to 304, Growing Pains can now grow up to 4,000 plants.
“It was a big expansion,” Farrell says. “Our weed has gotten better as we expanded. Most people go through growing pains as they grow. Ours got more dialed in.”
Since joining the recreational market in 2021, Growing Pains has built a loyal following by consistently rolling out fragrant, heavy-hitting flower.
In September, Growing Pains won three Michigan Zalympix awards for its impressive Honey Banana flower, which smells and tastes like banana bread stuffed with strawberries and honey and a dash of tea.
Growing Pains also took a dive into live rosin, a solventless concentrate known for its purity, potency, and flavor. The team brought on an experienced rosin producer, Jason Waller, who was tired of selling cars and missed weed.
Now Growing Pains is churning out some of the most unique and flavorful rosin strains in the state.
“I only knew enough to get in trouble with rosin,” Farrell says. “Jason is as obsessed with rosin as I am with growing weed. It’s so good to see that passion. He really cares. He has been a godsend. He was in the industry for years.”
In search of good flower to press into rosin, Farrell embarked on a cross-country trip and hooked up with L.A. Family Farms in California, where he traded a papaya strain for the Honey Banana. The buds were “fingery” and “very ugly,” Farrell says, so no one expected to sell any of it as flower.
“We saved a pound, and it looked crazy, and I smoked it, and I said, ‘Holy cow, this is great,’” Farrell recalls. “I didn’t have bags made, so I ran down to Menards and got half-ounce jars.”
And just like that, Growing Pains became one of the first cultivators in the state to offer half-ounce jars when it debuted the flower at the Refinery dispensary in Kalamazoo, which Farrell owns.
“My shop went crazy. People really liked it,” Farrell says.
Today, the jars range from $80 to $100 and are stuffed with large, sticky buds. Other high-quality growers followed suit and turned out their own versions of half-ounce jars, which have become popular among connoisseurs and others who enjoy great weed at a reasonable price.
A testament to the brand’s popularity, hundreds of people attended a rosin collaboration party co-hosted by Growing Pains and Detroit-based Hytek on Nov. 6 at Burn 1, a new consumption lounge in Utica. Some people drove hours to snag a limited edition rosin that combined the fruity, tropical sweetness of Growing Pains’s Honey Banana with the creamy, lime flavor of Hytek’s Lantz, which also did well in the Zalympix awards. Within an hour, the one-gram jars of rosin sold out.
“It wasn’t easy getting to this point,” Farrell says. “Early on it was tough. The weed in the first round didn’t come out well at all. We couldn’t figure it out.”
And then they did, and Growing Pains never looked back. The brand runs about 20 to 25 strains and recently began an in-house breeding project to hunt for the best genetics. It’s a laborious process, but Farrell and Miller are on the hunt for special genetics and phenotypes.
“Our goal is to find extraordinary cuts,” Farrell says. “It’s like a chef in a restaurant. We want to give our customers something different.”
Among Growing Pains’s most recent drops are Burnout O.G., a hybrid bred in-house that smells like a funky combination of cookies, kush, and diesel, and Candy Bonez, an indica-dominant hybrid that blends the flavor of creamy sherbert and ice cream.
I sampled five strains of flower and two jars of rosin, along with pre-rolls and disposable vapes. Without further ado, I present to you some damn good weed by a team that has gone through some growing pains and emerged as a dependable source of quality cannabis.
The five flower strains I sampled:
Credit: Steve Neavling
Credit: Steve Neavling
The two live rosin strains I sampled:
Credit: Steve Neavling
Prerolls:
Credit: Steve Neavling
Credit: Steve Neavling
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Steve Neavling
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