The husband and wife team behind a Western Massachusetts cannabis dispensary say the store they built has been unfairly taken from them. The company they once partnered with said the couple has stolen the shop’s brand, logo, website and a significant portion of the staff.
Now, the matter is headed to court.
A lawsuit from Apical, Inc., which holds the licenses for the Easthampton dispensary Fyre Ants and Northampton dispensary EMBR, targets Kot and Leakhena Kasom, who until recently managed the two pot shops.
The couple founded Fyre Ants and say they still own the store’s name and brand.
In 2020, facing strapped finances, the Kasoms said they sought a buyer for two of the four cannabis business licenses they owned and found Panda Solutions Group, which operates cannabis businesses in multiple states.
Under an agreement, they ultimately transferred control of all four licenses to Apical, a subsidiary of Panda Solutions, and temporarily licensed the company to use the Fyre Ants name and brand, Kot Kasom said in an interview.
The sides also agreed that the retail license for the Fyre Ants dispensary would return to the Kasoms by June 2023, he said.
The couple continued working to build out the Easthampton shop, which opened in January