When one of the owners of the Rock City Coffee in Rockland, Maine, sadly passed from cancer in 2010, the remaining partner in the business, Susanne Ward, then in her 60s, began to consider retirement.
Yet she grew fearful that if she sold the beloved community institution she’d helped build to a buyer inexperienced in the industry or to a competitor, or was unable to find a buyer at all, the outcome could be a shuttering of the business, costing all her workers their jobs.
Fortunately for everyone, Ward explored the less common option of selling the company to the workers, as these are, after all, the people that already know, love and are dedicated to the survival of RCC. And so after years of preparation and work, Rock City Cafe and Rock City Coffee Roasters officially transitioned last month from a single-owner corporation to The Rock City Employee Cooperative.
Read more at Daily Coffee News!