Welcome to the People First Economy Podcast, a podcast where we talk to business leaders and movement builders to learn more about how they are building a people first economy.  This edition of the PFE Podcast comes to you in part by our Move Your Money Campaign, a campaign we created to highlight the importance of our local financial institutions and how they contribute to an equitable and sustainable economy. Joining Emmanuel Ibarra, host & producer of the PFE Podcast, on this episode is Manny Barragan, AVP Client & Treasury Associate at Beneficial State Bank (BSB). BSB is a Cer ..read more

Welcome to the People First Economy Podcast, a podcast where we talk with business leaders and movement builders who are building a people first economy. In this episode of the People First Economy Podcast you’ll hear part 2 of our Sacred Economy conversation, hosted again by the PFE Director of Community Engagement, Kathleen Roark. In part 1, Kathleen spoke with Rabbi David about the research he conducted through a multi-faith lens to the commonality within the various religious perspectives to learn how to participate in and build up a Sacred Economy. In Part 2, you’ll hear Kathleen and Kevi ..read more

Welcome to the People First Economy Podcast, a podcast where we talk with business leaders and movement builders who are building a people-first economy. This episode of the PFE Podcast comes to you as part of Gift Local, Gift Good, a campaign designed to be a resource to our members and our audiences to help them shop locally and shop sustainably. In this episode, you'll hear our host, Emmanuel Ibarra, interview Ron Knox about a report titled 'Boxed Out' which covers the history of how large companies ( Walmart/Amazon/Kroger/Dollar General, etc) have exerted their power to dominate markets un ..read more

Welcome to Season 2 Episode 7 of the People First Economy Podcast, a podcast where we talk to business leaders and movement builders who are leading the charge in building a people first economy. This episode is part of our Nourish Our Community campaign, an initiative we started last year to highlight the importance of our local food system. Joining Emmanuel Ibarra (Good For Michigan - Impact Manager) on the podcast is Javier Olvera from Supermercado Mexico and Elissa Sangali from Northern Initiatives.  In this episode you hear Javier’s story behind Supermercado Mexico, how he stepped aw ..read more

Welcome to Episode 6 of Season 2 of the People First Economy Podcast! This episode covers a program developed by B Lab US & Canada called the LEVEL Program, a program created to for businesses that are led by people of color who identify as women. This program provides participating businesses the resources needed to: measure and improve their impact, tell their story, adopt legal stakeholder governance, and certify as a B Corp. Our Program Director, Alice Jasper (PFE Program Director) recorded this conversation with Andy Fyfe (Director of Equitable Growth at B Lab US & Canada) and Cee ..read more

Welcome to Episode 5 of Season 2 of the People First Economy Podcast: a podcast that brings insight into how our business community and our partners are all working towards building and participating in a People First Economy. In this episode of the podcast, you’ll hear our two directors here at PFE, Kathleen Roark and Alice Jasper, talk about about the meaning of PLACE and place-based movements (ie. localism, which has a focus of building stronger local communities, organizations, and over all a stronger local economy) and how it ties into the broader sustainability movement which aims to enh ..read more

Welcome to Episode 4 of Season 2 of the People First Economy Podcast! In this episode, you'll hear Rabbi David J.B. Krishef, from the Congregation Ahavas Israel in Grand Rapids, Michigan, interviewed by Kathleen Roark, Director of Engagement at PFE, to talk about the Sacred Economy concept. This concept was researched by Rabbi David through a multi-faith lens when he wanted to find the commonality within the various religious perspectives on how to participate in and build a Sacred Economy. Rabbi David writes the popular “Ethics and Religion Talk” column for therapidian.com and the Grand Rapid ..read more

Welcome to episode 3 (of season 2) of the People First Economy Podcast! Our program director at PFE, Alice Jasper, interviewed Nathan Stuck, of B Local Georgia and Ad Victoriam Solutions, about his work with B Academics and growing the B Corp Movement. B-Academics is a global network of educators and researchers who work to accelerate the global sustainable business movement. This network studies this movement and fosters collaborations between members of academic institutions and organizations that strive to achieve the B Corporation Certification. Nathan is working to bring this global movem ..read more

Welcome to Episode 2 (Season 2) of the People First Economy Podcast ! In this episode you’ll hear a conversation between our host, Emmanuel Ibarra, and two founders from Mallowfields, Jessa Challa and Carla Siler-Maddalena. Mallowfields is an employee-owned software engineering company based in Grand Rapids, Michigan, who’ve just achieved their B Corp Certification. Listen to this podcast to some insight into why/how they achieved their B Corp status and how they’ve built out their business. Check out Mallowfields at mallowfields.com to learn more ! This podcast is brought to you by Northern I ..read more

Welcome to Season 2 of the People First Economy Podcast ! On this first episode of our new season, Emmanuel sits down with the president of People First Economy, Hanna Schulze, to talk about the big changes that have taken place at the organization over the past two-ish years and about what we have in store for this next year in 2022. You'll also get to know more about Hanna, her history with PFE and her outlook on life !  ------------------------------------------------ If you're interested in jumping on the podcast to talk about how you're building a people first economy, connect with ..read more