Cookies Miami opening shows challenge Florida’s cannabis industry

Berner didn’t think he’d be here. “I was really worried I wouldn’t see like this,” says Berner, the sun shining through the floor-to-ceiling windows at the St. Regis Bal Harbour casting a warm glow on his skin. “’Cause that’s what you think when you’re in a hospital bed and you’re doing major surgeries and chemotherapy and there’s no guarantee it’s gonna work.” Since his colon cancer diagnosis in fall 2021, Berner’s life has been a whirlwind. Coming face to face with death changes priorities and for Berner, the rapper-cannabis mogul-fashion designer, it meant completing as many projects as possible. By March, he was in remission and earlier this month, just before the grand opening of Miami’s first Cookies, the multimillion-dollar cannabis brand which he co-founded in 2010, Berner said he saw himself as a trailblazer of sorts.

The arrival of Cookies, Florida’s first minority-owned medical marijuana dispensary, highlights the opportunity in a market where cannabis sales are projected to exceed $6 billion by 2030. It also raises the question of equity as many Black and brown entrepreneurs face many hurdles entering the industry, something the Cookies CEO wants to change. “I’m forcing the hand of other companies who have to work with people that look like me,” said Berner, who was born Gilbert Milam Jr. to Mexican parents.

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