Meet Howard Brodsky
Social Entrepreneur | Shared Ownership Visionary
Meet Howard Brodsky
Social Entrepreneur | Shared Ownership Visionary
Howard speaks with Van Ton-Quinlivan, CEO of Futuro Health, on her podcast Workforce Rx.
Howard Brodsky is the Co-founder, Chairman, and Co-CEO of CCA Global Partners. In the 38 years of his leadership, CCA Global Partners has grown into 15 companies serving over 1 million family businesses around the globe with $12 billion in annual revenue.
CCA Global ranks amongst one of the largest retail companies in America, and the fourteenth largest retail cooperative in the world according to the World Co-op Monitor. Howard has dedicated his life to building and sustaining family businesses around the world through the economic engine of CCA Global Partners.
Howard named chairperson of Co-op 20, a new G20 working group, holds first meeting.
Capitalism with a Conscience – People before Profit – Reducing Inequality
What surprises people the most about CCA Global and Howard is that while he is the co-founder, Chairman and co-CEO, he does not own a single share of the company. As a cooperative, CCA Global is owned by the members, the individual business owners operating their individual family businesses. The success of CCA Global Partners was never to be his singular success, but a force for good shared with all who are a part. Each member has a voice and the cooperative company has shared billions in profits back to its members.
A prolific entrepreneur and a recognized world leader of shared ownership business models.
Among his recognitions, Howard received the Rochdale Pioneers Award by the International Cooperative Alliance (ICA) in October 2019. Known as the "Nobel Prize of Cooperative Business,” Howard is the first American to receive the honor. The award is given out every two years to one individual from around the world.
Howard founded, and is chairman of, the nonprofit Cooperatives for a Better World (CFBW) to raise cooperative awareness around the globe. Through this he launched the first international marketing campaign for co-ops now adopted by 18 countries, translated into 8 languages, and reaching over half the world’s population. Howard also co-founded Start.coop with his son Greg Brodsky to inspire and fast track start-ups leveraging shared ownership business models. Through these organizations Howard leads a network of cooperative business leaders and influencers from different sectors of the economy and all corners of the world.
Furthermore, Howard lends his leadership to multiple organizations. Of note, he is the founder and chairman of the New Hampshire Better Business Bureau, and serves on the boards of the National Cooperative Business Association, SolutionHealth, the Institute for Cooperative Digital Economy, and Southern New Hampshire University – in the time of his board leadership, SNHU has grown from 2,800 students to over 135,000 learners making it the largest nonprofit provider of online higher education in the United States, and the university was listed at #12 on Fast Company magazine’s “World’s Fifty Most Innovative Companies” list and was the only university included.
Howard was born in Lawrence, Massachusetts and raised in Manchester, New Hampshire. Early adversity was a major catalyst for Howard, he lost his father when he was only thirteen years old, but his memory fueled a lifelong passion for and commitment to small business. Howard is a graduate of Wesleyan University. Howard has two sons, Jeff and Greg. His wife Joan is founder and director of the New Hampshire Dance Collaborative, and together they live in Manchester, New Hampshire.
“When you can create value for others, and have people rise up around you to create a better life for themselves, how do you measure that kind of impact? I made a choice to help change the lives of other people, and that is what I continue to do.”
- Howard Brodsky
CEO Gallery
Streets of Toronto, 2017.