Every business in the world is run by humans, and they all live in a community. And so many businesses thrive through global, online networks. So what makes a business truly community based? And why does it matter

The short answer is this—a community-based business thrives by its community and it helps ensure the community thrives too. It’s accountable to a place or a group of people or both.

In a business like CoffeeSock, that means supporting not just the place where we set up shop—Austin, Texas—but also the larger networks that form our community. From on-site employees and our local neighbors, to those farther away who harvest the organic cotton that makes up our thread and fabric to the coffee growers who sustain the entire coffee-drinking world. 

Support for the whole coffee-growing community

And those businesses too have their own communities. Take the Maya Ixil coffee cooperative in Guatemala. Not only do they supply coffee for communities far away, they also work with local families to strengthen the local food systems so that the community itself has what it needs.

Maya Ixil and the larger coffee nexus are part of our community too. And as a community-based business, we remain accountable to them as to our own employees, customers, and the earth itself. That’s why we partnered with Food4Farmers through 1% for the Planet to send at least one percent of our sales to Maya Ixil in support of a thriving community there.

Image a world…

Imagine a world where every business that supplies everything you need to thrive also ensures that the larger ecosystems thrive, including people and planet. That’s the vision and mission of a community based business. 

According to Food4Farmers, here’s how it's playing out right now at Maya Ixil:

We just received funding to start three agroforestry programs with our cooperative partners in Guatemala, Colombia, and Nicaragua, so we're starting home gardens for all 205 member-families at Maya Ixil! They're adding nurseries, fruit trees, shade trees, and native trees, along with investments in soil and water health to restore biodiversity, feed people and pollinators, and boost community resilience. 

Community-based businesses are accountable. They place care over competition to ensure the communities they touch far and wide can thrive.

That’s the power of community-embedded business.