We Are Closing – Thank You for 10 Years of Collaboration

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:waving_hand: Hello

After much reflection, we’re announcing that We Are Open Co-op will close on May 1, 2026, marking the end of a decade of collaboration and cooperation.

You can read all about it in our blog post, in which we also share how we’re archiving our work and ways to stay in touch.

We’ll be closing down our co-op email accounts, so to stay in touch please use:

We’ve enjoyed meeting many of you over the years and hope to work with you again someday :slight_smile:

Warmly,

Doug (Laura and John say hi)

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Sorry to hear this, WAO.coop.

this year has felt strenuous. We’ve felt like a lot of people have been struggling.

Yes. We’re witnessing this too.

Reading back from that post to this one from Laura, Solidarity for Freelancers in 2026 :

  1. Collaboration over Competition
  2. Networking over Not Working
  3. Solidarity over Solitude

Well-coined. Hope you don’t mind if we at Sepheo co-opt these principles? They express our mission well.

And more than that, our mission also explicitly aims to pave the freelancer → collective → cooperative route that WAO and other coops have taken – and perhaps soften the reverse route as well.

I think our people have spoken on this before, but see the points above… we’re surviving but not exactly thriving yet. We have people, some networking, lots of not-working!

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Yes, absolutely. Please do use our stuff!

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Thanks for sharing this news Doug, it’s sad to hear you’re closing shop but good to know you’re all moving on to exciting things.

I remember chatting to you and Laura over a meal at my first CoTech gathering in Wortley Hall in 2017. I immediately knew I was in the right place and with my kind of people. WAO’s high quality work, great writing and speaking and stylish design has been a constant source of inspiration to me.

Thanks for all the energy and enthusiasm you’ve all put into the network over the years, it’s been a privilege for us at Go Free Range to work alongside you.

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Thanks for the kind words @chrislowis! We need to figure out what we’re doing next in terms of our individual involvement with the co-op sector more generally, but we’re still the same people with the same values :sign_of_the_horns:

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Thank you so much for being around! You’ve really helped us over the years and I hope we stay in touch

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Thanks @KingMob appreciate you saying so :slight_smile:

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