A broker’s playbook for cannabis payments: Michelle Carr on redundancy, trust, and what comes next

Michelle Carr has spent more than two decades in the payments world.Carr’s path into payments started at home. “My father is the one who got me into this industry,”she told Greenway. Shortly after graduating from the University of Missouri in 2004, she joined his St. Louis sales office. The payments industry, like insurance or financial advisors, work best with a local option. Large processors rely on local agents and ISOs to bring their products and services to market.

For Carr, that meant beginning her career as a 1099 contractor, cold-calling and learning from the ground up before managing teams and partnerships.

“Your local community banks lean on offices and individuals like myself,” she said. “I partnerwith a lot of local banks here in Missouri and Illinois, and we are the payment processing arm forthem.”

She watched card acceptance move from a hard sell to table stakes. “When we started ourcompany, our calls were convincing businesses to accept credit cards,” Carr recalled. “Now it’s2025 and businesses are expected to accept credit cards.”

Today, as founder of Streamline Business Solutions, she works as a local broker andadvocates for independent businesses, including cannabis dispensaries, navigating a landscapewhere traditional banking rules meet fast-moving fintech.

“I don’t really get hung up on titles,” Carr said. “I’m technically founder, CEO, owner, president.”What matters most, she explained, is the role she plays. “I help independent business ownersuse technology to accept payments and work down that journey.”

Payment processing in cannabis retail

For cannabis retailers and dispensaries, Carr said, the challenge is different.“Visa and MasterCard are our governing bodies (in payments) and they follow what’s federallylegal,” she explained. That makes traditional credit card processing a persistent challenge forlicensed operators.

She pointed to the mechanics most customers never see, such as acquiring banks, issuingbanks, interchange, and chargebacks. “Most of those big acquiring banks don’t want to touch itbecause the risk is too high for them,” Carr explained.

Her rule for dispensaries is straightforward: “The only thing that’s a hard no, is falsifyingbusiness information or using an incorrect MCC code,” she explained. “Once you’re caught,your account will be shut down and you could be blacklisted, making it extremely difficult to gainapproval once federal regulations take effect.”

Everything else, she continued, lives in a gray area.

“Cashless ATMs have been around the longest and I think is what the majority are using today,”Carr said. The model runs on ATM rails rather than Visa or Mastercard rails, which is whytransactions often round up to the nearest five dollars and carry fees. “It is a digital transactionon a debit card that has worked for a long time,” she explained.

Credit-card-style workarounds appear and disappear.

“There’s actually two right now that are up and running and have been very successful,” Carrnoted, describing aggregation models that make the provider the merchant of record instead ofthe dispensary. “It’s so great how technology allows innovative companies to continuedeveloping solutions to help the business owner accept electronic payments.”

Outages, rails, and reality

Large, multi-state outages have rattled cannabis retailers in recent years.Carr ties much of that disruption to infrastructure limits.

   

“It’s happening because some solutions rely on several older, fragile layers of technology thatweren’t originally designed for retail point-of-sale use,” she explained. “You’re using thistechnology that was built 20 or 30 years ago for ATMs. And when you have an influx oftransactions that no ATM could ever hold that amount of money, it can sometimes crashbecause it wasn’t built to do that.”

There is no perfect hedge, but there is a practical one. “Have someone that can be youradvocate,” she said. “I am your local agent; I am your support to quarterback all these issues foryou.” That can mean troubleshooting hardware or getting replacements moving fast. “Obviously,you’re not going to get that kind of attention if you’re calling the 1-800 number from any of theprocessors,” Carr added.

Carr believes the difference often comes down to people. “There’s not a lot of difference inpayments, but there’s a big differentiation in your payment experience,” she said. “These largecompanies, they need people like us.”

Longevity matters. “I’ve stuck through, I’ve been here for 20 years. This is who I am and I’m notgoing anywhere,” she stated.

Missouri’s cannabis market is similar. “It is such a tight knit community,” she said. For Carr, being part of the community means being more than a salesperson.

“I’m here to help. I broker for multiple providers allowing me to offer the business owner options. And if you only walk away from our conversation with advice, that’s ok too.”

Building redundancy for dispensaries

Carr positions Streamline Business Solutions as a brokerage that creates stability throughredundancy.

“I maintain relationships with multiple providers across credit card processing, cashless ATMs,traditional ATMs, and ACH,” she explained. “My goal is to be your one-stop shop — if onesolution fails, another is ready to back you up. The payments landscape changes constantly,and most business owners don’t have time to sort through dozens of providers. That’s where Icome in. Think of me as a free resource to help you understand which solutions are availableand how they differ from one another.”

Looking toward federal change

Carr expects federal reform to arrive in phases. “I think that the reclassification and the federalregulation, those two things will be great for banking immediately,” she stated. But she does notexpect all big acquirers to jump in right away.

“I can see high-risk processing first,” she said, comparing it to how e-cigarettes and CBD were handled. From there, she expects migration to traditional acquiring and, eventually, deeper integration. “Once you can obtain a traditional merchant processing account, every operator will turn to point of sale integration,” she noted.

Best practices for cannabis operators

For cannabis operators who are stable today, Carr’s guidance is to prepare anyway. “Stay ontop of technology, have redundancies because these solutions are volatile and you never knowwhat’s going to happen. It is important to have a good person that you trust who can guide youalong the way.”

She invites cannabis operators to treat her as that person. “Use me as a resource,” Carr said. Most first calls, she explained, are 15-20 minutes to review needs and map. “Let’s see what’s best for you and your business model,” she said. “I want you to understand why your payment’s experience isn’t like a trip to your local coffee shop and what you can do about it.”