Warren Bobrow=WB: Where are you from? Why cannabis? Did you go to business school? Who is your mentor?
Derek Peterson=DP: I was born and raised in Massachusetts. Cannabis was always part of the culture in the Northeast and I never took to binge drinking alongside my peers in high school and college. I used cannabis recreationally in my younger years, but it wasn’t until an extraordinary surfing accident later in life that led me to truly understand and appreciate medical cannabis. I fractured a vertebrae in my neck and have used cannabis to manage the daily residual pain from that injury for the past 13 years. I put myself through Pepperdine studying finance and business. As a college student I tended bar to pay my bills and it was there that I met a gentleman named Mike Zacarro who worked in finance and encouraged me to intern for him while I finished my degree.