Veteran labor activist and cooperative developer Erik Forman talks with us about the strategy and structures giving the unprecedented project of a driver-owned, democratically run ridesharing service in New York City’s tough market a fighting chance.
Ownership Matters publisher Felipe Witchger sketches out in two parts the way his thinking about investing well — the urgency and the possibilities — became re-oriented. In this installment: the purposeful investor’s dilemma.
Detroit may not have a sizable cooperative business community, but it is fertile ground. DCWF’s executive director tells of partnering with local neighborhood development orgs and Seed Commons to grow this fund and incubator.
The Equal Exchange story begins, formally, on May Day in 1986, with a more-than-symbolic challenge to Reagan-era U.S. trade posture. Long-time former CEO Rob Everts talks with us about the cooperative’s journey, values and impact.
CFNE’s Executive Director talks about the 45-year-old fund’s position of strength entering the pandemic period last year as well as the evolution in focus and strategy it continues to undergo.
Rebecca Fisher-McGinty spent time in Mondragon, in Spain, in the course of studies in cooperative management. She came away with lessons in the power and priority of the worker in a community whose members are the owners of its economic institutions.
Co-founder Joseph Cureton talks about Obran’s holding-company structure, the strategic vision underlying, and some challenges encountered on the path to realizing that vision.
What exactly is the character of difference between investing in cooperative enterprises and conventional investing? Here’s an overview of the whys and wherefores.
Cooperative entrepreneurs and business investors who want their investments to fight wealth inequality face some obstacles to working together. These challenges can be overcome with understanding.
Kathy Gregg argues that the cause for worker-owned businesses in the U.S. is burdened by over-emphasis on “scalability” and under-emphasis on (right-sized) growth.
Finland stands out in Europe for the success of its cooperative sector. Why, how? Some insight can be drawn from a look at the later years of the 19th century — and, again, of the 20th.
Launched to meet the challenge of pandemic and disaster capitalism, the Main Street Phoenix Project turns acquisition, restructure and sale convention on its head — handing employees the keys and giving them the tools to stay in business as well.
“We focus on formerly incarcerated people because that’s where the barriers are.” ChiFresh Kitchen, jump-started under unlikely conditions in early 2020, has a solid business footing and a vision for growth.
Drawing on U.S. labor-movement and New-Deal-era history, Sara Horowitz urges a bottom-up approach to public policy to build cooperative-ecosystem density and “patient capitalist” perspective.
How Stephanie Swepson-Twitty, Eagle Market Streets CEO, and Kevin Jones, Faith+Finance co-founder, began collaborating to address a critical business-funding gap in their Buncombe-County home area of western North Carolina.
Seed Commons’ founder Brendan Martin’s vision is for a cooperative fund of funds enabling community-based financing — and his vision is working.