Cristin Cooper: Coop’s Soups, Oliney, Maryland

Coop’s Soups, founded by Cristin Cooper, is a community-centered social enterprise that addresses loneliness and food insecurity through shared food and relationship building. What began in 2018 as a dinner church in Cristin’s Maryland apartment has grown into a farmer’s-market–based soup business rooted in ministry, hospitality, and mutual care. Coop’s Soups offers vegan, gluten-free soups made with locally sourced vegetables, using a “soup to share” model in which every batch is intentionally prepared with donation in mind—so that sales sustain the enterprise and soup is specifically made to be donated. Through intentional labeling, monthly communal cooking gatherings, and the revival of a neighborhood garden, the project uses food as a catalyst for connection, dignity, and community resilience.