BRED: We’re building the ecosystem behind Baltimore’s cooperative economy

The Baltimore Roundtable for Economic Democracy (BRED), is the anchor of Baltimore’s local ecosystem for economic democracy. BRED started as a conversation between a few local worker cooperatives back in 2015, with the hope of bringing a little more structure and capacity to the informal network of mutual support that had emerged organically between them. As these cooperative projects grew and as more and more people were becoming interested in worker cooperatives, the lack of any central alliance or organization to hold the work of ecosystem building had become more and more noticeable. Kate Khatib—who helped co-found Baltimore’s Red Emma’s Bookstore Coffeehouse worker co-op in 2004, and who currently serves as the co-Executive Director of Seed Commons—was one of local worker-owners who convened BRED in response. As she notes, “We saw that there was a lot of discussion and energy brewing in Baltimore around the solidarity economy generally, but realized that without a dedicated organization, led by and focused on delivering practical results for real worker cooperatives, we weren’t going to be able to truly move the ball forward.”

Growth in Baltimore’s cooperative ecosystem began to truly take off after BRED was able to connect with Seed Commons to become one of the first peer members in the national network, bringing a much-needed source of non-extractive, worker coop-friendly capital to the table for local projects.

Read more in Seed Commons’ case study of BRED:

More on BRED’s work building Baltimore’s co-op ecosystem:

In These Times: Baltimore’s 230-year-old tradition of workplace democracy is experiencing a revival.

Baltimore Magazine: Radical Growth

Next City: Worker-Owned Cooperatives are Building Their Own Investment Network