Tune in to WOL 1450 AM, 95.9 FM and WOL Live Stream on Thursday, May 18 at 10:30 am EDT for Everything Co-op, hosted by Vernon Oakes. This week, Vernon interviews Camille Kerr, founder and principal of Upside Down Consulting. Vernon and Camille will discuss cooperative startup development, ChiFresh and her work supporting social justice movements.
Camille Kerr is working to build a democratic economy in service to U.S. social justice movements including organizations advancing Black liberation, immigrant rights, food justice and the U.S. labor movement.
Through her consulting firm Upside Down Consulting, Camille works to replace our current economic system with a solidarity economy that centers life, care for one another and justice. She specializes in cooperative startup development, managing complex worker-centered initiatives, supporting existing businesses to become worker-owned, as well as policy advocacy and drafting.
In partnership with Chicago organizers, Camille helped found ChiFresh Kitchen, a worker-owned cooperative food service contracting business, owned and determined primarily by formerly incarcerated women living in the south and west sides of Chicago. Camille is also a board member of Shared Capital Cooperative, Urban Growers Collective, EG Woode, Obran Cooperative, and the Interaction Institute for Social Change.
A weekly exploration of the impact and potential of the cooperative business model, Everything Co-op aims to generate interest in and support for the cooperative movement. Everything Co-op is hosted by Vernon Oaks, produced by Pat Thornton and sponsored by National Cooperative Bank.