Sometimes the road to Columinate is a direct line, and sometimes it’s a leisurely path with many twists and turns. For Lisa Malmarowski and Pam Mehnert of Flying Squirrel Milwaukee LLC, joining Columinate has been a logical extension of the work each of them has been doing at Outpost Natural Foods in Milwaukee. They have been sharing their skills with fellow cooperators for years, putting into practice the cooperative principles of education and cooperation among cooperatives.

Lisa Malmarowski: Marketing, store design, mentoring

Malmarowski was on a sales call for North Farm, a co-op distributor, in 1997, taking a break at Outpost to buy lunch, when Mehnert, who was in line behind her, asked if Malmarowski liked her job. Mehnert was the general manager (GM), and In the longer conversation that followed, she suggested Lisa apply for the marketing position at Outpost. Malmarowski got another job offer the same day Mehnert offered her the Outpost job, but the choice was an easy one. When she started work at North Farm, a light had gone on for Lisa: Co-op! These are my people.

Malmarowski says:

I’m probably most effective and helpful with places that have complex problems. I’ve been able to get my hands into a lot of pots, kind of like a GM with a marketing lens. Helping marketing departments grow, develop structures that make sense, create the structures in the co-op to support the marketing activities. I can help places get to that, using what they have. In my lifetime I worked in sales, in merchandising, and in distribution. Early in my career I sold a lot of shoes, and then one day I thought, ‘Wait! Someone has to shop for the things that people shop for!’ I started learning all I could about how this retail business works. One of the things that I think co-ops can excel at is ensure the co-op sense of community comes alive in the shopping or co-op experience for their members and customers. Like they say, ‘Promise less and deliver more.’ I can help stores and co-ops of all stripes figure out how to make that magic happen.  

Malmarowski and Mehnert are partners in life as well as business, and so welcoming them with this pair of connected profiles is a way to lift up and celebrate the passion and commitment to cooperation that they share and bring to Columinate. Their ability to work successfully as partners at Outpost for over 26 years is a testament to their strength as collaborators. As Lisa said, “Pam and I have a relationship and a working relationship that shouldn’t work, but it really, REALLY works. We were fortunate that the board of directors was willing to work with us and create a structure that made everyone comfortable with our personal relationship in the workplace.”

Malmarowski and Mehnert are both artists, and their creativity fuels their work. Lisa does mixed media, collage, and painting, and keeps a lot of sketch books. Pam uses vintage items with hand-drawn art to create assemblages people can enjoy.

Pam Mehnert: GM coaching and mentoring

Mehnert’s introduction to the co-op world came through a friend of her mom’s who worked in Outpost’s deli. She suggested that Mehnert volunteer so that she would get her foot in the door. As Pam came to understand what the co-op was all about, she called up the then GM on their home phone and said, “Hey, you should really hire me. I’m good with people. I’m really into natural foods. And I can make posters.”

Mehnert is a theology major who moved back home to Milwaukee after going to college in Southern California. That initial job at Outpost evolved, and by the time she met Walden Swanson, who was at the time working for a Wisconsin cooperative development organization through the University of Wisconsin, she had been a floor manager, grocery department head, assistant to the general manager, and was in charge of marketing. Walden was doing an audit of the co-op, and when he asked Mehnert why she wasn’t applying for the open position of general manager, she told him: “Everyone in that job has gotten fired. Why would I want to do that?”

Mehnert says:

When I first started as GM, it was clear our location was not going to last us long. Because of my ability to work with people, we started to grow our business, and it was clear we were going to outgrow our Holton Street location. Walden recommended Rick Stewart, who helped us figure out what it looks like to move. I don’t even remember if we did a market study, but we are still at our Capital Drive location today. And it was the same story: who knows how to run a business this big?! We didn’t have good systems.

 Ann Hoyt said, ‘You should meet my friend Howard Bowers [longtime manager of Hyde Park Co-op in Chicago], you could learn some systems from him.’ I had taken Ann’s Cooperative Management Institute and learned a lot. So I took my team to Chicago and learned what labor budgets were and what margin was. Howard helped me read financial statements. I benefited a lot from mentorship from people who had different experiences than I did. Marilyn Scholl was an early mentor, as well as Bill Gessner.”

Mehnert shared a story from those early days after relocating their store: Outpost was losing money rapidly, and the local bank said they were going to call Outpost’s loan. “They said we had three weeks, and we were like, ‘We have to finance this differently.’ So we put a plan together, and I got on a train and went to DC and met with a loan officer at NCB, and they took a chance on us. The loan officer said, ‘I believe you know how to turn this around.’ A week later we got the financing.”

Mehnert brings her forty-two years of work in cooperative grocery to her consulting. “For general managers, there’s a lot of value to working with someone who’s been in their seat, dealing with what they’re dealing with. I use my years of gathered wisdom to help them figure things out and answer the right questions. My brain is full of every possible example and what I’ve learned from them: understanding expansions, growth, strategic plans, and building alignment toward projects. I understand unions; I REALLY understand unions. I’m hoping to get some coaching groups together to work to build relationships with the unions and not see them as an enemy. So many GMs can take it personally when the union comes in, and it takes a lot of skill building, because unions are using tactics that are generations old and can feel personally challenging.”

She adds, “I’ve talked to other GMs for decades, and we’ve spent hours and hours on the phone problem solving. I can be that friendly ear to tell your problems to. I like coaching people to find their own solutions. I’m that person to walk down that path with you. To help you discover the right thing for yourself.”

Flying Squirrel Milwaukee LLC

Flying Squirrel was the name of an imaginary job, a bakery Mehnert and Malmarowski dreamed up that was to be a subscription-based operation for baked goods and granola and breads that people would sign up for and Mehnert would deliver.  She even created a logo for that imaginary bakery, and when she and Malmarowski joined Columinate, Flying Squirrel Milwaukee became the name of their business. Their website will highlight both their service offerings and their art, and they plan to create a blog about the things they are creating.

 Welcome to Lisa Malmarowski, Pam Mehnert, and Flying Squirrel Milwaukee!