COIN Café: Build a Community Business for Free

Your First Step to Community Ownership
Your co-op era is about to start! Coin Café is a casual, laid-back session where you get your first chance to learn how our FREE co-op building program works, ask questions, meet our team at The Big We + Historic Clayborn Temple, and connect with other Memphians thinking about building community ownership together. There is no obligation to apply — just come learn and see if COIN is the right fit for you and your crew.

About the Program
Co-Op Opportunity for Inclusive Neighborhoods (COIN) is a free, 20-week accelerator from The Big We and Historic Clayborn Temple that helps Memphis-area teams turn a business idea into a real, member-owned cooperative. You do not need a business degree, funding, or experience — just a team, curiosity, and a willingness to learn.

Over 20 weeks, you and your team will work through the building blocks of a sustainable co-op: your customers, your business model, your numbers, your governance, your day-to-day operations, and capital readiness. By the end, you will leave with a legally structured co-op (or a clear path to one), a business plan you have actually tested, a financial model built on your own numbers, a governance structure your members agreed to, and a cohort of other cooperative founders and mentors in your corner.

What is The Big We?
The Big We is a nonprofit social enterprise building resources and infrastructure for the cultural economy. We do this through storytelling, creative placemaking, and social entrepreneurship, using art, culture, and story to help build communities where people thrive from the culture they create.
Our team at The Big We believes Memphis has the creativity and talent to build a stronger, fairer economy — one rooted in shared ownership instead of outside investment. COIN is one of the ways we are putting that belief into action.