[ three boats, different builders ]
Same water, different hulls. A co-op, an LLC, and a nonprofit each decide who votes, who owns, and where the money can go, and those three answers are the whole difference.
[ the short version ]
Members own and vote it, one each. Surplus returns to members by patronage. Can absolutely make money and pay people well.
Votes follow money. Profit goes to owners in proportion to what they invested. Nothing stops you writing co-op behavior into an operating agreement, but the law will not hold it there for you.
Nobody owns it. Surplus cannot be distributed to members at all, and a board holds it in trust for a purpose. Good for stewardship, wrong if the people doing the work should own the upside.
[ choose your vessel ]
A design studio and a market garden need different warnings and different shapes. Pick the one closest to yours and the rest of this page narrows to it.
[ The people doing the work own it. ]
Members are the workers. Each worker-member has one vote regardless of how much money they put in, and the year's surplus comes back to them by how much work they did, not by how many shares they hold.
fits Cafés, farms, cleaning crews, trades, care work, design studios, anything where labor is the business.
[ The people who buy from it own it. ]
Members are the customers. They elect the board, and surplus comes back as patronage refunds in proportion to what they bought.
fits Grocery, hardware, credit unions, utilities, buying clubs.
[ The people who grow or make things own it. ]
Members bring product to be graded, processed, branded, and sold together, and get paid on what they delivered.
fits Growers, seaweed, and shellfish harvesters, fishers, makers, small dairies.
[ Independent businesses own it together. ]
Separate businesses jointly buy supplies, insurance, software, or marketing so they get the price a big company gets.
fits Independent shops, clinics, farms buying feed and seed, small studios sharing back office.
[ More than one kind of member owns it. ]
Workers, consumers, and sometimes community investors each hold their own membership class with its own votes and its own share of surplus.
fits Land projects, food hubs, care networks, anything where several groups genuinely carry the thing.
[ The residents own it together. ]
The co-op owns the buildings and each household holds a membership giving the right to occupy a home. Limited-equity versions cap resale so it stays affordable for the next household.
fits Shared land, multi-household sanctuaries, city buildings, land trust partnerships.