Skip to main content


Are you a member of a co-op?

  • Strong yes (34%, 97 votes)
  • Qualified yes (20%, 57 votes)
  • Qualified no (26%, 74 votes)
  • Strong no (20%, 57 votes)
285 voters. Poll end: 2 years ago

Evan Prodromou reshared this.

Co-op household? Co-op business? Co-op store?
@jamesmarshall Harlan Pepper, stop naming nuts
🤔 how do I tell
i voted "qualified no" because i'm pretty sure the answer is no but I'm not sure how this is not a binary yes/no question so maybe i'm missing something important but i still think my answer is probably no
@aeva people have nuanced responses, like "I'm a member of a credit union but I mostly use it like any other bank so it doesn't feel like a cooperative so qualified yes" or "My insurance company used to be mutual insurance but now it's mixed model so qualified no."
@aeva
ah ok that makes sense
@aeva I like fuzzy logic; nothing's ever entirely true or false.
@aeva
gödel has entered the chat
former housing co-op member.
Our electrical utility is a co-op.

Anyone remember Co-op stores in the SF Bay in the late 60s/early 70s? My mom would drop me off at the kids play/care center while shopping.
“Tell me you are an over 50 year old American, likely from the San Francisco Bay Area, without telling me your age or where you grew up”
Interesting Wikipedia article which it erroneous: there were Co-ops in the east bay “over the hills” (eat least one!!) and they are written out of the history which claims a maximum of 12 stores and lists the 12.

I’m pissed. My pre-K history is being erased. 😅
I get my electricity from a Rural Electric Cooperative, which are somewhat common in rural USA.
I suppose my handle is a dead giveaway! 😄
housing co-op & carsharing co-op
I haven't answered but a Co-Op is exactly how I've described the org I'm trying to form across multiple teams - we're all working to one goal, and can share knowledge.

It's a slow but growing movement.
Yes (I actually used to work for the Co-Op - the chain of UK supermarkets many years back).

There's no option to form a legal structure here, but there are options to lean on and share (say one part of the org has a tool - let us try to use theirs, rather than buy a whole new licence for our part of the org, etc)

But also let's stop duplication and rebuilding, share knowledge, etc.

It's a good structure to build that org change on
the food coop closed, no thanks to wholefoods. Was a member of a worker run coop at one point
any kind of co-op? There are so many. I once read a newspaper at the co-op on Capitol Hill in Seattle and there was a 90 something year old man talking about all the different co-ops he was a part of after World War II. And one of them was a funeral co-op. Blew my mind. Incidentally, co-ops in Japan are often just very normal grocery stores.
There's a gradation?
@cyberspook there's a gradation to everything
#SocialCoop for #Mastodon, Two local grocery coops, & REI. Maybe more than I’m forgetting. & I’ve lived in housing coops, but don’t currently.
I was, but I lapsed when I moved away. I would happily rejoin if I found myself able to again.
REI customer count? Lol. I voted qualified no, but I wish there was an option for "I wish I was"
Member of Housing Coop, Banking, and @HackerGeno
+ various smaller local stuff.

So stron yep.
I'm a member of two grocery store co-ops, an energy co-op, and REI.

Qualified yes, because:
- I haven't done co-op stuff with them, I just give them money for goods and services
- I think customer-owned co-ops are kind of weak. Without strong representation for the workers who rely on the business to live, I fear we may just be replicating the same injustices common elsewhere. REI seems like an example of this.
I don't understand the middle options on a yes/no question.
@dneary a few people mentioned shopping at REI. Or being former members of a co-op, or being members of an informal collective.
Ah, I see. Apologies for my polarization.
I am good! Working on some math stuff in preparation for pi day 😀
Cool! This is really a lot of people.

We're starting https://cosocial.ca/ as a co-op, and I was wondering how many people were familiar with the model.

#CoSocial
@Br3nda oh, I forgot to give my own answer! I was a member of https://mec.ca/ am now a member of https://cooptel.ca/ and will be a member of https://cosocial.ca/
Oh, you wanted specifics? I've lived at Walnut Street Co-op for a few years now, and before from 2006-2014. http://walnutstreetco-op.org/ (Yeah, aged website. We'll be repointing that to our blog soon enough: http://walnutstcoop.wordpress.com/ )
@Br3nda I've been a client of coops like MEC (I almost don't think of them like coops because there's no work requirement or other coop type stuff required if you're a client) and ages ago I was an active member of Miel Mtl (a beekeeping coop, it was mainly about serving and coordinating urban beekeepers and thinking about urban beekeeping issues) and my community garden is a non-profit with an elected board (I'm president, which sounds much fancier than it actually is, we're pretty relaxed and it's small potatoes organizationally but we do coordinate and deal with the city, which is less relaxed).
You should be able to round up @cafreeland…
@mhcat yes, it's a big inspiration!