Manufacturing

This is a story of how the makers who create a living off their hard-earned skills, banded together to challenge this dominant business ethic, and about the cooperative they built that’s just now getting off the ground. It is a venture that aims to grow at the speed of trust to serve the makers, the customers, and the staff who run it.

Cecosesola is established in Barquisimeto, capital of the state of Lara, located in the central-western region of Venezuela, as a cooperative integration organization that has been established since 1967. It is a meeting space where we make active life of more than 50 organizations, integrated into a network for the production of goods and services that brings together more than 20,000 associates from popular sectors. Through this network, we develop a wide variety of activities such as: agricultural production, small-scale agro-industrial production, funeral services, transportation, health services, financial services, mutual aid funds, distribution of foods and household items. We are made up of about 1,300 associated workers who manage daily activities through participation that is open to everyone, without hierarchical positions.

Dru Oja Jay is joined by Kevin Harding, one of the organizers of a spirited hail-mary attempt to save Mountain Equipment Co-op from being sold off to a US private equity firm.

In this special episode in honor of National Co-op Month, Kevin speaks with Kevin O’Brien, co-founder of the union co-op Worx Printing.

In the foothills of western North Carolina, the small town of Morganton is home to a growing co-op movement that’s reinvigorating the region’s once-struggling textile and furniture manufacturing industries, and refashioning them around egalitarianism and localism. 

This webinar brings to life a case example of a worker-owned co-operative in a technical field.

An interview with a worker-owner at the Vio.Me worker-occupied factory in Greece.

Professor Imanol Basterretxea discusses some of the governance failures that helped lead to the collapse of the Mondragon cooperative Fagor Electrodoméstico.

Michael Johnson interviews Gail Haines about life and work at the Green Mountain Spinnery.