Stop Confusing People-Centered with Non-Profit

“I am still debunking the myth that cooperatives are non-profits,” says Katie Marty, mostly with excitement, yet peppered with just a hint of dismay. “I regularly explain that while cooperatives are technically for-profit businesses, they primarily exist for people.”

I ask What does it mean to “exist for people”?

For Katie Marty, the Community & Event Coordinator of Mississippi Market Food Co-op in Saint Paul, Minnesota, it means, “We are keeping dollars local. And decisions local. And therefore we keep power local.” She continues, “Because all of the stakeholders are right here: Board, members, staff.”

From the on-set, I have a suspicion Katie’s observations about cooperatives absolutely being businesses would touch-on some of the themes explored in my earlier interview with Daniel Bonilla. Katie’s discussion about cooperatives as businesses delivers in that regard - and more!

People = Local = Power

I dig deeper What does it mean to keep power local?

“Consider folks who aren’t part of the ownership economy,” observes Katie, “They might not own a car or a house. But a food cooperative is an easy gate-way for ownership.”

She definitely sees immense power in the concept of ownership. Notably, people can’t ‘own’ traditional 501(c)(3) non-profits. Yet they can, as she illuminates throughout our interview, own part of a cooperative business.

“Ownership equals voice. It equals decision making. And, ideally, it equals profit or economic benefit.” I appreciate Katie’s sensitivity to the word ‘profit.' We both know that word ruffles the feathers of many in the broader cooperative stakeholder community. Yet I also appreciate her insistence on cooperatives creating some form of economic benefit - not just social benefit - for their member, producer or worker-owners.

But for Katie, economic benefit is necessary - yet insufficient. I can also hear her insistence and urgency about local ownership and empowerment leaping through the phone, right into my interview notes. “This is part of my passion for working in retail food cooperatives.”

She also notes how economic benefit emanates from cooperatives where member-owners are fully engaged, because

“Values are inherent in the cooperative model.”

I request an example. Katie illustrates that, with a cooperative, “it’s not just by chance that people experience aligned interests.” For example, in creating a local economic multiplier effect, cooperative members don’t long debate “whether or not to focus on, say, a local farmer.”

The Power of People-Centered Business

She returns to the theme of being people-centered. “Mississippi Market will be building an emphasis on food access,” Katie continues about some of the key strategic projects and directions ahead in her corner of retail food cooperation. 

I think, what’s so special about a grocery donating excess food-stuff? Before I ask, she points out that the reach of a retail food cooperative can be much broader. “This includes extending the power of cooperative buying to food shelves, so that they can access increased quality food at lower prices,” providing yet another example of economic benefit. Katie further notes, “It also includes culturally-relevant food access. And it also includes an emphasis on healthy, fresh, local foods.”

Ah. It’s not just about the write-off, shifting excess foods to food shelves (still a good thing), but about local power (from Katie’s vantage, an even better thing).

“The power of the co-op ownership model includes establishing a broader base.” By extension, she observes, “more of the decisions are made via a broader appeal, including a broader set of voices.”

How does this show up in her local context? This isn’t an abstraction according to Katie, but rather involves concrete, specific actions. “Our members and our board are emphasizing, for instance, procurement of products and services from Black-owned businesses.” She shares what she hears directly from the cooperative’s members, “This is what we want to see.”

Furthering the Ownership Economy

Retail food cooperatives are sometimes critiqued for an apparent over-emphasis on higher net worth, urban consumers. Katie's work is part of responding to this critique not just with words, but with actions, grounded in her cooperative’s and the broader cooperative community’s shared values. “When we hold-up cooperative principles and focus on them, we see that they can create voice,’ she says. “And capital. And position.”

To that strategic and principled end, Katie highlights a key tactical decision of Mississippi Market aligned with this principle: “We are excited to be increasing cooperative ownership and reducing the barriers to ownership via a lower-cost $12 LIME membership. Right now, we want to extend that program to further expand access & ownership.”

You can learn more about Mississippi Market's limited-income LIME membership in the link immediately below:

Expanding Ownership Via 'In Between' Spaces

Katie reflects on the realities of unequal access to ownership in our contemporary economy, returning to the theme of cooperatives as people-centered businesses. “Cooperatives can fill an ‘in between’ space.” 

Why? I ask. Because, she continues,

“Cooperatives are businesses that will work for all.”

She relates this to some of the present socio-economic realities in her broader community. “In the Twin Cities, there have been mutual aid groups popping-up everywhere. These can be a great precursor to building out formal cooperatives.”

Returning to Mississippi Market, this includes a partnership with Saint Paul food shelves and a current prospective member (or customer) engagement test of providing $12 vouchers. Food shelf participants then have personal agency to determine for themselves whether to apply the voucher to immediate food purchases (becoming a customer). Alternatively, people can elect to apply the voucher to off-set the cost of membership, thereby access a 10% reduction in food costs over time (becoming a member-owner).

Among retail food cooperatives, very few limit shopping only to member-owners. In fact, it’s quite common in most retail food cooperatives for consumers from the general public to occasionally shop at a food cooperative. With that as background, Mississippi Market’s food shelf customer and prospective member engagement test strikes me as one for the broader cooperative community to take note of and watch closely for future results. 

Cooperatives in the Broader Economy

Katie pauses to zoom-out from her Twin Cities context. “Cooperatives can create more livable jobs. And can also focus on social justice and environmental justice.”

She reflects on the network-effect among and between cooperatives, expanding economic reach. “We are seeing power and ownership extended in other cooperatives as well. I think about the example of day care cooperatives. Or examples like ROC USA.” (ROC USA grows resident-based, cooperatively-owned communities.)

“What’s been on my mind a lot lately includes the power of ownership for those who have been traditionally marginalized economically. Ownership can be a tool of empowerment. And for opening paths for building wealth.”

I say That seems like a lot to ask from a retail food cooperative membership.

Member Education, Then Ownership

Katie responds that, as part of member education for the retail food cooperative, Mississippi Market includes broader training, education and skills-building on wealth building. “We’ve hosted events on themes explored in documentaries like Jim Crow of the North. How racial covenants in Minnesota housing deeds specifically excluded certain racial and ethnic minorities from home ownership.” As a result, if they choose to, “any cooperative can actually, more broadly, address these racial inequities and focus on wealth-building and access to ownership.”

From Katie’s vantage, something as seemingly small as a retail food cooperative membership “represents real power but also real possibility.” She cautions, “Yes, this is a bit of a jump. We know it’s not a jump everyone will make.” Yet some will. “ For the Jim Crow of the North event? We had more than 600 people register. So yes, many will make that jump.”

It’s quite intriguing to hear how a retail food cooperative sees ‘justice’ not just through the lens of food access, security and sovereignty. Something Mississippi Market might model for other retail food cooperatives specifically and other consumer, retail cooperatives generally.

“The momentum for this,” Katie points out, isn’t Mississippi Market per se. “It’s broader than this. The momentum comes from the membership.”

Yet the Non-Profit Myth Persists

Still the myth persists even among employees and members new to Mississippi Market. “Especially in our staff trainings, we will call out the distinctions between a for-profit and a non-profit. And help the staff understand cooperatives.”

I ask How do you get the ‘we are a business’ point across?

“Sometimes it’s a simple as ‘nope, we’re not a non-profit.’ ”

I can hear Katie chuckle a bit as she reminisces about past staff and member meetings. She also illustrates how to explain this through the core elements of their business model: “We have quality goods that we are selling. We have amazing people who are buying these goods. And so we are profitable.”

Katie also hammers-home the key point about how cooperatives are differentiated from other for-profit businesses, leading to occasional misperceptions of cooperatives as being not-for-profit. “Yes, as a cooperative, we also get to do even more.”

Ownership = Voice

But it’s not just profit (or economic benefit) that differentiates cooperatives for Katie. “For me, ownership is the key piece that differentiates co-ops.” 

She sees cooperatives, especially low barrier-to-entry cooperatives like retail food, as a powerful force expanding and democratizing the economy. ”You can own [your food cooperative] for less than buying your own business.” This, from Katie’s perspective, is just the beginning. “With that ownership comes agency. And comes power. To have your voice. To make your own decisions.”

Bumping into Cooperatives

“Truth be told, I stumbled upon cooperatives.” Even though she’s an ardent supporter of the expansion of cooperative businesses today, Katie rewinds in her own life to a time when she, too, knew nothing about them. “As a business student at Luther College, I was not formally taught about the co-op business model but learned about co-ops through a student group.” 

What did she find compelling from that experience? I ask. The student group “was helping a start-up farming cooperative in Ethiopia.” What she realized, quite quickly, was that she was “seeing this model create shared-ownership of a common resource, an irrigation system, and empower farmers to be self-sustaining.” 

This formative experience fundamentally changed the arc of Katie’s business career. “It motivated me to learn more about cooperatives broadly.”

Scaling Cooperatives; Modeling for Non-Profits

This part of our interview reminds me of when I first met Katie Marty: shortly after college, in her early days of seeking to build a non-profit organization dedicated to exposing more college-age students to cooperatives and cooperative-oriented curriculum. A curricular gap, Katie notes, that still exists to this day on almost all U.S. college campuses.

Through these efforts, Katie reflects, “I was introduced to mentors who taught me the ins and outs of co-ops, connected me with conferences and workshops, and instilled regular inspiration with stories of the wide breadth of solutions cooperatives can provide.” The ears of Cathy Statz should be burning! Turns-out Cathy is a mentor to not only Kristi Schweiss, profiled in my last article, but also Katie Marty.

Katie counts this time immediately after college as a “formative experience.” Yet, at some point, Katie herself felt drawn away from the non-profit educational and technical advisory spaces, and toward actual business-building. Still she didn’t drift too far. “It led me to stay in the cooperative sector and do everything I can to continue teaching about cooperatives.”

Looking back, Katie sees a key lesson cooperatives can model for non-profits, especially since these businesses are so often mistaken for non-profits. “I think non-profits in particular should pay attention to cooperatives’ unique aspects of creative financing, member support, and sustainable revenue models.” A lesson, I suggest, that perhaps boils-down to business acumen? Katie agrees.

Business + Mission: Why She Stays

“The cooperative sector has given me more support - and more energy - than what I found in the non-profit sector,” reflects Katie.

“For me, personally, through my experiences the work-to-life balance of a non-profit Executive Director career path was not where I wanted to spend my energy,” she notes. “Yes, that would have been a natural path.” She pauses, then adds with a slight question in her voice, “Maybe a faster career advancement path?”

“Yet, for me, personally, what I wanted out of life included work/life balance,” she continues. “And people-centered values. I experience that every day at Mississippi Market.” She returns to the theme of comparing cooperatives (as businesses) to non-profits. “I also see the competing challenges of multiple stakeholders that Executive Directors experience in non-profit. Donors. Clients. Etcetera.”

“In comparison,” she continues, “in a cooperative, it’s fairly simple from a business perspective. Focus on the members.”

Expanding on the distinctions between a cooperative and a non-profit, Katie further shares, “It’s not that the multi-stakeholder environment of a non-profit is a bad thing. But the power dynamic is distinct. An immense amount of power flows to the funders.”

Returning to a cooperative’s core business focus? “In the cooperative, we look at the whole community as our boss. It makes it easier to stay on-mission.”

Ownership = Power: Where She Might Go

I ask What’s next in your career?

First I hear a deep breath, then Katie shares,

"In cooperative businesses, the career path isn’t necessarily as linear as in the non-profit sector."

"It’s also a bit more sector-based. People in agricultural cooperatives often stay within the agricultural sector."

For Katie, though, it’s less about a sector-specific career, more about an impact-centric career. “Cooperatives and wealth-building. This is a probable direction for my career going forward.”

Clearly Katie has found herself in a phenomenal place. “Fortunately, I already see those opportunities right here at Mississippi Market.”

My key take-aways from my interview with Katie:

Before drafting my key take-aways from my interview with Katie, I re-read the interview notes with – and article – about Daniel Bonilla. If you haven’t read that interview article yet, I encourage you to do so, particularly because Daniel’s and Katie’s perspectives on cooperative myth-busting and business-building are fairly similar.

With that, here are my key take-aways from my interview with Katie:

1. From a socio-economic impact perspective, what might happen if every U.S. retail cooperative (food, goods, financial services) focused on expanding ownership as a form of cooperation among cooperatives?
2. From a talent perceptive, how might cooperatives win the so-called coming ‘war’ for talent if college students learned about cooperatives not by accident (like Katie did through extra-curricular activities), but on purpose, as part of an overall business curriculum?
3. From a personal perspective, where, when and how am I advancing the ownership economy as a part of social justice?

Enough about me: What about you?

What do you takeaway from this interview with Katie Marty?

What strikes you as intuitively correct from Katie’s perspective about retail cooperatives offering a low barrier-to-entry for people into the ownership economy?

Are there different or additional entry points for democratizing the economy that you would highlight?

Katie highlights day care cooperatives and, specifically, ROC USA as other examples of cooperatives expanding ownership. Do other examples about come to mind for you?

Let’s start a conversation in the comments below.

Great to Reconnect Katie!

It had been several years since Katie and I had connected. Thanks for your willingness to participate in this #coopprofiles series of articles. And deep, deep gratitude for expanding my own perspective on the power and potential use-cases of retail food cooperatives in the broader economy and on behalf of justice.

Adelante.

Kadima.

Forward!

- C