Jarret Alan Schlaff is cultivator, engineer, and organizer (CEO) of Pingree Detroit, a worker-owned, community-based manufacturing company co-founded in January 2015. In Pingree’s Detroit workshop, Detroiters and U.S. veterans are paid a living wage to handcraft bags, urban utility boots, and accessories using luxury-grade leather upcycled from the American auto industry.
Listen to Jarret Schlaff on the Make Meaning podcast with Lynne Golodner
About Jarret, CEO Pingree Detroit
Jarret Schlaff lives on Detroit’s eastside in the Charlevoix Villages community and is committed to fostering neighborhood resilience and developing opportunities for sustainable, community driven job creation accessible to all.
Since 2007, he has launched four separate nonprofit projects and organizations currently making an impact in the youth mentorship, environmental justice and food access arenas across Metro Detroit. He has 10 years’ experience in management and personal, professional and organizational development. Jarret was named a Global Leadership Fellow by the Hesselbein Leadership Institute in 2010, Campus 2 Congress Fellow with the Bard Center for Environmental Policy in 2012, was one of 90 leaders selected from across the U.S. as a 2015 Young American Leadership Fellow with Harvard Business School, named an Emerging Leader by the Detroit Chamber of Commerce in 2015, was a finalist at the 2016 Regional Detroit Chamber of Commerce Entrepreneurship “Detroit Pitch” Competition, and was named 20/20 Detroit Person of the week in November 2017.
Jarret Schlaff was born and raised in Waterford, MI and has lived in Detroit since 2010. He received a B.A. in Public Administration and Policy, with a minor in Business, from Oakland University.