Zeke Coleman’s story says a lot about his worker cooperative, Our Harvest—part of Co-op Cincy’s growing network of worker and community owned businesses. But it also says a lot about America:  

Before [here] I worked at a chicken processing plant. I got a raise one or two times, at fifty cents, and that was it. I didn't receive another raise for the next four years. I trained people there and eventually they became my boss. [It’s] different here, because I feel like I’m treated like a person, and it’s not a big corporation where the CEO is making millions and millions and millions while the workers are getting peanuts. [...] I don’t have nobody chasing me around because of the color of my skin or because I’m tall or because I’m big. People don’t really think that that happens these days, but it does. I was a fork truck driver, I was at that company four or five years—it was Barack Obama’s first presidency. People were excited about that, they couldn’t contain themselves. But that next morning when we went into work, it was like a firing squad on Black males, it was boom, boom one after the other. It was like a nightmare what I went through. But I guess I had to go through that to really appreciate what’s going on here, and what they are trying to build, here in Cincinnati and around the country.

Coleman is a worker-owner and the food hub manager at Our Harvest, the first co-op founded by Seed Commons member Co-op Cincy in 2012. Growing healthy food on over twelve acres spread across two urban farms, and sourcing more from twenty other community scale food system projects, Our Harvest connects local growers and producers to consumers and wholesale customers, creating good jobs along the way. And they’re expanding—in March of 2025, they signed a deal to acquire a six-decade old greenhouse business located up the road from one of their farms, giving the workers there a chance to become part of the cooperative when the longtime owner decided to retire. That deal—including the purchase of the sprawling 3-acre greenhouse facility—relied on over a million dollars of capital, which Co-op Cincy was able to access and deploy on non-extractive terms, thanks to its membership in Seed Commons.

Worker co-ops, union jobs

The workers at Our Harvest have something besides cooperative ownership supporting them—they’re also dues paying members of the United Food and Commercial Workers union (UFCW). Co-op Cincy, in fact, got its start as the Cincinnati Union Co-op Initiative, and while the name has changed, their commitment to combining the promise of worker ownership with the power of organized labor has not.

Kristen Barker, one of Co-op Cincy’s co-founders, explains that the prehistory of Co-op Cincy is in the trips to Mondragon that the Catholic social justice organization she used to work for, the Intercommunity Justice and Peace Center (now Ignite Peace), used to organize back in the 1980s and 90s. Visiting the massive complex of interlinked Basque cooperatives, Jerry Monahan, Executive Secretary of the Greater Cincinnati Building Trades, came back fired up about the possibility of economic democracy—something especially notable since the building trade unions are not generally associated with radically transformative economic visions. He passed on that enthusiasm to Phil Amadon, a railroad union organizer and peace activist, and when Phil read that the USW and Mondragon were exploring a potential partnership in the US, the fuse was lit, and he convened a reading group around cooperatives at Kristen’s house, where they were joined by Ellen Vera from UFCW, and her boyfriend—now husband—Flequer Vera, who had been working as an organizer for a faith-based social justice organization on immigrant rights. For Kristen, Mondragon, despite being half a world away, represented something important to this group:

We were doing all kinds of policy work, things to uproot injustices. I still think that’s all incredibly important. But I also think it’s important to build the alternative. What leads to a city where there is less violence? Well, when people can live well, when they have access to affordable homes, when they have access to jobs with dignity—that’s what ends up shifting the dynamic. 

This small study group would eventually form the nucleus of the Cincinnati Union Co-op Initiative, with the goal of creating union jobs in cooperatively-owned businesses in Cincinnati. The model here, based on the role that social councils play within Mondragon’s cooperative factories, was the union coop model first articulated by the Steelworkers, in which union membership adds a layer of protection for all workers in a cooperative, on top of the democratic ownership structure and governance, while also connecting these workers in solidarity to the wider labor movement. Three initial projects were envisioned, each one connecting to one of the unions involved. A food system project, Our Harvest would be rooted in UFCW. A possible collaboration with Mondragon would link to USW. Finally, Sustainergy, built to create green jobs doing energy efficiency retrofits, would connect to the building trades.

Green jobs, worker power

Flequer Vera, who helped found Sustainergy, knows first-hand what exploitation in the American workplace can look like. Originally from Lima, Peru, he immigrated here, without papers, in 2001, and spent seven years undocumented, working brutal 12 hour days doing construction in New York City for just $65 or $70 a day in pay. A few years later, he would move to Cincinnati, and was swept into the nexus of faith and labor organizing as he struggled to prevent his own deportation, becoming a community organizer in the process:

Being undocumented really shaped me, because while it was literally the worst stage of my life— you live in fear every day that you will be deported, separated from your family—it really gave me this sense of solidarity, and helped me see the world better. [...] So really, I’m grateful that I went through that because it shaped me into who I am today, shaped my principles and gave me this broader view of the world.

Between fighting deportation, scrabbling to survive, and finding himself as an organizer, Flequer was also going to school for finance and building science, getting ready for a real career in the construction industry, something that ran deep in his family back in Peru. But the union co-op model struck a chord that tied all of this together—with Flequer realizing that he could “merge [his] passion for social justice, and [his] passion for business.” A few years later, in 2013, Sustainergy would launch, after scraping together around $40,000 in community loans.

The idea was simple—create green jobs going after the lowest hanging fruit around home energy efficiency, with a service that working class people could affordably access, lowering their bills and cutting emissions in the process. But especially as an undercapitalized startup, this wasn’t an easy road—Flequer worked for two years without being able to pay himself, for instance. And it took a while to figure out the union piece of the puzzle, with Sustainergy ultimately affiliating with the Steelworkers instead of the trades, who couldn’t quite figure out how to fit a worker-owned business into their standard playbook, especially when the work that business was doing was primarily residential—a sector that, unlike commercial work, doesn’t deliver the outsized margins translating into the wages and benefits the trades are typically securing in their contracts.  

But despite these challenges, Sustainergy worked. Flequer explains how it’s making a difference for its worker-owners, like his colleague Yovany, a first generation immigrant who is still learning to read and write in English. When Yovany’s car was stolen, for instance, the co-op’s revolving loan fund helped him get back on track without having to turn to extractive payday lenders. The co-op’s patronage refund, or share of profits distributed to worker-owners, on top of wages and salary, now averages between $7 and $10K a year—and that made it possible for Yovany to make a down payment on his first house. The union structure is working as well—with open book management at the company, and a weekly meeting to help workers level up their financial literacy, everyone at Sustainergy knows exactly how much money is coming in and where it’s going.  That meant that when the USW local president came down to hammer out a first contract for the workers, Flequer recalls that he said it was one of the fastest negotiations he’d ever seen. (USW did recommend adding a few more paid holidays to the calendar so the company would be in line with the prevailing standard, which no one objected to.)

Now, with Co-op Cincy a member of Seed Commons, the capital piece is a lot easier. Kristen underscores that all of this got started in Cincinnati without a ready source of financing, let alone the non-extractive financing offered by Seed Commons, as she puts it “the coolest kind of capital.” Now, when a co-op they incubate is getting off the ground—like the Cincy Cleaning Co-op, started in 2019 and currently profitable with eight full time employees, all but one Guatemalan immigrants—there’s a stream of resources to support that journey, and to help them scale. Sustainergy, for instance, has been able to leverage a Seed Commons loan to expand their capabilities, allowing them to add higher-margin solar installation services into the mix alongside their insulation and efficiency work, which in turn has allowed them to target higher wages across the cooperative.

Green jobs, with dignity, unionized and cooperatively owned: Sustainergy is the model for the kind of just transition we need, more urgently than ever. And what they are offering, and the kind of economic democracy they represent, is popular, even in places you wouldn’t expect. Cincinnati, for instance, is across the Ohio river from Northern Kentucky—and unlike multiracial, reliably Democratic Cincinnati, those suburbs get really red, and really white, really quickly. Flequer recalls his first foray into those areas, as a brown-skinned Latin American man, and just being able to feel the “open, pure racism.” But he’d do sales visits anyway—and it turns out that as much as conservatives nationally may bluster about the environment, a big energy bill is the same big energy bill, no matter who you voted for.  The services Sustainergy can offer make sense and are in demand, and when Flequer gets a chance to explain their business model, he often finds unlikely champions:

I tell them that we are a co-op. They love the idea that we’re not looking for a free lunch. We set our wages, control our jobs—this is what we do and they love it! And the folks that I could tell didn’t like me initially are like, ok, where do I sign?

Steps to scale

Today, Co-op Cincy has incubated or supported over a dozen co-ops, that employ more than 100 workers. But they are planting some impressive seeds for a lot more.  All of the co-ops, for instance, put 5% of their net profits into a central cooperative of cooperatives, modeled on Mondragon’s structure, and another 5% back into supporting Co-op Cincy, which in turn is able to provide intensive, customized training and business support for the businesses.  This support has helped Sustainergy grow, on average, by 30-50% each year, to the point where they are beginning to think about replicating their model with regional franchises.

Meanwhile, Co-op Cincy is thinking about how to leverage this success across a broader ecosystem of small, minority and women-owned businesses working in the green economy. Investment in energy efficiency and renewable energy is projected to increase from the tax code provisions of the Inflation Reduction Act—albeit less dramatically than one might like given the rollback of climate policy happening at the federal level. Phil Waller, Co-op Cincy’s special projects manager, explains that:

Over the next 10 years the green construction industry is going to grow immensely. We want to make sure that growth happens. We want to bring as much of that money that’s coming to Ohio to our region, specifically, and we want to create more green jobs that are of high quality. We want to make sure that this is a transformational investment as well, meaning that as many of those jobs as possible go to people who’ve been traditionally left out of the industry. So we’re really targeting creating jobs for and owned by people of color and women.

To make this happen, Co-op Cincy, with the help of a $500K grant from the Department of Labor, has convened a steering group of around 50 people from 40 organizations to figure out the challenges facing smaller contractors owned by people historically marginalized in the industry. Co-ops like Sustainergy are part of this, as is Old Growth, a newer Cincy co-op focusing on regenerative landscaping. But so are six more businesses with traditional ownership structures.

Waller lays out the vision of why it makes sense for a cooperative development organization to be working with traditional businesses: “we’re helping small businesses figure out ways to support one another, to grow and to compete against big business. This moves us towards an economy that works for all—cooperation comes in many different forms.” One possibility Co-op Cincy is exploring: a shared services cooperative, designed to help make all of these businesses in the network more efficient, and able to operate at a higher scale. Waller notes that he was initially skeptical that the businesses in the network would be so receptive to the possibility of cooperation, and that “the fact that all of them are jazzed up by this opportunity to do something that’s greater than the sum of their parts is really inspiring to me to see.” He’s also hopeful that the example of worker-owned businesses might spread the idea of shared ownership by “osmosis,” seeding the possibility of future conversions.

In the meantime, Co-op Cincy is developing the muscles to drive conversions of existing businesses to worker cooperatives. One such project is the Shine Nurture Center cooperative, a childcare business that converted to worker ownership with the help of Co-op Cincy in 2022. Worker-owner Mary Wilder, who runs the business and facilities side of things as the daycare’s office manager, is clear on the difference being a cooperative can make:  “I’ve worked underneath bad ownership in a daycare, I know what it feels like to not feel appreciated, to not feel like your work matters. Now that I am a worker owner, and I own a daycare with other people, I can make sure that our workers never feel like I felt for ten years, which is amazing to me.”

Wilder joined the business when it was still being run by its founder, Katie McGoron, who had a vision for  nurturing, Montessori-inspired childcare that could operate in close proximity to nature, and made that happen in 2015 when Shine opened up next to the 1,459 acre Mt. Airy Forest, Cincinnati’s largest park. McGoron was always excited about the possibility of transitioning the business to worker-ownership eventually, and when she decided it was time to step away, Co-op Cincy was able to make that a reality. Childcare isn’t a particularly high-margin business, and workers like Wilder didn’t necessarily have the financial resources to buy out the company’s founder. With non-extractive capital from Seed Commons, Co-op Cincy helped the workers step into ownership, and then helped them purchase the daycare’s building, with its business-essential location connected to the natural world next door.  Now, Co-op Cincy is helping Shine plot an expansion of their facility, with the idea that increasing the headcount of children able to attend, while keeping overhead more steady, will help them push wages for workers up across the cooperative.

All of this financing also comes with the kind of hands-on support and partnership you would never find from a traditional lender. Wilder meets weekly with the co-op’s project steward at Co-op Cincy to talk through operations and brainstorm solutions to challenges: “they’re pretty much our facilitators, if I'm being honest. They have all the things that we need to be a successful business, they had a template for bylaws, they've helped us with conflict management, they put us in touch with accountants and lawyers—they’ve been a huge resource to us.” She’s clear that “for Shine, Seed Commons has been nothing more than a blessing.”

The investment in cooperative ownership also translates to better outcomes for the kids and educators, as well. The cooperative transition has anchored the business to its mission for the long haul, something doubly important as private equity continues to make more and more extractive inroads into the sector. Wilder relates that “having the co-op structure means that we work together as a family, and we make decisions for ourselves. A really big thing in daycare is that teachers don't usually have autonomy in their classrooms. At Shine, they do. We want our staff to be just as whole and taken care of as our children.” This commitment to direct democracy isn’t limited to adults, either—the children get a say in and a vote on decisions that affect them, like on a recent addition to the weekly lunch menu. (They opted for yogurt bowls.)

This is all unfolding in connection with the larger co-op ecosystem in Cincinnati. Shine’s Fall Festival last November doubled as the monthly installment of Co-op Cincy’s co-op movement social. Sustainergy is slated to install the solar panels on the roof of the new building that’s getting underway, and Comp.coop, another worker-owned business in the Cincy network, is redoing the website. Meanwhile, Shine has helped provide childcare for cooperative events and gatherings.

Co-op Cincy’s intentional focus on ecosystem development is impressive—and it doesn’t stop at city limits. Ohio is a bit of hotbed for employee ownership, and Co-op Cincy has been developing strong partnerships across the state. Together with nearby Co-op Dayton, and with Cleveland Owns in Northeast Ohio (both also members of Seed Commons), they have organized a statewide cooperative training program, marking the graduation of its first six-business cohort with a joint celebration and “dolphin tank” pitch night. (They describe the latter as just like Shark Tank, only postcapitalist.)  Co-op Cincy also helped Cleveland’s Evergreen Cooperatives finance the conversion of LEFCO Worthington, a wood pallet and custom packaging fabrication company, to worker ownership. They are also playing an active role as a member of the statewide table for worker ownership convened by the Ohio Employee Ownership Center at Kent State.

Regional solidarity is growing across Seed Commons' Ohio member organizations

Living and working cooperatively  

Co-op Cincy’s seemingly boundless eagerness to experiment with cooperative possibilities also extends to community control of land and housing. Renting Partnerships is the brainchild of Margery Spinney, who worked for decades in affordable housing policy and finance, where she saw firsthand how the industry’s obsession with scale could cut off real transformative possibilities. That led her to create a new model, for what she calls “rental equity,” designed to create a first rung on the asset-building ladder for low-income tenants. The idea is simple, but elegant. When managers of rental housing have to deal with turnover, with tenants who aren’t invested in the upkeep of a building, who don’t pay rent on time, all of that costs money that has to be borne by the project.  If tenants, on the other hand, are able to commit to a minimum tenure, to timely rent payments, and to participation in building-wide meetings, this commitment is an asset for the housing development—and making good on it is a way for tenants to earn equity based on the money saved, while living in deeply affordable housing.

Renting Partnerships formalizes this basic idea in a contract between residents and the housing management, with clear benchmarks and a vesting period, with residents receiving equity in the form of credits on rent that can be used immediately, or banked for emergencies to free up cash flow for other more pressing uses.  (The credit structure also ensures that residents are not penalized for building equity by income or asset cliffs for public benefits they depend on.) As Spinney puts it, with this unique model,  “we're actually creating wealth that would never exist.”

In prototyping the model for Renting Partnerships, Spinney learned two important things. First, a real commitment to community is the essential ingredient to make this work—you can’t realize the savings unless residents are really invested in the model, which means a deep commitment to authentic organizing and education. It’s not a model that works transactionally, or that can be easily replicated by a big, impersonal developer. And second, you need permanent ownership of the buildings to make the equity earned something residents can count on—something like a community land trust, with a permanent commitment to the housing mission. 

All of this makes lots of sense—but it’s not the kind of project you can easily build out with the kind of traditional and transactional LIHTC or Section 8 funding that dominates the affordable housing sector. And grants will only go so far. That’s why Spinney is so thrilled that Co-op Cincy has stepped in to help fill the gap, with non-extractive financing helping drive the acquisition and renovation of properties to fuel the model, starting with a duplex in 2022, and in 2024 closing on what will be a 10 unit property when renovated.

Going places

At the moment, Co-op Cincy has created or supported over 150 jobs at worker-owned companies, with over $7.4 million invested in the local cooperative economy. It’s an impressive start—and one that has been made possible by access to non-extractive capital as a member of Seed Commons, which has provided the overwhelming bulk of their financing. 

But their ambition is even more impressive—with years of organizing and building behind them, they are firing on all cylinders, working on startups, conversions, and acquisitions, in construction, care, IT, food service, housing, and more. They’re building statewide networks, working with local unions, and organizing small business owners. And as Kristen Barker explains, they are just getting started. 

A decade and half in, they are now starting to think strategically about the next half century. Kristen tells me that in addition to their 150 cooperative workers, there’s another 5,000 workers in the Cincinnati area at businesses 100% owned by ESOPs, and Co-op Cincy is actively working to push or entice these companies towards more participatory and democratic management structures. With this as a foundation, they estimate that if they can grow the democratically-controlled economy by just 6% each year, by 2072 they will have built a complex of cooperative and worker-owned jobs 80,000 people strong—about the size of the legendary Mondragon experiment that inspired this journey.  That’s going to take a lot of work, a lot of luck, and a lot of non-extractive capital, but Kristen is clear and optimistic on the systemic stakes driving the work of Co-op Cincy: “Ultimately, we want to see a real shift in wealth inequality, the elimination of poverty. That's what we’re going for.”

The quote from Zeke Coleman that opens this case study comes from Works For All, the excellent short film documenting the mission and work of Co-op Cincy by Mark Dworkin and Melissa Young.