Notes from February 12th Meeting

-Invite Stacey, Tom, and John (consultants) to next meeting

-barter for pizza

-continue with NCV plan

-rent NCV kitchen provisionally

-plan fundraiser

-plan it during next meeting?

-sell pizza at the 'zine fair (3/22-3/23)

-bachelor auction

--grants

-homefries will look into grants for women-owned businesses and queer-owned businesses

-homefries will forward business plan links to everybody

-Non-profit and for-profit issue:

-non-profits accept donations

-non-profits accept grants

-we might get more business as a non-profit

-taxes are cheaper as a non-profit

-something we should ask Stacey/Tom/John about? -get someone who knows about this issue (stacey, tom, john) to be at next meeting

-Ciara feels that it should be for-profit, if that's what makes it a good, rent-paying job for folks

-Ciara envisions that everyone should be payed a living wage

-Ciara wants to ensure financial sustainability

-dee's talking to people at LPC about non-profit status

-James from LPC can consult about acquiring non-profit status, Dee will talk to James about the logistics of acquiring non-profit status

-Ciara will talk to her friend about non-profit status

-Flyering

-dee's making a flyer

-Business Plan

-Homefries' friend Brian can help

-START DRAFTING IT AT THE NEXT MEETING

-What We Want/Envision

-Dee wants to work with people who have a collective mentality or anti-authoritarian understanding

-Ciara's concerned about creating barriers for involvement for a collective that needs membership

-Dee wants to feel like people have hir back, or understand what the expectations of collectivework are

-Ciara says we need to explain well what's involved and expected in being a collective member (?)

-Dee brainstormed about having volunteers for an interim period before they're hired

-modelled after Bluestockings Bookstore in NYC-What does everyone want out of this business?

-defined by the core group of the collective

-Ciara:

-living wage

-possibly profit-sharing

-being paid at least minimum wage to start

-maybe not an overtly political project

-bringing a business mindset to it

-bringing collective organizing politics to it

-the bottom line is financial operations of the business

-not enforcing various political worldviews on collective members, but folks need to be able to work together

-self-employment is main awesomeness

-Dee:

-Dee's excited about collective small business

-how to work in a money economy without fucking each other over?

-fair pay, no bosses

-equality and unity

-Dee could find a job delivering pizza somewhere else, but self-employment is awesome

-veganism is a core value

-local food is a core value

-leave a small footprint (environmentally) as a business

-homefries:

-pizza

-locally-produced ingredients

-vegan

-bike-delivered

-collectively run

-NEXT MEETING: 2/25 (Sunday) at 6pm at 29 Evergreen St. in JP

February 1st Meeting Notes (First Meeting!)

so we really did not have an agenda at the last meeting and kind of jumped around a little bit, which is no ones fault but maybe why these are a bit scattered.

-prolouge: homefries has a dream. a vegan pizza dream...
-locations for the business:
-nuestra culinary ventures was the only place talked about. they give business advice to starting culinary enterprises and have nice space and is in the brewery. its around $25 dollars to rent plus more for storage (homefries was going to look into exact prices). we would need to fill out appilcations, get certified and have a business plan before applying there.
-we couldnt think of any other locations but we will make a final decision next meeting-possibly catering to start? no.
-hours (discussed very loosely): most likely the evenings as that when people want their pizza
-bussiness plan: we need a business plan! homefries said she would talk to stacey and her friend, brian, ciara said she would talk to some friend who works at a collective bakery in berkeley and dee will talk to alexander and whoever did the business plan at lpc. contacting somebody from spokes? i dont know if anyone said they would do this.
-nonprofit vs otherwise: some pros and cons discussed. dee will look into benefits of nonprofit. maybe we can talk to the people we are talking to about business plans about this as well.
-financing: not talked about it depth, partly depends on whether we are a nonprofit or not. other words i had written down were microlending and bachelor auction.we said we would brainstorm for the next meeting so get on yer think'n caps.
-names: we did not think of names yet. homefries intial name is post-apocylyptic pizza pizazz. generally it seems aliteration is the way to go with names. brainstorm some more!oh k then for now

-dee