>>What requirements must be met to be a NedCoop<<

A trusted sponsor/individual willing to give approval of a group that desires to become a coop. The approval of the Ned board of advisors. That the group adheres to the 7 basic principals of cooperatives. The desire to work hard, work smart, be open to change, trying new things, and explore new ideas.

>>What resources will a NedCoop have access to<<

Financial support via investment funds, sponsor funds, donations, loans and other various financial instruments. Online tools as needed including private groups, ned.com email addresses, and other advanced web site features. Access to groups of professionals that offer cogent advice and help guide different various business models.

>>How is being a NedCoop better than just being a coop<<

I know franchising is a different concept for most parts of Africa. As over time people come to recognize Ned as the global brand, each location will get extra revenue as a rising tide lifts all boats. As ned/Portland/licensee sets up an eco-tour to ned/Uganda/Kampala there is one direct benefit. As ned/Portland/licensee highlights the 1-2 imported items from each of its overseas coop partners, increases sales will benefit each coop. As one coop develops a new working model and introduces it to a system of coop, they will also benefit with a greater financial reward from introducing the model to the overall group (and helping guide others when needed).

>>What leadership or guidance will be available to the coop<<

Online, email, phone and FTF. I strongly prefer the terms partnership and guidance to leadership. Each person has the capacity to be a leader within their own coop, within their own business unit of 3-5 people. The guidance will grow as an experienced network of real world physical locations grows as well. For instance, once the liquid soap team is up running and profitable in Gulu and Kampala they can franchise/teach a coop in Lesotho to do the same thing...and earn a little more income in doing so. Guidance in models. Guidance in financing. Guidance in governance. Guidance in research. Guidance in branding. Guidance in finding solutions.

>>What type of reporting will be required if any<<

Open and clear communications when there are problems, sharing ideas, or anything that is almost everything that requires a quick feedback loop. 100% transparent business operations, financially and operationally.

Regular daily/weekly updating of progress at ned.com via written posts and photographs by all participating team members (assuming decent connectivity).

Entrepreneurial drive and team collaboration with the understanding each coop member needs to work hard and creatively to make this work best for everyone. The ability to scale up success, and try to understand when and why something did not work out, learning from mistakes/failure is a very valuable thing.

Weekly real world meetings with short written reports of actions and accomplishments from the previous week, and actions, accomplishments and goals in the week ahead to be reported on at the next meeting. Heavy emphasis on sales, marketing and current revenue earning products and services.

A brief written business plan model template for other Ned locations to use to help launch their various models and connecting with other locations online to offer guidance when experience permits.

Written timelines, milestones, & concrete measurable objectives, and team members who agree on specific tasks towards their achievement.

>>What is the advantage to Ned in organizing these coops<<

Connecting four coops per each one licensee location is hardcoded into the base of the model. Each Ned/licensee in essence acts as importer to the 4-8 items that are created at its sister-city coop. In essence the distribution chain is about as flat as it can be where someone in Portland can get online after having seen a bracelet in the store and meet the person that made it in Uganda. Flat, flat, flat.

>>Our communities have been operating on the premise of doing income generation that benefit anyone who wants to participate. How does your plan of forming small groups to start businesses promote that? If say Gulu has 200 members, how does the coop include all the members or benefit them? Perhaps I am missing something but if we are only going to sponsor groups of 3-5 to start businesses, I just don't see where the coop fits in. Seems to me we will just have a lot of individual businesses that only benefit the small groups.<<

Well, that's the reason Christina has thousands of dollars of unsold merchandise in her garage for one thing. Coops can and should be open to everyone, but in order to scale each business unit, be it 3 people, 10 or 200 must be profitable. If everyone that wants to participates (on the revenue side), what happens if 2,000 people show up? The marketing, sales, and revenue generating arm was never really developed and that is just crucial to any business model. The revenue from each business unit feeds back into the overall coop and no one is then to dependent on all 100 people making one thing for one org. Eggs in one basket, and all. Biz units of 3 or 5 can surely grow...as demand (sales) grows. If demand slows for one local product (candles), team members could then flip to another product (soap) where then demand would be growing.

I know there was concern with the 3-5 business unit idea. That's just a good business unit size to give a 3 months trial for a new product or service. If liquid soap takes 10 people, that's fine too. Again, flexibility is an important trait for all biz unit members. The only thing that is constant is change...and nothing is written in stone. That is the ambiguous place a successful business lives. Open to new ideas. Trying things with a quick feedback loop and changing the course as things move forward.

>>It would also seem to me that a lot of the community will be left out in the cold because of numeracy and literacy challenges. What is the benefit to them to be in a such a coop if they will not be able to compete for a business?<<

Well, perhaps there is some level of literacy and numeracy training that can be done online within the ned.com framework. I'm not a teacher, but I suspect we could find people that might be very interested in making those kind of connections. Perhaps we can find 4th year teaching students in college and have them make this a piece of their coursework.

Also, there is a social team component of this as well. If you look at the right side of the coop flowchart. The social teams also earn revenue for taking leadership in tackling local problems they themselves want to focus on. So those that may want to focus on a local environmental issue, or education or health...can also work in small paid teams...financed by sales from the biz side of the coop.

>>These are just some of my questions and concerns. I am not disagreeing with the coop at all, I just need some clarification on how this will all work in Africa. Hope you understand.<<

Evvy. Seriously...these questions are all great! Having built a handful of businesses one thing I can tell you for sure. I don't know everything for sure...not by a long-shot. But early indications are much of this model is making some pretty interesting people sit up and take notice. I know I can go big picture and talk about 250,000 locations in 25 years, or go granular and talk about a dozen measurable objectives over the next 15 months. We can drill down as much as possible, build out ideas, and discuss further. We can also fund a small handful of 3-5 person business units with 400,000 shillings in working capital once the 2-3 page business plan is together and a team to work it...ASAP.

Now as much as questions from everyone is important (Evvy, Christina, and Linda) it would be great if there were much more active participation here from Grace, Munnu, Teopista, George, Peter and others.