A Tauranga shop owner which sells synthetic cannabis has no hard feelings after people choose to protest the sale of legal highs outside his store on the corner of Cameron Road and 16th Ave today.

Special T Discounter, formerly known as Puff n Stuff, owner Mike Lawrence says everyone has the right to protest what they believe in, himself included.

Protestors outside Special T Discounters on the corner of Cameron Road and 16th Ave. Photos: Tracy Hardy.

'If I find something that is not right and believe in the cause, I would stand up and have my say about it as well.”

The rally in Tauranga today is part of a nationwide protest to try and get synthetic cannabis banned.

Mike says he has been trying to work with the mental health unit in Tauranga to see what ways he can help their clients.

He says because of the privacy act there is very little they can officially do.

'So basically, we have taken it on our own backs to create a programme called to ‘consumer exclusion programme' where people who find they are struggling with this stuff, whether they are getting to addicted to it or finding their spending too much money, they are coming in and they are actually starting to talk to us about this.

'We try and help our customers manage how much they are using, the same as a bar owner would if they think a customer has had too much.”

From Mike's understanding, the number of people who experience issues with synthetic cannabis is relatively small.

'From what I understand of the total number of products sold to people, 0.1 per cent have actually had an issue, 99.9 per cent of the people, as I understand it, are using it responsibly.”

He says the prime example of using it responsibly is a husband and wife couple who come into his store.

'They used to drink up to three bottles of wine, get into an argument he hits her and things go really bad.

'They have since started smoking synthetic cannabis and on Friday nights they smoke a little, he falls asleep in front of the TV, she giggles at him and tells him to go to bed and that's it.”

Mike says being responsibly is knowing your limit and knowing when to stop, a lot of people don't have that when they take other substances, such as alcohol.

'Well over 90 per cent of my customers are enjoying it socially.

'My staff are all trained and come to me when they have seen a particular customer more than once a day, if the behaviour or the spending pattern of the customer becomes multiple times a day, we do have a word with them.”